5 Common Website Mistakes to Avoid

Standing out online is imperative for your small business, and your website plays a significant factor in this. Yet, so many small business owners put little emphasis on its importance and figure having a bad website is better than having none. 

This is probably one of the biggest mistakes any small business owner can make. With over 80% of consumers taking to the internet to find goods and services, if your website is poorly designed or not working as it needs to, you are handing your competitors free customers! Another common misconception is that some of the most common errors only do SEO. When, in fact, they are primarily about your website users. Search engine providers such as Google focus on this too – meaning it is not all about SEO. Ensuring your site works for your users is rewarded by search engines for putting users as the primary focus. 

This blog will give you some of the most common website mistakes that we come across here at E2E. Issues that will prevent your website from standing out online and frustrate potential customers. 

Your Website Isn’t Mobile-Friendly 

Official figures show that over 50% of internet activity is completed on mobile devices, but for some websites, this can be as high as 90%! If your website does not show correctly on varying sizes and styles of devices, you will be frustrating potential customers before they even make contact. 

Mobile-friendly web design, or as it is also known, responsive website design , is the process of ensuring that your website is accessible and usable on as many device sizes as possible. Quick tip to remember, even if it looks good and functions on a desktop device or laptop, it does not mean it will work on a mobile or tablet device. 

Website Loading Times

Too many website owners think of website loading times as just an “SEO issue”, which is a big mistake. Website loading times affect SEO, but more importantly, they affect your website users. Think about the last time you used a website. Did it load quickly? Or were you left with a white screen? Most people will only give your website a few seconds to load before clicking away and looking for an alternative. 

There are a lot of factors that can affect this, such as  website images , poor quality hosting and even the design itself and how it renders on devices. To avoid losing potential customers and hampering any SEO efforts, ensure that your website loads as quickly as possible and presents all aspects of your design to the user within a few seconds.

Focusing Too Hard On Social Media 

Two common website mistakes that we come across here at E2E with social media are:

1. Social links being the sole focus: Diverting website visitors away from your website to your social channels before they have even had the chance to interact with your website. 
2. Using social platforms for contact methods: Limiting how people can contact you. 

Social media is a very potent tool for small businesses, don’t get us wrong, but it should NEVER be the primary focus of your business marketing. Social platforms are a business at the end of the day and there to make money, so most business owners’ organic reach is almost zero. Most importantly, you don’t own it – it could close tomorrow, and you have zero control over that. 

Your website should always have ways to contact you on these contact forms, clickable telephone numbers, and email addresses as a bare minimum. Plus, believe it or not, not everyone on the planet is on social media – honestly! Diverting them to a platform they are not on to find out more or contact you means they will never be able to do so, meaning again, you are handing your competition the edge. 

Not Securing Your Website

Not securing your website could not only put website visitors off but could also land you in trouble with the law! Simple steps such as having an SSL certificate on your website and installing a firewall are straightforward to do – and will offer a layer of protection for your website and its visitors. 

SSL is probably one of the most critical hosting factors you need to implement. As browsers such as Google Chrome, Edge and Firefox all now will not show your website to a user and display a warning screen if your site does not have one or they deem it to be insecure. This means the end-user will not see any part of your website and will be advised to click away “back to safety” instead of viewing your website. 

Unclear Content & Media

Simply adding the industry, you work to to the top of your page, and a few stock images will not clarify what you do. Think of plumbers; there are varying types of plumbers and an even more varied list of services that they will offer. You can save your website visitors and yourself a lot of time by clarifying what services you provide on your website. This helps website visitors know what you offer in advance of any contact and helps your website rank in search engines for relating terms, for example, bathroom fitter or boiler fitter. 

Images are another common issue for websites: stock images or poor quality ones. Ensuring that they relate to your business and are of a higher spec can make all the difference. Humans are very visual creatures – and can base their decisions entirely on how something looks over anything else! 

Website Mistakes Summary

There we have our top 5 common website mistakes to avoid! It can be easy to think just having an online presence, no matter how basic, will serve your business well. In truth, if you are in a low competition niche – maybe, but these days there is no such thing as low competition!

Here at E2E, we are experts in small businesses and how they operate and here to take the strain from your shoulders when it comes to getting an online presence that works for you. We are a team of dedicated small business specialists who know precisely what it takes and have the tools, the skills and the passion for helping your business succeed online.