Are you aware that owning a website is not enough to acquire a relevant online presence unless it is functionally structured to effectively produce business returns? Currently, business owners do not pay detailed attention to the features that make up a good website and when the website fails in the nearest future they become stranded to either create a new website or reinvent the old website. The 8 reasons why a website fails and how to fix it is an article that addresses the concerns of website owners who wants to know why their website fails and how to fix it.
To know where your website stands, make sure you are not making any of these 8 website mistakes that cost even the best businesses. In this article, we explore 8 reasons why a website fails and how to fix such mistakes.
- Your website is slow: When a website’s speed is slow in responding to website visitors’ requests, it becomes a hindrance to your website’s success and a major factor that makes a website fail. Websites users exit a site when the website pages take a long time to load. Statistics have shown that more than 50% of users abandon a website that takes more than three seconds to load and also reveal web users spend more time on a website that loads faster. Most web users always want answers provided immediately to their requests and will not wait around for long when your page takes a long time to load. A website loading time will be affected when the website is not optimised for mobile devices, files are not compressed, the browser cache is not configured, the hosting server is slow and images are not optimised. If your site doesn’t load fast, your web users will find another one that does. If your website takes more than 3-4 seconds to load you may lose around 90% of your visitors and 79% of your visitors who experience slow loading speed won’t return to your website. A slow-loading website will increase your site bounce rate which will affect your search engine ranking.
- How to fix this
- a. Compress large site images and reduce the number of redirects or 301s.
- b. Fix performance bottlenecks to improve website server response times.
- c. Remove the irrelevant elements by reducing code like HTML, JavaScript and CSS.
- d. Use browser cache to reduce how often browsers need to reload your web pages.
- e. Choose a functional web hosting plan that meets your business’s peculiar needs.
- Poor Website Design: A website design serves as an extension of your physical store and also as the first point of contact between your business and customers. A poor web design makes a website difficult to use and makes your website inaccessible. A poor website design decreases a website’s usability and increases web visitors bounce rate. A poor web design will do your website more harm than good as customers will compare your website with other websites and if yours is found wanting, they will choose their option elsewhere. So, you must have a powerful web design that gives users a pleasant customer experience that encourages them to stay longer on your site moving from one page to another with ease and also to return for future purposes. A bad web design will not bring any positive points to your website. If your web design is out of date it will be considered a poor web design and customers may prefer your competitors. Your website design should match what your business entails. Factors that make a web design poor are choosing the wrong colour palette, layout, navigation menu, typography and clickable elements.
- How to fix this
- a. Change the website layout for improved usability.
- b. Modify the website colour palette for better readability.
- c. Develop a responsive design that allows your website to display on all devices.
- d. Update your website copy for clarity consistently.
- e. Place your navigation bar where it can be easily seen.
- Not Optimised For Mobile Compatibility: If your site has mobile incompatibility, you will miss a lot of potential visitors which will make your website fail. Poor website navigation on mobile devices leads to website failure as statistics have shown that more than 50% of website traffic and success come from mobile users. The number of people visiting websites on their mobile devices has surpassed the number of users viewing a website on a desktop. If your website isn’t compatible with mobile devices, it will make visitors get frustrated and exit your site. Research shows that 4.28 billion as of July 2020 make use of their cell phones for internet purposes. So, your users expect that your site should be mobile friendly to enable you to have an advantage over your competitors and for your website to rank higher on mobile google searches.
- How to fix this:
- a. Modify your website to have a responsive web design that is fully mobile-optimised.
- b. Avoid using the regular CSS rather than use a CSS media query or CSS layout to achieve a responsive web design.
- c. Keep your web design simple and not complex.
- Website SEO Not Optimised: Not paying attention to your site’s SEO makes your website have a low search engine ranking and makes it difficult for web visitors to find your site. A website that has a good web design can still fail if it is not optimised for search. By overlooking website SEO, your website won’t be easily found and will have fewer visitors. A website without SEO can fail. An optimised SEO can increase your google ranking.
- How to fix this
- a. Optimise your website’s SEO and ensure your site offers a good website user experience.
- b. Optimise the images on the website.
- c. Your website should have a good site structure or layout web pages.
- d. Add image alt texts and meta tags.
- e. Format your URLs correctly.
- Broken Website Pages or Links: A broken website page or links gives web visitors a bad user experience which can lead to a website failure. When a website has broken links or pages, it makes web users unable to access the information they desire and this reduces their chances of converting into customers which leads to website failure. Broken links also notify Google and other search engines that your site is not up to date and this can affect your search engine ranking position. Broken links and pages are caused by CMS updates, human error and moving pages.
- How to fix this
- a. Monitor and maintain your website once it starts working.
- b. Change URL by fixing the links within the content.
- c. Create a 301 for pages that are moved.
- No Clear CTA: A website without a clear to call action will fail. Statistics have shown that web users leave a website that doesn’t have an easily identifiable CTA. A site that has multiple CTA leaves the web visitors confused and may cause them to exit your website. A website without a clear CTA is bound to fail. Websites without specific CTA will make the web visitors exit the page without taking any action. Hidden CTA increases the bounce rate of users and makes the CTA unclear.
- How to fix this
- a. Avoid complex and avoid multiple CTA.
- b. Make CTA easily identifiable.
- c. Use an easy and precise CTA.
- d. Use one CTA per page.
- Not Promoting Your Website: A website can fail due to a lack of promotion. Without promoting your website, your website may not reach its full potential. A website that is marketed to attract and drive visitors will make a website succeed. If you are not actively marketing your website, your website will fail due to a lack of publicity.
- How to fix this
- a. Use social media.
- b. Use pay-per-click advertising.
- c. Use an Email campaign.
- d. Retarget your organic visitors from google.
- Your Website has Poor Structure and Menu: If your website can’t be navigated easily, many web users will exit your site. If a website has many sub and side menus with several dead ends, it will make your users confused and they will leave your site. A website with a poor navigation structure and menu will make such a website fail.
- How to fix this
- a. Make your menu easy to use and easily identifiable.
- b. Make your website navigation easy to use.
If your website falls within the mentioned 8 reasons why websites fails then it is time to fix this problem because nobody wants a website that fails. So, if you are worried that you have a failed website, that can be corrected. With Da-Manager, your website can receive the support and services for your website to succeed and you will no longer need the 8 reasons why websites fails because your website will be optimised for success.
