5 Ways To Avoid Making Your Web Design Annoying

Websites have been around for a long time and it is likely you have seen every kind of site out there.  From the ones that consist entirely of articles and text, to those that look almost like a picture book.  Either way, we have come a long way from the basic one page layout that started the web design era.  Since we have of plethora of ad-on’s available, do you know where to stop? In other words, do you know how to not make your website annoying to those who visit it?

Here are a few tips that you can follow when designing your website, so you don’t over-do it.

• Poor navigation – imagine an encyclopedia without an index or contents page, it can be difficult to know which page or chapter you need or where it is.  The same applies to a website – if your visitors cannot find what they are looking for easily they will go elsewhere.  A good web design will be built around a logical and intuitive navigation.
• Font Size – Even though nowadays monitor sizes have become huge, and there are a lot of options to increase and decrease the viewable page size, you should not make your font too small.   These days the size also reflects the tone in which we talk, so the smaller the font the smaller the tone.  Likewise you don’t want to sound like you are yelling at your customers with an overly large font size.  You need to keep a medium size when using a font size.  Over doing or under doing a font size shows fault in web design.  Again, with the options available today in browsers, if the size is not fit for someone with vision problems, they can simply increase their size to view the page.
• Flash – time was flash was top of every one’s web design wish list.  Flash animation can give a website something unique and different, but it can also create a wealth of problems for your visitors.  Flash can slow down page speeds and even prevent a page from loading altogether – a sure fire way to have visitors clicking off and going elsewhere.
• Pop up’s – Who enjoys pop up’s?  Probably no one does, and it is one of the most annoying things on a site these days.  With all these new pop up blockers out, your pop ups most probably will not even make it to the customer to begin with.  Not only that, but they scare a lot of people, because pop up’s are associated with virus’ these days.  Use the space you have on your page to promote what you have to offer instead of using pop up’s, another sign of a bad web design.
• Adverts – monetizing a website through ads for other sites is popular, but even if you are an affiliate, it is bad form.  Ads not only affect your visitor experience, they can also have a negative impact on your SEO.  Packing every page with ads and banners not only looks bad but it is extremely annoying, especially if those ads are placed at random within the content visitors are trying to view.  Whilst ads are not a strict no-no, try to place them thoughtfully so they do not intrude on your visitors experience.

‘This article was written by Stephanie Wagner, a freelance author writing about technology, small business and investment.  She is not associated with Aplus but can recommend them for quality web design services.’