{"id":8787,"date":"2014-10-06T15:20:24","date_gmt":"2014-10-06T15:20:24","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/owdt.wpengine.com\/?p=8787"},"modified":"2026-02-06T15:51:43","modified_gmt":"2026-02-06T21:51:43","slug":"mistakes-that-will-kill-your-website","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/owdt.com\/news\/mistakes-that-will-kill-your-website\/","title":{"rendered":"Mistakes that will ‘kill’ your website"},"content":{"rendered":"

[vc_row][vc_column][vc_column_text]<\/p>\n

Annoying pop-up ads turn off viewers<\/h4>\n

In previous blog posts I’ve discussed features that are integral to outstanding, high conversion rate websites. These encompass things like high quality design, seamless navigation, strong copywriting, web-specialized photography, video and professional branding.<\/p>\n

Even if all these factors are in alignment, however, viewers will be repelled if you make the following mistakes–<\/h4>\n

Problem:<\/strong>\u00a0 A website that tries to be all things to all people. Presentation of products and services is muddled.
\nSolution:<\/strong>\u00a0 Include easily understood, direct headlines and taglines. Clearly define\/highlight a call to action, whether it be to watch a video or buy a product. If you are a large company with a broad range of offerings, develop sister websites that speak individually to your different customer bases.<\/p>\n

Problem:<\/strong> An ‘About Us’ page full of jargon or over inclusion of SEO terms. Search engines have sophisticated algorithms that penalize sites using this outdated tactic of writing content for ‘bots\/crawlers.’
\nSolution:<\/strong> Speak in clear, concise language that non-experts (i.e., most of your customers) can easily understand.<\/p>\n

Problem:<\/strong> Annoying pop-up ads that turn off viewers.
\nSolution:<\/strong> Don’t use them! Employ other strategies to gain email or other subscribers. Compelling content is the best approach, not offensive pop-ups.<\/p>\n

Problem:<\/strong> Invasive music and\/or talking head videos that launch immediately when customers access your site.
\nSolution:<\/strong> Viewers, especially in work settings, experience this as an aggressive sales tactic. Let visitors chose whether to play your multimedia content; don’t push it down their throats.<\/p>\n

Problem:<\/strong> Generic people doing generic, transparently fake, ‘business things.’
\nSolution:<\/strong> As recommended in my last blog, invest in a professional photographer to take pictures of your real employees on site.<\/p>\n

Problem:<\/strong> Internet links are slow to load, take viewers to irrelevant pages or nowhere at all.
\nSolution:<\/strong> Only include links that will take viewers where they want to go.<\/p>\n

Problem:<\/strong> An old (or new) website that lacks social media links. People want to share interesting content from your site but can’t.
\nSolution:<\/strong> Update your website! Why lose the business exposure, improved search engine rankings, and lead generation opportunities that social media links provide?<\/p>\n

Problem:<\/strong> People would like to know more about you or gain your advice on their challenges, but can’t because you have no blog.
\nSolution:<\/strong> Creating a blog requires time, but little or no cost. Addressing people’s issues and providing information about your industry\/profession will improve your search engine rankings and increase your conversion rate.<\/p>\n

Problem:<\/strong> Your call to action promises something it doesn’t deliver. For example, you post a 25% off coupon but when users click it, the terms of use are so restrictive that only a small number of them can redeem it.
\nSolution:<\/strong> If you inadvertently do this, apologize immediately and establish an offer that matches your original promise. Not doing so will undermine your reputation and lower your conversion rate.<\/p>\n

Problem<\/strong>: Designers have created stunning websites using flash, but search engines can’t read it!
\nSolution:<\/strong> Simply avoid Flash if you want to do business on the Internet.[\/vc_column_text][\/vc_column][\/vc_row]<\/p>\n<\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In previous blog posts I’ve discussed features that are integral to outstanding, high conversion rate websites. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":9,"featured_media":27159,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[30],"tags":[361,362],"class_list":["post-8787","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news","tag-seo-news","tag-web-design-news"],"acf":[],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/owdt.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8787","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/owdt.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/owdt.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/owdt.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/9"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/owdt.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8787"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/owdt.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8787\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/owdt.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/27159"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/owdt.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8787"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/owdt.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8787"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/owdt.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8787"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}