Top Ten Web Design Mistakes of 2005
This year's list of top problems clearly proves the need to get back to Web design basics. There's much talk about new fancy "Web 2.0" features on the Internet industry's mailing lists and websites, as well as at conferences. But users don't care about technology and don't especially want new features. They just want quality improvements in the basics:
text they can read;
content that answers their questions;
navigation and search that help them find what they want;
short and simple forms (streamlined registration, checkout, and other workflow); and
no bugs, typos, or corrupted data; no linkrot; no outdated content.
Anytime you feel tempted to add a new feature or advanced technology to your site, first consider whether you would get a higher ROI by spending the resources on polishing the quality of what you already have. Most companies, e-commerce sites, government agencies, and non-profit organizations would contribute more to their website's business goals with better headlines than with any new technology (aside from a better search engine, of course).
