Your website can fail even before you start writing a single line of code – in fact 95% of websites will never achieve a page 1 or page 2 listing in search engines for their desired terms. Planning your website correctly is actually more important that writing it. Here are the top 10 planning mistakes to avoid:
(For resources supporting this article please see my blog: Top 60 Web Design Mistakes of 2009)
1 – No Keyword Research – Attempting to write a website without keyword research is effectively going blind. Good keyword research usually reveals many surprises and potential niche keywords that could be used to drive traffic. Poor use of keywords is the number 1 reason for website failure and it’s totally avoidable through the use of keyword research tools – many of which are free to use.
2 – No Competitor Research – Not checking out your competitors could prove costly in terms of wasted time/money – without competitor research you won’t be able to tell weather your page 1 competitors have a few or thousands of backlinks, and you wont be able tell how many content rich pages their websites have. Competitive research will also help you determine any areas you could improve as far as page planning is concerned. Moneysupermarket.com who usually rank no1 for ‘mortgage’ and have over 300 thousand backlinks & thousands of pages would hence cost a fortune to outrank
3 – Nothing Special to Offer – doing exactly the same thing as your competitors is likely to make you blend into the abyss of failed or failing websites. Quality web design is all about being different – hence unless you spend some time planning to be better than your competitors then you are likely to fail. Think about better content, better visitor experience, easier navigation, special offers – anything that distances you away from the average – If you make the effort so will your visitor
4 – Lack of Quality Content – many people believe that just writing a website with a dozen or so pages is the recipe for website success – this simply is not true for most websites. If you have done your competitor research then you will know how many pages containing keyword relevant content your competitor’s website has. Lack of planning for high quality keyword rich content will result in poor visitor experience, lower ranking & poor conversion rates.
5 – No Page Planning – lack of page planning will inevitably result in lower search engine ranking. Insure that you use well researched keywords in: page names, directory names, titles, descriptions, headings, footers, menu text, link text & your paragraphs. Your menus should be easy to follow and your important headings should be high up the page. Keep your page layouts consistent and if you are writing a large website use scripting language such as ASP or PHP. Wherever possible build CMS so pages can be added or removed easily.
6 – No Plan for Marketing – if your aim is to write a website which will drive business through web traffic and you haven’t considered how this traffic will magically appear then you haven’t made a marketing plan. Depending how competitive your industry is – you may need to build 10s, 100s or 1000s of backlinks using web partners, directories & blogs. This may take hours/week/years hence you will need a plan with timescales.
7 – Cheap Hosting Overseas – unless your site is geared more to international traffic rather than local or national then hosting overseas is a bad idea. Cheap overseas hosting will lead to longer load times & will affect your ranking in search engines. Plan to host your website in your home country – use a fast well recommended hosting service with 24/7 support – be sure to check the hosts IP address to insure the servers really are based where the host claims they are. Many search engines today use Geo Targeting in some manner.
8 – Poor Colour Choice – your website is not the place to express yourself – you have less than 3 seconds to make your first impression – hence choose a colour scheme that is perfect for your website – try colour matching your photos/logos/artwork & avoid drab/luminous colours. Take care when designing websites geared for other countries as certain colours have cultural significance & insure that your colours are web safe. Poor planning in this area is will make your website look amateur.
9 – Strange Fonts – consider that not all of us have perfect vision hence try not to make your visitors strain to read your content – use basic fonts such as Helvetica or Arial. Poor use of fonts is a certain way of your website becoming a victim of the back button. There are nor laws in place in a few countries that govern the use of text within websites – I haven’t heard of anyone being sued yet, but I’m sure someone will tell me otherwise.
10 – Website Name & Suffix – choose a domain that contains your keywords & select the correct domain suffix (top level domain) – whilst using your keywords in your domain is not essential, it helps with towards your page ranking. Choosing the wrong suffix will not help you achieve listings in the right territory. Common UK TLD’s:
.com – ecommerce or commercial website (UK &/or International)
.co.uk – uk corporate website
.net – large network website – often used by hosting companies.
.biz – use for B2B business
.org.uk – organisation, group or charity
.info – informational site .name – usually used for individuals
.name – For identity purposes of an individual or organization
.ltd.uk – UK ltd company
Web Design Services - Research Should Be Done On The Company
Tags: Web design, business, seo, web
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