5 UX Design Mistakes That You Should Avoid At All Costs

UX design can be a fulfilling and satisfying project. A carefully crafted and user-focused design can help you build traffic and drive conversions for your website.

However, even the best designers can make mistakes. Not surprisingly when that happens, it affects your bottom line. But not just that. When users are clicking off your website, it can signal to the search engine that your website isn’t worthy of those coveted top-ranked search positions.

Search engine ranking page

According to an Echidna case study, better UX design can increase on-site conversion by as much as 150%. Moreover, search engines, such as Google, use UX to signal how to rank sites via their algorithm.

Google’s Web Vitals indicate that they actively assign websites status based on their user performance. With this in mind, it is more important than ever to get your UX design game on point.

So let’s discuss some common mistakes and how you can fix them.

1. A Bad First impression

What makes a good first impression on a website?

According to the research given below, the top three impression factors are:

• Page speed
• Mobile-friendliness
• Aesthetics

The first point is critical. Bounce rate grows exponentially with the time it takes for a page to load. Research from Google identified that in just three seconds of load time, bounce rate can increase by 32%. That figure grows to a startling 123% within just 10 seconds.

To drive this point home, consider that 70% of users admitted page speed affects their likelihood to buy. To create a good first impression, page speed is crucial. No matter how fantastic your page design is, it won’t matter if users click off, waiting for your page to load. To solve this problem:

• Choose a reliable host.
• Compress your HTML, Javascript, and CSS where possible.
• Use browser caching.
• Reduce page redirects.
• Make your site safe against attacks or vulnerabilities that could slow you down.
• Optimize your visual content for the web.

Next is ensuring your site is mobile-friendly. In 2021, more than half of all global site traffic came from mobile devices. With smartphones, it’s easier than ever to access content with a mobile device.

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Yet whether it’s through an app or mobile browser, if your content isn’t mobile-optimized, it can spell disaster. 59% of shoppers say mobile-friendliness factors into their decision to buy from a brand. A good designer will take this seriously. Try:

• Choosing a mobile-optimized theme.
• Simplify your content where possible.
• Reconfigure designs to fit mobile screens.
• Make content readable for all devices.
• Prevent pop-ups on mobiles that can block content.
• Make it easy to contact you with communication software, such as alternatives for Grasshopper (phone system software).

They say humans are visual creatures. Users will base their impression of a brand on how they present themselves online. While sites must be functional, they also must be visually appealing. Research has found 50% of consumers are heavily influenced by aesthetic design. The most powerful tools in your design arsenal should be:

• Color
• Images
• Text and fonts
• Alignment and flow
• White space

With all these points, you should reflect on who your audience is and design accordingly. Think of it in terms of customer acquisition cost vs lifetime value. Investing in a good first impression can generate long-term returns by retaining users on your website.

2. Poor Site Architecture

Organizing your site properly can be a challenge. Poor planning can ruin a beautifully crafted website. A survey of top web designers suggested poor navigation was one of the top reasons for a visitor leaving a site.

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It should be no surprise then that 79% of users will go to another site if they can’t find what they’re looking for. In this way, making your site easy to navigate, with a clear site hierarchy and architecture is paramount.

You can:

• Divide up your site categories clearly.
• Use accurate navigation titles.
• Make sure your search function is working properly.
• Make it clear not only to users but search engines as well, through your code architecture.
• Consider a contact center RFP to make it easier for you to manage any customer issues that may arise.

Suffice to say, good architecture and navigation plays a key role in making a site functional.

3. Bad Functionality

One way to think about functionality is task success rate.

This is a measure of how easy it is for a user to complete a task on your site. For example, if a user goes to make a purchase and the cart function has a problem, as many as 70% of users will abandon their cart because of poor UX design.

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To manage this problem:

• Ensure you carry out user testing with a variety of users.
• Measure their task success rate.
• Identify barriers to completing tasks.

A good measure of task success rate is between 70% and 80%. Achieving this rating will put your website ahead of most competitors.

Another consideration of functionality is accessibility. Over one billion people worldwide have some form of disability. Functionality for them can be the difference between using a site or not. Regardless of its content.

Yet, more than 90% of homepages fall below the WCAG (web content accessibility guidelines) standards. UX designers need to take a proactive approach to making their websites accessibility-compliant.

WCAG state sites should be:

• Perceivable,
• Operable,
• Understandable,
• And robust for all users.

Making your site functional for these users is not only ethical. It opens you to traffic from a wide source of users.

4. Inconsistency

We might think of inconsistency in terms of aesthetics, but here we are talking about what it means to use a website. Or more broadly, interact with a brand.

Consistency in UX designs means that a site responds the way a user expects across different interactions.

For instance, if you’ve ever found one thing on a site, but been told another through their call center or even another page, that is inconsistency. You need a holistic approach to your whole business model. 3CX alternatives provide ways to make your communication consistent.

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You need a clear understanding of the customer’s journey through your site. You want to create a consistent experience to build trust and credibility for your design. Research on UX shows a user expects two things when they use a site:

The second aspect of consistency is brand identity and presentation. The majority of consumers engage with retailers through multiple channels. The way you present your brand should:

• Be researched and data-driven.
• Reflect users’ buying habits.
• Be consistent across all channels.

Why? Because a consistent brand presentation has been shown to increase revenue by as much as 20%. Recognition creates trust and credibility. Trust and credibility drive conversion.

Ensure your team is trained to create a consistent, data-driven brand face.

5. Not Content Friendly

When we design our UX, it’s common practice to substitute the old Lorem ipsum for actual content. The problem with this approach is when we add the final product, our content can go awry. From sloppy formatting to spelling mistakes, this can impact UX more than you think.

Spelling error on a post about spelling errors!

It takes users as little as 50 milliseconds to make a judgment about a website. Surprisingly, within that time, users can spot many issues. We have to think about this in terms of what the users’ eyes go to as soon as a page loads.

Studies show that most users don’t go to the trouble of reading a site in its entirety. Their eyes skim for keywords and headlines to decide the value of content. In this instance, you are making a value proposition to the user. They will ask:

“Is this page worth reading?”

And the odd spelling mistake, unclear copy, or poor phrasing can be the difference between yes or no. The best copy is:

• Researched and edited.
• Succinct and to the point.
• Useful and purpose-driven.
• Actionable.
• Empowered by a catchy but accurate headline.

In short, don’t leave your copy to the last minute. Build your design around your copy.

Takeaways

Now we’ve covered these common UX design mistakes, let’s end with some takeaways:

• Design with your audience in mind. A user-centric approach has been a throwaway term throughout the industry. Yet, often the focus remains on sales rather than customer experience. Consider IoT development software to learn how people use your site.
• Usability is key. From page speed to architecture and functionality, the bottom line is if a user can’t use your site—no matter how beautiful it is—your efforts will be in vain.

Well, that’s all folks. Happy designing!

Bio:

Jenna Bunnell – Senior Manager, Content Marketing, Dialpad

Jenna Bunnell is the Senior Manager for Content Marketing at Dialpad, an AI for contact centers’ unified communications system that provides valuable call details for business owners and sales representatives. She is driven and passionate about communicating a brand’s design sensibility and visualizing how content can be presented in creative and comprehensive ways. Jenna Bunnell also published articles for domains such as Miro and VoilaNorbert. Check out her LinkedIn profile.

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