How often do you visit a website that is so full of flash intros and graphics that it makes it difficult to find what you came to the site for in the first place?
Unfortunately with the way the internet is going, this seems to becoming more and more the norm. Companies spend thousands of dollars creating a website that looks great, however sometimes overlook some of the more basic mechanics of a site.
What we need to be aware of is that there is a growing market of internet users that are not as web savy as those of us that have been introduced to the internet at a young age. This generation of web users that have recently begun to use the internet (Â more because they have to now, than by choice) are going to use sites that have a clear purpose, simple navigation and do what they promise with a minimum of stress involved.
Links are Blue and Underlined
I am not sure if many of you remember this, because links seem to be morphing into all kinds of colours, and formats. However this can be a key component of an easy to navigate site. Look at the most popular sites in the world. www.google.com, and www.ebay.com are good examples of this. Do you think these guys don’t know what works? When catering to a wide audience it is the simple things that count, don’t confuse your visitors a link is a link and its blue and underlined.
Not everyone has Broadband
The excuse nowadays for making a flash front page that takes ten minutes to load with a modem is that nearly everyone has broadband. Well it may be the case that more and more people do have broadband, but it is pointless pissing off potential visitors or customers to your site based on that assumption. A fast loading site has always been important and the less fancy graphics and flash movies that are playing the better.
Respond to Contact Messages
If someone sends you a message via a contact us page on your site, respond to them (promptly!) otherwise don’t have a contact us page on your site – this would save everyone a lot of grief. Nowadays I am almost surprised if I get a response to a query that I make via a website.
Keep Forms Simple
Only ask for the bare requirements in any signup forms that your site has, otherwise you are just going to scare people off because many of them (myself included) can’t be bothered spending 20 minutes registering to be able to login in to your site. Email , Password and lets go. Get the other info off them later.
Help Files – FAQ?
Some people believe it or not don’t now what FAQs means, so just call it help! once again I direct you to www.ebay.com for an example of an extremely popular website that caters to a wide profile of web users.