Three Elements Repeat Visitors Don’t Want to See
There are the dos and don’ts of web design, then there are the annoying aspects of site designs that make you simply want to cringe. They are all around us, and even I have occasionally forgotten about my visitors, and have resorted to using any of these tactics of increasing conversion rates. No matter what type of site you run, even if it is a blog, you should try to avoid these practices, as they drive traffic away from your site, and will result in lower conversion rates in the long-term.
A Background: Why These Are Used
There’s absolutely nothing wrong with making a little money from the time you spend developing your site. However, what’s wrong is when you plaster large call-to-actions across your site, destroying the focus of your website. Instead of grabbing the attention of your visitors to purchase whatever you may be selling or promoting, these vibrant “graphics” do nothing more than entice visitors away from your site—many will never return.
Each visitor to your site matters. Even though many sites only see a 1% return rate on visitors who either leave comments or purchase/click through to multiple areas of your site, your visitors are the most important aspect of your site. Without any visitors, what will your site be? Just text and images on the web. We’ve seen how effective they can be—you need more that that to separate yourself from the millions of other pages on the web.
Subscription, Offer, and Promotional Forms
Those boxes appearing when you visit a website that invite you to take an action -signing up for a service, downloading an eBook, or subscribing to a blog are some of the most annoying types of call-to-actions. They may be effective, but generally only for first-time visitors or those who believe it must be filled out to gain access to the content.
If you happen to value the number of subscribers you have, compared to the opinion of your blog, then this technique will most certainly work for you. Using these forms is the same as telling someone watching television that they must click “next” between each commercial. It becomes even more annoying when multiple sites you enjoy visiting use the technique.
I wouldn’t mind seeing them once when visiting a site, but quite often, I can visit a site, reset the browser, and then see the form again, when I only wanted to read the latest post. The only way these forms work is if the site only displays the box once per IP address or if it can detect if someone subscribed already through the current IP address.
Flash… of Any Kind
Integrating Flash as a prominent part of a site is a sure-fire way for determining whether you want visitors to return to your site. Flash is a prominent part of the web for video and animation, but doesn’t belong on your blog. Blogs should focus on the content—there is no reason for a thirty-second animation with a separate page welcoming me to your site. It’s quite similar to the subscription forms. Once, it might be cool to see, but the second time around, not so much.
Although Flash can be used in innovative ways, much of this innovation has been reserved to the interactive sites offering static content, which results in a degraded experience when integrated into a text-heavy blog.
The main problem with Flash is that it is overused as it is, and may not present the best experience across all platforms. While on the subject of “flash,” having “blinking lights” around your site can detract the value of your content. Visitors will be focusing on the graphics, rather than what you have to offer.
A Hidden Search Form
Having the ability to search one’s site is the key. If you make it inaccessible, then it will be difficult for your users to find previous content. For example, someone may want to read more information about a particular subject, to only find there are no links to archive pages or categories.If this is the way your site is right now, the best solution to this problem is to make the search box more visible.
Until we can pinpoint specific content without browsing through archives, tags, and categories, we’ll still need to integrate a search field and other methods into the designs of our blogs.
Conclusion
While these tips may have been on the basic side, they are essential in your design, as you shouldn’t be including unnecessary elements or leaving out elements that should be included. Testing is also extremely important, as you’ll be able to determine what works for your site and what doesn’t—effectiveness is key.
