There are many elements that make a good website great. And one of them is the smart website navigation design. We have already discussed with you how the effective website navigation works. Now itās time to look closely at the common website navigation mistakes that stand in the way of the perfect design.
There are our top 5 most frequent mistakes in website navigation and our tips on how to avoid them.
Mistake 1: Too Many Options
You must have already seen all these monstrous websites with the infinite numbers of links and options in the website navigation menu. Something like that:
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It seems like the designers wanted to make the navigation as much comprehensive as possible. But the result only puts to confusion, when the users canāt find the core information. There are cases, when too many menu items make the result not that bad but not good either:
SOLUTION:
There is a proven fact that the ability of human mind to hold information in the memory is limited to 7 items. You should keep it in mind when designing your primary navigation. Challenge yourself by providing the users only the essential information limited to 7 items or even less. Believe us, thatās just the case when fewer is the better – each removed menu option makes the remained ones look more catchy.
Mistake 2: Wrong Order Of Options
Letās imagine, that we managed to pare down the menu options to the minimum cutting away all the fat and bloat. Now what? Thatās right, now we have to put them in the right order.
Unfortunately, some people still have some problems doing that. Look how sweet this website navigation example (apart from being a total mistake 1 disaster) placed the āforum roomā link between the āUFOās and aliensā and āpagan trinity of Romeā. I mean, if youāre having a breakdown, at least put your menu option right:
SOLUTION:
Options have the most prominent impact on the users when they positioned first or last on the list. The reason why is the serial-position effect based on the fact that a person recalls the first and last items in a series best. So, basically, all you need is to place the most important items along the edges and the least important ones in the middle. Remember about the conventions: some elements such as ālog inā or ācontactsā have their own traditionally established locations.
Mistake 3: Unconventional Navigation Style
Designing a website navigation is not the best time for being too creative. the intricate system of odd icons, buttons, and shortcuts placed in the weird site areas is a bad idea that can backfire on your siteās aesthetics and usability. As the car designers donāt experiment with the location of a gas or a brake pedal, so web designers shouldnāt be over-innovative or that daredevil to create this:
We havenāt found the search box yet, have you?
This websiteās problem is that it has not one, not even two, but three navigation menu at once! The left menu, the right menu and the top horizontal menu are very unconventional and unproductive choice for the ecommerce.
SOLUTION:
Each web navigationās main purpose is to guide a user and help him find the relevant information as fast and easy as it possible. Users are hence generally expected to see the navigation bar placed on the top or the left side of the web page. Toying with the conventions might confuse the users and reduce the number of visitors.
Mistake 4: Unreadability
The importance of web content optimization is already generally recognized. Yet sometimes people forget that all their effort might go in vain if the content is not reader-friendly.
Multiple fonts in the text make the page look cluttered. Large, uninterrupted blocks of text are as bad as the excessive visual content. All the web users do not read the whole text slowly absorbing its essence. They tend to scan the information, jumping from one point to the next. And if your site looks like visual and information overload overwhelms users, well, youāre in a big trouble.
This colorful background with the text in capitals will make you feel real pain.
The disastrous website interface is able to obscure (or ruin, more precisely) even the high-quality content.
SOLUTION:
According to a study by the Norman Nielsen Group, siteās visitors scroll through about 50-60% of the text on your site. We donāt want this number to reduce dramatically because the users canāt physically read the text, do we? So how to avoid this website navigation mistake? Itās simple: donāt use controversial color schemes, choose your fonts wisely, all the navigation icons are clearly visible and, ultimately, enhance the conversation with your visitors.
Mistake 5: No Responsive Design
We canāt argue with technical progress. According to Statistics, today there are more than 50% of web pages are loaded on the mobile devices. All these mobile users are potential customers and you canāt ignore such target market.
Unresponsive websites distort the way your website appears on mobile devices: text bounces, images fuse together, the search box is nowhere to be seen. You run risks that your visitors would switch to the competitors.
For example, this site (that actually doesnāt look great on the desktop either) is definitely not good for the mobile devices.
SOLUTION:
Itās pretty obvious: make your website responsive! One of the responsive siteās benefits is that thereās lower maintenance plus higher credibility. Everybody knows that Google favors mobile-friendly websites. Donāt make your user choose between the website and a device.
Conclusion
As one of the great design principles states: Keep It Simple, Stupid (KISS). Do not overthink and over complicate. The website navigation design best practices are pretty straightforward. Three pillars the most effective web navigation leans on are a solid structure, clear design, and pure minimalism. Improve yourself and let Umbrella be by your side.