If you think achieving all the best practices principles in designing websites is sometimes challenging, at least you should try to avoid some of the most common mistakes. The Internet provides dozens of lists which help us to identify possible web design mistakes, but still, for those of us who, shall we say are less savvy, it is difficult to follow and respect all of these aspects that should be followed to optimize the design.

We thought it might be valuable to offer a short list identifying basic web design mistakes which you might find helpful in your design efforts. Previously, we offered some tips in this area, and decided it would be helpful to come back with a more comprehensive list. Keep in mind that these are common sense attributes which do not require the need for specific web development knowledge:

• Using fancy or tiny fonts. Not using readable fonts will annoy your website's visitors and will make them give up reading your content. Make sure you use a common font that is easy to read and delivers the message straight to your visitors.
• Using blinking text or words. Users simply find this annoying and will make the content virtually impossible to read.
• Using fixed font sizes. The fixed font size reduces readability for most people over the age of 40. You should respect your visitors' needs and provide them the option to resize the text as needed.
• Not changing the color of already visited links. Your visitors should know where they have been. Using different colors for visited/unvisited links is a useful feature that enables your visitor to avoid navigation confusion.
• Overusing Flash and using ‘intros' will increase your website's loading time and will cause your visitors lose their patience. You can't force anyone to watch something before accessing the content and, ultimately, even your customers will avoid your website knowing that they will waste valuable time waiting for it to load.
• Using a lot of links before accessing the website's content. The fewer the steps to the content, the better for users.
• Not providing search options. Your visitor should be in control when he/she is on your website and you should provide him/her an easy way to find what they are actually looking for.
• Using ‘drop down' menus. You should provide your visitors with a clear perspective of the website's navigation. A ‘drop down' menu, for example, could hide the information your visitor is looking for.
• Using images for navigation. Yes, we know, it is one of the most artistic ways to make a website more appealing, but the use of images in navigation could also be a challenge for those who "turned off" images for browsing the Internet.

At CodeMyIMAGE we can help to assure that your website design will be free of the most common mistakes in web design and our specialized development team will anticipate and address the mistakes with you in order to deliver the optimal design and web experience for your users.