Top 10 Website No-Nos’

Here are my top 10 website no-nos’…

#1
Spam in any way shape or form..
You are headed down a dark path. Your wasting your time and you are contributing to the trash that is out there and makes surfing more challenging and sometimes down right frustrating.. plus spamming keywords etc.. SEO 101.. Search Engines are on to you. Don’t do it! Etc, etc..

#2
Using a counter on their web pages
Come on.. this is almost 2010. Are people still using these things?

#3
No ‘Call to Action’
Every page should contain some sort of “call to action”… What do you want them to do after they’ve read that article or review?

#4
Having a confusing website structure..
Your visitors should not need to click around and search for what they are looking for for 10 minutes. Make it easy for them to understand where to go to find what they need. Keep an even theme throughout.

#5
Uneven, Nonsensical Navigation
Make it easy folks! And don’t change where your navigation sits and looks somewhere in the middle of your site.. Don’t confuse me; I’m very impatient.

#6
No pigging out.. keep it lean my friend for better health and loading.
Don’t load up your pages with big graphics, videos and other large files etc so that it takes 4 minutes to load on high speed cable.. and 3 hours on dial up! Pear those graphics down.. move things off the page and link to them separately, find alternatives. Just don’t do it.

#7
Content no one wants to link to..
Making it interesting and focus on link bait! It’s good for your visitors and it’s good to get natural inbounds! Create a conversation on the web… Think Web 2.0 people! Comments, Interactivity etc, etc..

#8
Flash or Javascript without content..
Well, I guess if you don’t care about getting search engine traffic on any keywords that’s fine. But lets face it, most of us do. The only time you might get away with this is if your site becomes so popular that everyone links to you anyway..

#9
Talking someone else’s language
Make sure you know your market and talk to them like they expect. Don’t talk Mozart to a Heavy Metal visitor in other words. And know what part of the buying or action cycle they are in so you know how to talk to them as well!

#10
Wearing to much glitter and eye makeup
Listen… people don’t need flashy graphics, bright, in your face colors in most cases.. they are looking for content and solutions to their problems and questions. Give them what they need and don’t distract them with non-sense.

If you have any more, I’d love to hear what they are!  There are certainly more… 

-Matt Levenhagen