In today’s world, you need to have a personal or professional website to be relevant online and find the partnerships and job opportunities you’re looking for.
But there are thousands of websites that make huge design errors that are just eyesores and sink the professional quality of the site. Knowing these common errors will help you avoid making the same mistakes with your own site so you can present yourself in the best way possible online.
Here are six of the biggest design mistakes a website can make.
1. Too many details
As you can see in this website, having too much information on a page — whether text, graphics, or both — makes it impossible to find what you’re looking for. It also increases the download time for the site and looks unprofessional. On your own website, remember that less is more.
2. Graphics aren’t sized to the fit the website
We’ve all seen sites where the images are too large for the page and get cut off or are horribly pixelated. Always preview your posts and resize and rearrange the images so they look good on the actual webpage.
3. Tiled background
Customizing a website leaves you with a lot of options. When you’re adding a custom background, don’t make the mistake this website did by simply tiling an image that doesn’t fit the page.
4. Bright, overwhelming backgrounds
A lot can go wrong with the background on a website, from having light text on a light background which makes all the content hard to read, to going as far as this website does and having moving, multicolored, and just tacky looking graphics for the website’s base.
5. Audio that plays automatically
Having audio on a website is fine … if the visitor gets to decide when it’s played. Including ads that play video and audio automatically, or including a blaring robotic voice like this website has, is annoying to most visitors and won’t encourage them to stay very long.
6. Moving graphics
This website is an extreme example of what’s wrong with having moving images on a webpage.
How to fix these problems
Whether you notice some of these problems on your own site, or are looking to spruce up an old site or build a new one, consulting a professional designer is always a good idea. There is certainly a broad range of designers with various skills and prices in your area; by directing a new set of eyes to your website you’re helping your own online presence, improving the look of your site, and hiring a local artist.
