Building a new website provides an opportunity to try out new ideas, designs and more. But, it can also involve making some costly mistakes. Keep reading and the upHost team will tell you about the eight mistakes you need to avoid when building your new website…
1. Confusing brand message
Who is your website aimed at? How are you going to communicate with them? If you can’t answer these questions confidently before you start building your website, you could end up building a site that has a confusing brand message.
This is an important point. If you’re unable to clearly communicate what your brand is about – and create a genuine connection with your target audience – your website simply isn’t going to perform.
To avoid this issue, make sure that your website’s copy is focused on the wants, needs, and pain points of your target customers.
Remember, it’s not about you, it’s about your customers!
2. No calls to action
Just as your website should have customer-focused copy throughout, it also needs to include bold, prominent calls to action (CTAs) that motivate your would-be customers to make a purchase or get in contact.
It’s an old copywriting adage that you shouldn’t just speak directly to your customers, but you should tell them what you want them to do, too.
So, ensure that you have calls to action that include motivating words like ‘Don’t miss out, buy now’.
Every page on your website – be it a landing page for a service, or an individual product page – should include a call to action.
You may also find that it’s worth experimenting with your CTAs, such as putting them in coloured buttons etc, as this can increase clicks.
3. Too cluttered
So far, we’ve been talking about the importance of including customer-focused copy and CTAs on your website.
However, it’s all too easy to go overboard and include too much info on your website.
Not only are cluttered, busy websites hard to navigate and read, they also tend to have terrible bounce rates – meaning people are arriving at your website, and then leaving within only a few seconds. As you can imagine, this wouldn’t be great for your business.
The key is to find a balance. You obviously want to get your brand message across, and let people know about your goods and services, but you don’t want to go overboard.
Here are three tips that’ll help you maintain that balance:
- Ensure there is plenty of white space. Keep large borders of white space around your blocks of text and images. This allows the viewer to more easily absorb the content on your website.
- Place your most important content at the top of the page. Not everyone is going to scroll to the bottom of every one of your website’s pages – so place the info you really want them to see at the top!
- Keep the navigation simple. Visitors to your website won’t want to navigate endless sub-categories and drop down menus. Keep your website’s navigation simple, and you’ll have a much more successful website.
4. Not mobile optimised
It’s likely that when you’re designing and building your website, you’re going to be doing so on a desktop.
As such, it’s all too easy to overlook how your website looks on mobile devices.
All too often, we see wonderful-looking websites – which when scaled down to mobile – simply don’t function well or look good.
It’s an easy trap to fall into.
Plus, given that approximately 54.4% of global website traffic comes from mobile users, you’ll lose out on precious custom if your website isn’t optimised to create a pleasing and functional mobile experience.
So, ensure you choose a website developer that is able to build you a website that looks awesome across both desktop and mobile…
5. Not securing your website
Do you know what an SSL certificate is? If not, you need to familiarise yourself with them asap!
SSL certificates are a type of digital certificate that authenticates a website’s identity and puts in place an encrypted connection.
In plain English, an SSL certificate tells web users and search engines alike that your website is safe and secure.
Ensuring that your website has an SSL certificate is more important than ever. Why? Because web browsers like Google Chrome now flag up websites without SSL certificates, presenting would-be visitors with an alarming red warning sign. Seeing this, very few people will choose to proceed to your site.
So, without an SSL certificate, you could find yourself losing tons of valuable web traffic.
What’s more, search engines like Google are now making SSL certificates an essential ranking factor. Without one, you could find your website losing important keyword rankings and search engine visibility.
6. Hard to find contact info
Although shopping online is more popular than ever, many consumers still want to be able to speak to a human being before placing an order.
This is especially true if you’re selling ‘big ticket’ items that have a high price tag.
Consider also that 44% of visitors will leave a website if they can’t find contact information.
Adding an easy-to-find contact page on your website will not only increase the number of calls and enquiries you get – and thus sales, but it makes your business look more transparent and trustworthy.
Note – there is one caveat to this advice. If you’re going to add a contact page to your website, make sure you respond to enquiries in a timely fashion. Responsiveness will help to further build trust with your would-be customers.
7. Lack of search engine optimisation
These days, search engines like Google have multiple ranking factors that they look for in websites.
These vary from things like page load times, the quality of content that’s published on a website, mobile optimisation, internal linking structure, good UX and much more.
All too often, however, people completely overlook these things when they’re building their new website.
The result is typically a fantastic-looking website, but one which will perform poorly in terms of search engine visibility.
If you’re not sure what you should be optimising for whilst building your website, it’s helpful to speak to a company like upHost. When we build websites, we not only ensure they look amazing but that they perform really well from a search engine optimisation perspective too.
8. Failure to check compatibility with browsers
Whilst Google Chrome is the leading web browser in the world with a market share of 65%, that still leaves a lot of other browsers potentially being used by your target customers.
It’s worth bearing in mind that many computers and other devices come with other browsers pre-installed and set as the default browser. Think of Apple devices which come with the Safari browser. Or Microsoft devices which come with Edge.
Plus, you may find that the majority of your users are using a particular browser, depending on what you sell or the industry you work in. For example, if you sell services to other businesses, the chances are that your customers will be working on Microsoft-based PCs using the Edge browser.
So, it’s important that you check that your website looks good – and functions correctly – across all the most popular browsers.
Want a website that works? Then speak to upHost
If you want a new website for your business that not only looks fantastic, but functions perfectly, then speak to upHost today.
We offer complete website packages from only £34.99 per month, with content included, imagery included, unlimited updates, UK-based support, the ability to cancel anytime and more.
Choose upHost to build your new website today
For more WordPress website and hosting advice, read the upHost blog…
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