In the cyberspace, your website is what presents you. It is your corporate identity on the internet. Something that is accessible to your audience round the clock. Thus, it becomes imperative that you design it thus, so as your customers benefit and become regular visitors.
Over the decades, internet has become the most popular destination for customers looking to research their options. As the audience becomes more tech- savvy, their expectations of the website increases and they become less tolerant of the hurdles that they encounter.
So, in order to survive in this era of technological advancements and cater successfully to your target audience, it deems necessary that you understand the likes and dislikes of your customers and design your website accordingly.
Here are some key, but often overlooked points that can quickly turn off visitors:
Lack of Contact Information
A commercial website should essentially carry relevant contact details like company’s name, postal address along with a map, if the operation has a storefront, and contact phone number. Visitors on these website are on the lookout for these details to purchase products or services. When they fail to locate these easily, they most likely leave and don’t return back.
Registration Needed for Basic Information
Information about the company’s services and offerings should be quickly and easily attainable. Most of the visitors who leave the website have this common complaint that they did not have access to the basic information about the company.
Site Search Tool Failure
Visitors to a website often have specific questions in mind. The site should allow them to search for the information that they seek. Value the time and interest of your visitors and make them jump straight to the information that they need instead of serving them what you like. Most visitors don’t wait to browse through heaps of data to get to their interests, they prefer to leave the site altogether.
Dead Links
Dead links are an image of poor maintenance and lack of investment by the company in the website. The site loses credibility and visitors lose their trust in the organization. Make sure you have all the links of your site working fine and in tune with the destination it links to.
Pop-ups
A new window can be an effective tool; however it should be used sparingly due to its connotations with hard sells and spam. Nowadays many web browsers block pop-ups. As a consequence opening new windows everytime may eventually not be seen at all by the visitors.
Requires installation of extra software to view the site
A website need not cater to the lowest common browser abilities, but it should also not assume that all visitors are surfing on the latest and most up-to-date browser. Most people do not take the pain of installing new software just to view the website. They prefer going on to some other website more. Get your website designed by professionals who know how to make it accessible to the most people.
Slow-loading Pages
A good website design allows for quick and painless load of its pages, especially the splash, or front, page that creates the initial impression of the website. Websites that make visitors wait top the charts of the hate-list.
Poor language
One of the prime but mostly overlooked turning off point is the spelling and grammar mistakes in website content. Even though the website’s prime focus may be its products or services, but the language that is used in the content is critical to build the credibility quotient. The errors shout a lack of attention to detail that prospective customers assume carries over to all aspects of a business.
Inability to Go Back
This is a primary issue that triggers customer frustration. The inability to easily return to a prior page or the main site just irritates them and makes them leave faster than anything else. Lack of clear and intuitive navigation could take toll on the consumer traffic and consequently the business
Out of Date Information
An outdated copyright date or an expired offering calls all the information on a website into question as to its correctness. Make sure to load your website with current and up-to-date information so that the visitors get a hint of your constant vigilance.
Maneet Puri is the Managing Director of LeXolution IT Services, a leading company offering web solutions
and KPO services to its offshore clients. Maneet has over 10 years of experience in implementing various knowledge driven process for his clients located overseas. He also offers expert advice on various web based applications and software services through his blog popularly known as www.lexolution.in/blog
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