I have been in the webmaster arena since the early 1990’s, when Aol and Geocities were the “hit” thing and everyone had Hotmail accounts. Which allowed me to experience both the up’s and the down’s from various websites scattered across the interwebs, also known as “The Internet.” When discussing with other webmasters about the do’s and don’ts, I have picked up on a handful of beneficial tips for new webmasters who are about to brave the art of running a website. I compiled and ordered a list of some of the most common mistakes that webmasters have done or are doing.
Advertising / Content
You should never advertise a website that has little to no content on it. After all, who is going to bother browsing the pages of a website if there is nothing to read. You could register on other webmaster sites and do content exchanges or even pay user’s to post content on your site. Once you have the content, now comes time to advertise that content. You could start with the basics and advertise at advertising/promotion type websites. Some promotion websites even offer free promotion type services for newly created websites. Making use of these free services should be one of the first things you do. You could also hit up these large advertising networks that are out there, and pay publishers to publish your ad for you, hopefully reaching your target audience.
Design / Layout
When designing your website, if you do not already know the in’s and out’s of structuring a webpage, such as Html and JQuery property layouts and ordering, then you are going to want to hire a professional web designer, to quickly build your site for you. You could do it yourself, which I do recommend, however if you do not have the time or willingness to learn how to code yourself, then hiring a professional web designer should be your top priority.
You should design your website around the niche that the website is about. Something that is both easy on eyes and simple to follow where you want your readers to focus on. Some websites can get away with using darker color themes, while others need to have a brighter theme with softer colors. Don’t create a website you want, create a website that will attract online users. The content on the website needs to be laid out in a way that your users eyes will be easily able to follow the flow of content on the page they are currently browsing. And just because a website has the content, if the webpages have mismatching colors or the theme design is unattractive, I will only browse the website for so long.
Membership (Guest Permissions & Premium Vip’s)
I highly frown upon a website that withholds content from me before I even register on the website. If the content that I already am reading does not attract me when I am browsing the website as a guest, then why would the content that I would get when I register attract me to stay? When creating a website and setting permissions, I tend to give guests full permission of reading everything that a user who is normally registered and logged in would see.
Regarding “Premium Vip” membership on websites, I simply think is a joke. None of these so called “Vip” memberships offer anything useful. Why would I want extra message inbox storage when I don’t have a single message? Why would I want access to a “Vip” area on the website, when I was already content without having access to the “Vip” area? I also tend to stray away from any website that forces me to “pay/register” in order to access extra content.
Discussion Topic: 3 Common Webmaster Mistakes
