15 Bad Web Design Trends That Are Outdated

Posted on 4/7/2019 by VUDU
There is a good reason why successful companies have such a well-designed website.

Is your website not gaining the amount of traffic or conversions that you were expecting, despite your SEO efforts

It attracts visitors and keeps them coming back for more. As much as you should focus on what constitutes good web design, staying away from these outdated bad web design trends is just as important.

1. Sidebars

Sidebars have gained a bad rep for being nothing more than a distraction, pushing users to stray off the path you want them to take when navigating your website.

2. Endless Scrolling

Your website shouldn’t push the limits of your visitors’ attention span. Content should be properly formatted and overly saturated pages should be broken up instead.

3. Stepped Menus

Stepped menu options can quickly become overwhelming, making your users frustrated and more motivated to go somewhere else.

4. Parallax Websites

While these can be an impressive way to display your landing page, avoid making the mistake of using parallax to squeeze pages of content onto a single regular page.

5. Floating Elements

Floating menu bars are obnoxious, unattractive, and hostile towards users with small screens.

6. Complicated Backgrounds

The images you use for the background of your website should be a simple way to direct attention or give visual cues on what really matters instead of being distracting and pointless.

7. Pop-Ups

Especially those that show third-party advertisements, pop-ups are widely despised by internet users today.

8. Splash Pages

Just like pop-ups, people hate splash pages and can easily become disinterested in visiting your site again if you constantly show a splash page.

9. Obnoxious Social Engagement Elements

Having a social engagement element on each page is useful and important. However, it shouldn’t be overly obnoxious or constantly prompt users to visit your social media profiles.

10. Loud Design

Users these days greatly prefer clean, minimal designs that get to the point of what your website offers.

11. Hidden Elements

Each element or navigation button should clearly indicate what it does. Avoid using icons or other visual elements that users won’t understand, as this could keep them away from where you want them to go.

12. Spin to Win

As quickly as it became a trend, the “spin to win” wheel that pops up as soon as you visit a website has become hated by most users. Especially if your website has a professional or corporate focus, avoid using this element.

13. Carousel Ads

Carousel ads are annoying and move users’ attention away from where you want them to focus.

14. Unclear Fonts

Cursive or otherwise “hand drawn” looking fonts are hard to read, decreasing the ease of use for visitors and pushing them away.

15. Too Many Different Fonts

Just like with cursive fonts, using too many different fonts decreases cognitive fluency. This means users will find it difficult to understand what they’re looking at, making it more difficult for you to obtain conversions.

 


 

Avoiding these simple mistakes and outdated trends will go a long way in making your website more attractive to users. Once you’ve run through the above trends and made sure that you aren’t guilty of using any of them on your website, you should see immediate improvements in leads and conversions.

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