How Do I Know if I Need a New Website?
Indicators of Poor Website Design, Part 1
by Eric Peterson 12/16/2010
With so many people now researching potential purchases and services online, a website is often a businesses first and sometimes only opportunity to make a first impression.
So, the first thing for any website, is it must be able to be found.
- Your website should pull up in search engine results when people type in some word or phrase that relates to your product or service. Not just if they type in the name of your website or business.
- Your site should pull up organically. In other words, you want your site to pull up all by itself. Not just in a directory of other businesses like yours. When you pull up in a directory alone, you immediately have competition, and there's no certainty that the searcher will choose your business.
Many websites out there are so poorly designed that there is almost no chance that they will ever pull up. Search engines are looking for food to feed their results. Things like page titles, descriptions, keywords, and of course, content. Visual design is only a part of things. You can have the most attractive, impelling site on the world wide web, but if there isn't any food for the search engines, nobody is going to find it. Your beautiful design will go unnoticed!
Here are some indicators of poor website design...