A website is a great way to market your plastic surgery practice. But if you’re an Internet user, you know that some websites can prove very irritating. And when you encounter an irritating website, your most likely course of action is to simply leave and go elsewhere. For your own website, this is an action that you want to avoid having your visitors take. With that said, make sure that you avoid some of the more common Internet annoyances:
Doorways and Pop-Ups Doorway pages and flash pages that require a user to click on something to enter a site are generally more of an annoyance than an asset. You want to make it easy, not hard, for visitors to come to your site. Pop-up windows should always be avoided as well as they are very irritating.
Horizontal & Vertical Scrolling Vertical scrolling is mildly irritating, but horizontal scrolling is awful. Make sure that your pages don’t force visitors to scroll from left to right and do your best to fit your pages on a single screen view.
Illegible Text & Too Much Text Illegible text can be very frustrating. Make sure that you choose a common font style and that the size is neither too large nor too small. It’s easiest to read dark text that is set against a light background. Try to avoid large blocks of text as well as these can turn visitors off. Instead, use images and headlines to break up text. For very large amounts of text, is often best to break it up into multiple pages.
Non-Standard & Broken Links Use a standard format for your text links that allows visitors to instantly recognize them as links. This is usually underlined and in blue. Also regularly check your links to ensure that they’re in proper working order and quickly fix any broken links.
Personal Information Be careful when requiring personal information from your visitors. If you don’t absolutely need the information, don’t ask for it.