One main principle of inbound marketing is to not annoy people. So why have we ran into countless websites that still have us banging our heads on our keyboards? Perhaps with the sheer excitement (or terror, depending on your personality) that comes with designing your own website, all of the user experience quirks that have driven you crazy over the years escape your mind. But be conscious of your mistakes because poor user experience can cause your website to turn into a graveyard (low visitor-to-lead conversions, poor organic search listing or just a bad reputation).
In light of this, Lifeblood is here to compile a list of the 4 most tedious things we’ve all seen and experienced on websites. Treat this as a guide for what NOT to do.’
1) Not mobile-friendly
Last time I checked it is 2017 and even your kids now have mobile devices. We’ve all went to a website where we have to pinch zoom because words, pictures or buttons are way too small. To tackle this, Google made a major mobile algorithm update where if your website is like this, it will take a major hit on their ranking scale.
2) It takes forever to load
A couple weeks ago we wrote about the 5-Second Rule for Marketing. We talked about how our patients has a direct influence on our actions (no duh). According to a KISSmetrics report, 47% of consumers expect a web page to load in two seconds or less, and 40% abandon a website that takes more than three seconds to load. That means every one-second delay decreases customer satisfaction by about 16%. How can you do this? Page load time can be impacted by image size, code, videos and other factors.
3) It contains multimedia content that auto play
I’m here to navigate your site and would rather not hear about what Susan has to say. If someone’s enjoying what they thought was a silent browsing session and they’re bombarded with your theme song or a talking head on a video for which they didn’t press play (and they can’t find the stop button) what do you think they’re gonna do? – Peace out. If you really need to play a video for all users who come to your site, at least mute it for them.
4) Generic or cheesy stock photography everywhere
We all know that images attract more than text. So you go and start to find images for your website, you go browsing and … find this gem:
Wow you got some happy employees working for your company! Bad stock photos are generic at best, and ridiculous at worst. Images can help clarify but they can also give the wrong idea.
What website components drive you nuts? Share them in the comments session.
