Visitors tend to only scan your website’s rather than spending a large amount of time thoroughly understanding the site. As such it is of utmost importance to make your message and options clear. Failing to do so will leave your visitors lost, confused and frustrated. Any of these options will end the same way – a missed opportunity and little chance of a repeat visit.

15 simple tips for a more usable website

1. The home page should clearly tell your visitor what the site is about
2. Make sure each page of your website has purpose
3. Organize content so that headings are in hierarchical order to give clear structure to the copy.
4. Don’t make your visitors guess about your navigation make the links obvious
5. Use consistent and meaningful terminology for navigation items and hypertext links (read loose the “cutesy names”)
6. Restrict the navigation bar to a manageable number of links or buttons
7. Clearly indicate what your next steps are for your visitors
8. Remove any clutter that may distract your visitor from the appropriate next steps
9. Don’t change interactions through-out your site stick with what works
10. Make it easy to find information such as contact details, pricing and delivery charges
11. Contently review your site for errors that will make your site look unprofessional
12. Make sure you text is large enough to be readable (at least 10px, 72% or .75em)
13. Use a font easily read online (Verdana, Georgia, Arial or Times New Roman ) for your body text
14. Do not underline any text that is not a link
15. Include ample white space in the page layout

The more user friendly your website is, the greater the chance of converting your visitor into either a prospect, customer or both.