Low Quality Images

There’s a variety of ways that crummy pictures can sink a site. You only have seconds to make a strong first impression when a potential lead visits your site, and a bad picture with low-resolution picture is a good way to send them bouncing away to a competitor. But if you just use Google Image search to find the perfect picture, you could end up accidentally using a copyrighted photo. That photo might look great, but the papers from Getty’s legal team won’t.

Remember: High-resolution photos can be just as dangerous! If you’re using a photo that’s too big, then your site could take too long to load, another sure way to increase that bounce rate.

No Grid Design

Most professional website designers use a grid to layout the site. This isn’t just a simpler, more organized way to arrange a site, it’s also more pleasing to the human eye. You want your visitors attention to naturally flow down the page (and towards that contact form!) Unfortunately, if you tried to layout a website without a grid, the end result can end up looking sloppy. And if the various elements of your website are all over the place with no eye for order, it can have a very jarring effect on the user, even if they can’t quite figure out why.

Remember: Although you can look for quick fixes or tweaks to instill order from the chaos, this problem usually requires a new custom web design.

No Mobile Version

The Web exploded in popularity almost overnight, which means best practices for website design are never static. If you designed a website years ago, you probably didn’t think to include a mobile version. And why would you? But in 2015, a mobile version of your site is absolutely necessary. More than one-third of Internet users go online primarily with mobile devices, and many local searches are performed on the go using smartphones or tablets. Without a solid mobile version of your site, you could be invisible to one-out-of-three potential users.

Remember: This is another problem without a quick fix. Unless you’re a skilled website designer yourself, you’ll need to find a web services team to help you build a new version of your site. In a pinch, you can start over yourself using a template that includes a mobile version.