Top 7 Web Design mistakes Small Businesses make

We are living in a digital age and small businesses can ill-afford to ignore the over-powering impact internet has on marketing strategies. Any small business that does not have a well-structured, imaginatively designed and functional website risks the possibility of losing numerous potential customers.

Many small businesses have imperfectly designed websites because they fail to realize the importance of web presence. They do not entrust the job of web designing to competent professional web designers. It may be worthwhile to know some of the seven common web design mistakes that small businesses commit.

1. Flash lets web designers to create appealing elements like video, audio and animations. Despite the wonders of Flash, constructing an entire website overly using Flash can be self-defeating. Please know that visitors who are impatiently searching for relevant information will often find excessive Flash design annoying.

2. Many websites give little importance to navigation and so creating a frustrating experience for visitors. If customers cannot find information quickly, they will exit the site thinking your business will be as disorganized as your website.

3. Color and contrast do not receive the priority they deserve. If your website text does not have sufficient contrast in relation to its background, visitors will find reading your content difficult – more so, those suffering from poor vision or color-blindness.

4. Sadly, a large number of small businesses overload their site with dense text and graphics instead of establishing a proper visual content hierarchy so that visitors can quickly gather relevant information. Besides, a website that is heavy with graphics, also takes a longer time to load. Please bear in mind potential customers that visit a website are invariably impatient.

5. Many small businesses tend to cram as much information as possible making the web pages cluttered and reader-unfriendly. A cluttered website will also impede traffic because visitors will avoid re-visiting the site. This will result in poor traffic, higher bounce rate and a low Page Rank.

6. Website not getting promptly updated with the latest information about business happenings, products and services. This sends a wrong signal you are no longer in business or you are not ahead of the competition. Besides, visitors may resent reading content that is stale.

7. Directionless targeting can be suicidal. The website becomes messy when it tries to satisfy every kind of visitor. There is need to focus on designing the website with the right target audience in mind and provide them best possible user experience. Trying to please too many may end up pleasing none.