We don’t build websites in a vacuum. Every conversation I’ve had with a business owner about design ends up touching something deeper—brand identity, business goals, customer confusion, internal chaos, or sometimes just the raw emotional tension of trying to keep up with today’s relentless marketing expectations. When people come to me for a website, they think they’re asking for pixels and plugins. What they’re often seeking, though, is clarity—and clarity has to come before clever design.
Over the years working with entrepreneurs, local businesses, artists, and growing startups, I’ve noticed a handful of common website design mistakes that can sink a site before it’s even had its first chance to convert a visitor. These aren’t just technical missteps—they’re often reflections of deeper thinking errors. They reveal how we see ourselves, our customers, and the value we offer.
This post is about helping you avoid those traps. Whether you're DIYing your own site on Wix or hiring a designer (like me) to build something custom in Webflow or WordPress, knowing what to watch out for could mean the difference between a digital storefront that builds trust—or one that burdens your audience.
This is the most foundational mistake I see, and it’s extremely human. Business owners naturally project their own preferences into the design. If you’re a minimalist, you want the site sleek and spare. If you love vibrant colors, you want the homepage bursting with energy. The problem is, you’re not the one using your website.
When we create something that represents us, we naturally want it to feel good. There’s a kind of digital self-expression at play—especially for small businesses or solo entrepreneurs. But your website should first and foremost serve your customer’s needs, comfort level, and navigation habits.
I worked with two coffee shop owners in the same region. One had built a beautiful, artsy Squarespace site that reflected their personality with handwritten fonts and dark earthy tones. The other had a more functional, clear design built on Wordpress. Guess who got more online orders? It wasn’t the one with the cooler aesthetic.
The reason? Customers didn’t know where to click. The artsy site didn’t clearly show the menu, link to product pages, or provide quick info about hours. That business was designing primarily to feel proud of their digital home, but forgot the person knocking at the door was looking for a simple answer.
Choose one clear target user and build the website around that person’s preferences. Write content for them. Choose layouts based on what they want to find within 10 seconds. Your site exists to make their journey smooth—not to serve as your online art gallery.
A common myth I encounter is that all the information must be available up front. This leads to crowded top menus, dropdowns within dropdowns, and what I call sitemap sprawl. The irony is that more options don’t make things easier—they make people bounce.
Dave, a small business consultant, asked for a redesign after watching his bounce rate flirt with 80%. His homepage contained seven menu links. Each had dropdowns. One had a 4-level hierarchy. Clicking through felt like nested Russian dolls. His reasoning? “I want all my services to be visible.”
We reduced the primary nav to three essentials, moved secondary pages into strategic footer links, and restructured his site content using clear landing pages. Within months, session duration increased by 40%, and new leads began scheduling consults again.
Users aren't interested in playing digital hide-and-seek. They want clarity, not cleverness.
More than half of website traffic is now mobile—this isn’t news. Yet I continue to see beautifully styled desktop experiences that fall apart when shrunk to a phone screen. Text gets tiny, buttons get lost, and layout elements stack in awkward ways.
If your potential customer waits in line at the grocery store and pulls up your site to learn about your services, you have about 10 seconds to make things make sense. If it's hard to scroll, clunky to read, or just plain slow, you lose them. It’s a moment you won’t get back.
A real estate agent I worked with had a WordPress site that looked great on desktop but had issues with image ratios and tap targets on mobile. After switching to Webflow and taking a mobile-first approach, mobile views converted more appointment bookings than desktop for the first time. Her audience—often busy professionals browsing listings on phones—finally had an effortless experience.
It's not just about shrinking the layout. It's about rethinking how users engage when holding your brand in the palm of their hand.
This one might be the most subtle—because often, it doesn't look like a mistake. It just looks bland. Sayings like “We care about quality” or “Your success is our priority” sound good, but they float in air. These kinds of statements are so overused, they might as well say nothing at all.
Your homepage has seconds to communicate what you do, for whom, and why it matters. When you lean too heavily on abstract virtue-signals, you avoid making a real claim or promise. It's like trying to describe a restaurant by saying “We serve good food.” I need to know—is it spicy Korean BBQ or hand-rolled tortellini?
A therapist client initially had a hero banner reading: “Your journey to a better life starts here.” Not terrible. But also, not helping the specific visitor feel understood. After audience research, we changed it to: “Anxiety, depression, and burnout don’t have to run your life. In-person and online therapy for Nashville professionals who are tired of holding it together.”
The bookings that week? Doubled.
Copyhackers has great tutorials on sharpening your value proposition. It might feel risky to narrow your message, but in digital communication, specificity is equal to sincerity.
I often ask clients: What do you want users to do once they land on your site? The blank stares I get usually tell me a lot. Without a clear goal, how can your design support it? Every page should guide people toward a specific next step—something achievable and useful.
One freelancer I worked with had a site where the only CTA was “Reach Out.” That’s ambiguous and lazy. Instead of telling the user what to expect (schedule a free 15-minute intro call), it puts the onus on them to figure out how to engage. When we changed that button to “Book Your Free Discovery Call” with a Calendly link, conversions rose immediately.
This one’s part technical, part psychological. Slow-loading websites don’t just hurt SEO—they create subtle friction that degrades trust. If your business doesn’t load fast, people wonder what else is slow: responsiveness, communication, delivery?
According to Portent, each second of delay reduces conversion rates by an average of 4.42%. And Google’s Core Web Vitals score directly affects your site’s visibility in search.
A handyman in Franklin, TN, had a site that took nearly 6 seconds to load on mobile. He didn’t realize his 12MB homepage—with auto-play video and full-res images—was driving impatient customers away before they saw a single service. A redesign using modern Webflow techniques and compressed assets brought load times under 2 seconds. Suddenly, his Google Maps clicks turned into real calls.
People are more hesitant online than we like to admit. Even the most beautiful site, if devoid of social proof or validation, can make a visitor uneasy. Imagine walking into a storefront where no one has ever left a review, there are no business credentials on display, and everything feels too quiet. Would you buy?
One small e-commerce brand I worked with added 6 customer testimonials, SSL site security, and a “featured in local magazine” badge to their Wix page. Just these elements led to an A/B test showing a 17% increase in cart completions. Trust doesn’t have to be flashy. It just has to be there.
Finally, there’s the idea that you “launch the site” and then move on. A website is more like a garden than a billboard. Even the best-designed platform needs updates, tweaks, and fresh content to keep working for you.
One Franklin-area salon came to me after letting their original site sit untouched for three years. It still pronounced “Now Accepting Clients Summer 2022.” Outdated news like that creates a subtle dissonance. Visitors wonder what else is stale.
Designing a great website isn’t about picking trendy fonts or stacking pretty sections. At the core, it’s about knowing yourself, your customers, and being willing to build a bridge of clarity between the two.
You don’t have to avoid all mistakes perfectly. What matters more is your posture: stay curious, consume data with humility, and design with people—not perfection—in mind. Whether you’re in Webflow, Wix, WordPress, or just ideating a redesign, every smart decision you make adds up.
The most effective websites don’t just look good. They feel like they “get it.” That’s not magic—it’s discipline, strategy, empathy, and iteration. And those are things we can all keep growing in.
Copyright © Zach Sean Web Design
