3 Common Website Usability Mistakes & How to Avoid them
Poor Readability and Legibility
Readability refers to the amount of effort it takes your website visitors (who I will sometimes refer to as users) to read and comprehend the information on your web page. It ensures your content is easy to scan and accessible to everyone.
Legibility is how your fonts or typefaces look and how easy it is to read. Web-safe fonts are a great place to start if you're unsure about readability and accessibility. These are fonts that appear across all operating systems, making these standard fonts the go-to for web headings and text.
Problem: How many websites have you been on where you can't read some of the words clearly? Whether the fonts are the script, way too small, or the colors fade into the background.
Why is this a problem? Readability impacts your website's SEO; search engine optimization. Google considers this when ranking websites, as they're perfecting their algorithm to mimic humans. Search engines are now much better at recognizing quality content, favoring websites without broken links, typos, and efficiently written information that enhances user experience.
Solution: Since readability is one of the most important aspects of website usability design, it's crucial to understand to optimize it. Using web-safe typefaces, readable fonts (avoid cursive), contrasting colors, capitalize on white space, and organize your information with bullets and lists.
5 ways to increase a website's readability:
Use bullet points to outline the most important details
Short sentences are easier to digest than long paragraphs
Images break up content + give visual cues about the text
Larger font sizes; 16px minimum
Leverage white space; don't fill up ever corner of your site with content.
These easy-to-follow tips will allow you to ensure your website has better readability, and your users won't have any problems interpreting what you have to say.
Rushing Pop-ups.
Don’t rush pop-ups. Time them strategically.
Pop-ups more effectively work on a website when they follow the principles of Kairos. There is a time and a place and it's not five seconds after landing on a website.
Problem: These notifications are disruptive and distracting to your user's goals, by requiring their immediate attention. Nothing is more frustrating than being greeted by a giant pop-up notification within seconds of entering a website. Even thirty-seconds upon entering feels too soon. When you first enter a website, you need a second to focus and find your bearings. Your visitors came to your website for a reason, to whether it was to read your blog post, hire you for your services, or get in touch. Pop up ads and subscriptions immediately take them out of focus.
Solution: Limit the number of distractions on your website, and if you feel that a pop-up announcement is necessary on your website. Consider putting it on a two-minute timer. It will be more effective and less of a bother. If someone is on your website after a few minutes, they're most likely engaged in what you have to say or what you're doing.
This time allows them to explore; read into the blog post they came to see, check out who you are and what you do before being asked to commit to subscribing. When I first enter a website and am greeted by a pop-up, the first thing I do is click it off and I'm not alone. People want to know what they're subscribing to.
Overwhelming Users
Don’t complicate the journey for visitors to reach goals.
Too much information or too many choices overwhelms your site visitors and distracts them from completing your call to action.
Problem: This is a common problem I've seen with website usability; overloading users with walls of information takes away from the important messages on your website. People don't read on the web–– we scan. We look for the details most important to us. The length of long paragraphs makes scanning for your most important details and features difficult.
Solution: It may seem counterintuitive, but you need to cut out the long-winded material on pages you want customers to make decisions. Remove the extra, unnecessary words and break your information down into shorter paragraphs or phrases. Streamlining what's important allows your users to make decisions.
Limiting the options on each page can also help people move through your website in the direction you want them to go- like purchasing, contacting, or subscribing to your website. You can even find free short courses and resources online to learn more about writing better business copy or writing for user experience copy.
