3. Unpleasant designs - Designs that use too many colors, colors that clash, or a messy layout, are just plain hard to look at. A site should be pleasant to look at, not a chore.

4. Long pages - Long pages are a problem because your force people to sift through piles of information to get what they want. Pages that focus on just a few topics with links to related topics on other pages are much better. This approach allows reader to isolate specific subject they are interested in.

5. Poor Navigation - It is extremely important that a user be able to access all pages of your site from every page. Users will often enter your site from a search engine listing with a link other than your home page. You do not want your visitors at a dead-end with no way to access rest of your site. You will have wasted traffic and given prospect a bad impression of your business.

As you surf web, you should keep a list of annoying things you find on other sites. Every so often, check your site to see if you have same problems. Regardless, if you avoid common web design mistakes listed above, you will stand a better chance of running a successful web site.

Fixing The Problem

Fixing problem often is lengthy and costly depending on number of pages on your site. If you have over 100 products, a complete re-design may be best answer. If you have a relatively small number of pages, there may be less brutish options.

Converting pages to static html is a definite solution for smaller sites. Essentially, one would take page for each product and convert it into a static html page. The domain would then be converted to short sub-domain. If a user then clicked on “buy” button for product on page, they would be sent to a dynamic database page. The viability of this solution is dependent upon layout of site. Some sites can be fixed, some simply cannot.

In Closing

The database parameter problem is surprisingly common with sites selling products. A majority of site designers do not understand search engine optimization and don’t realize problem they are creating. If you intend to build a database driven site, make sure you bring in a search engine optimization specialist before it is created. Nobody wants to spend money to design a site twice.