What makes you click the back button immediately? For me, it is cheesy music with no way to shut it off.

Signs of Webmaster Newbies

All of us have been “newbies” at one point in our webmastering lives.To make what we thought were impressive sites, we spent hours searching the free javascript sites, dhtml sites and so on for copy-and-paste scripts.

First timer’s sites are easily recognized with their smorgasboard of animated gifs, javascripts and other features. Unfortunately, this makes a site look amateur.

Creating an Amateur Image

You might have a brick and mortar business that’s been around for the last decade, with tons of satisfied customers.  On the Internet, however, your visitors do not know who you are.A professional online image will inspire trust.  When designing your website, here are some things to avoid so that your business does not look amateur or like a fly-by-night operation:

• Dark, heavy backgrounds with hard-to-read fonts - For a business website, it’s best to use a plain white background and black text so that your visitors can read it easily. Some first timers are tempted to have “fancy” backgrounds with different colored text. Not only is this hard to read, but if you have a product line, it is difficult to make pictures of your product line blend in with the background.
• Pages that are larger than the browser screen - There’s nothing more irritating that trying to read a web page that scrolls across the screen. The majority of web users use 1024 x 768 as their desktop resolution. Try to stay within those confines.
• Sound effects - Everyone has different tastes when it comes to music, but even if you discovered music that appeals to every single person alive, don’t make it automatically load on your site. With a music site, there are scripts that will allow the user to click “play” at his or her option. This goes with audio advertisements or other background sound effects — provide a way to pause the sound or shut it off.
• “Cool” effects - About 8 or 9 years ago, it was real “cool” to have a flash presentation on the index page. Almost everyone was doing this. This does not help establish your online reputation. Flash introductions involve a lot of effort to create and when it is all said and done, many look silly. These introductions can take a long time to load and generally, people will not view them. Page fading effects, animated images and scrolling text are things that beginners seem to think are cool. I added these types of things when I first started out, thinking it made me look talented. However, the cold, hard reality is that these effects are a turnoff and waste of time. I’ve seen some sites, designed by supposed design specialists, where the links scroll by really fast and you have to “aim and shoot” just to be able to click a link. Do not bother including these effects. People visiting your site are looking for specific information or products and are generally not looking to be impressed with the scripts you have embedded.
• No clear navigation scheme - Many people enter a website by the interior pages, not at the home page. You need to provide them a way to easily navigate through your site. Menus that are positioned on either the left or the top of the web page are the most popular and will be most familiar for your visitors. The key is that no matter where you place your menu, make sure that it is consistent throughout your site. A surefire indicator of an amateur web design is the absense of a navigation menu.
• No search feature - Particularly if you have a large product line that you are selling or if you have a content rich site, always include a search box to help your visitors. If you do not know how to do this, there are quality free services such as Google search.This creates a “user friendly” site and shows that you care about your visitor’s experience.
• “Secret” prices - If you’re selling products, include the price. Don’t try to force your visitor to go through the shopping cart process to find out what the cost will be — many of them won’t do it, anyway.
• Policies - An amateur site will not include privacy policies, terms of use and, when selling products or services, returns and shipping policies. In this vein, you should also provide contact information, particularly if you are selling products or services.
• Under construction pages - “Under construction” or “coming soon” pages are a surefire way to announce that you’re an amateur. Do not link to a page until it is completed. Add a link to your menu or sitemap at such time as the page is completed.
• No online shopping cart - If you are selling a product, provide a way for people to purchase your product online. When people are looking to buy something online, they usually intend to buy it immediately. For the most part, your potential buyer is not interested in spending the time mailing in a check or money order. Paypal is a good option if you don’t have a merchant account and if you’re selling digital products, services like Clickbank are worth considering.For people who already have a merchant account, there are free and quality shopping carts available, like Mals-e.com, which also givesyou the ability to offer an affiliate program.

What’s Your Top Gripe?

Newbie or pro, you can voice your opinion about what makes a stinking website at the NotGuru’s survey about poor website design.  If you’re looking for software, giveaways and other things to help your fledgling online business, the NotGuru blog provides plenty of resources.Take the site design survey and feel free to voice your pet peeve in the comments - the results are quite interesting.