Some traps it's so easy to fall into in designing your web site
Archive - Originally posted on "The Horse's Mouth" - 2012-06-23 09:47:31 - Graham Ellis"Vegetarians' can obviously be catered for" ... obviously. Don't know why they bother to tell us ...
"I hope they haven't paid a lot of money for this" says Lisa, pointing me at the web site of a hotel that's not in Melksham, but is "near" according to their definition. I hope they haven't - or that it's work in progress, with us seeing a site that's being transissioned overnight. Now - no website is perfect, and that very much includes ours. I comment here as a checklist - things to look out for that people may notice. And, yes, things I noticed on this one.
| • Slow Loading. The home page took nearly 5 minutes. I'm not kidding you. And I have just checked our connection to make sure - 19 Mbits download, 5 Mbit upload and everything else running fast. And every page is slow |
| • Contradictions "BOOK ONLINE NOW. YOU ARE UNABLE TO BOOK THESE ROOMS ONLINE AT THE MOMENT PLEASE RING" and those sentences directly follow each other! |
| • Missing pages and incomplete templates. Click on "Map" for an untailored 404 page - "Not Found. The requested URL /maps/map.asp was not found on this server. Apache/2.2.14 (Ubuntu) Server at www.sitecube.com Port 80". And wording "Your Text" where I suspect that content is missing. And a couple of images which are either stock art or the owner's pretty daughter. |
| • Spellings. "Cancelation", "avalable", "DISSCUSED" |
| • Abbreviations "INT PICTURES" and "EXT PICTURES" - I assume "Internal" and "External". "HEATED POOL & HOT T" - Tub?? |
| • False Claims? "Near Bath". 15 Miles, 30 minutes to drive according to the AA. And £37.00 by Taxi. according to taxi fare calculator. "APPROX 1 1/2 HOUR DRIVE THE CITY OF LONDON" ... odd that - the AA says 2 hrs and 18 minutes, 107.4 miles; that's on their "local attractions" page. |
| • Lot of shouting: "WHEN BOOKING ON LINE YOU WILL BE DIRECTED THROUGH A COMPANY CALLED EVIIVO. IF YOU WOULD PREFER PLEASE RING PXXX OR LXXXXXXX ON (01225) 7XXXXX OR (0797X) XXXXXX" |
| • Below the crack. So - what does this cost? I click on the "prices" page and I see lots of terms and conditions, an invite to call for a special deal for very late bookings, and no prices. Then I notice a scroll bar on an internal frame and, sure, if I scroll it I do discover the prices. |
| • Punctuation and capitalisation. Sentences ending with commas. Capitals al over the place. Apostrophes where they shouldn't be. |
| • Lack of clarity: "Please note that we have a miniumum of a two day cancelation policy" - is that 48 hours before earliest checking time, latest checking time, or two clear working days? And if it's a minimum policy, does it mean that you have to give longer notice for some bookings? |
| • And the site breaks the law - sets cookies but didn't ask me ... |
Some thoughts there to say "there, but for the grace of God, go I", and to look at your own web site to see if you fall significanly foul of any of the traps the designers of this site have, it would seem, walked straight into!