Although you can put everything on your website but please don’t. Here are a few things that should never go on a website, under any circumstances.
1) Vague headlines
Homepage headlines often fail to say what the business does. Instead, they offer a general statement about quality or value. The visitor’s first question is “am I in the right place?” The headline should answer this question by explicitly stating the main business category.
2) Section Headers
When parts of a page are broken up into smaller sections, those sections often get their own little headers. These headers are often larger than the items in the section, but far less meaningful. If you have section headers on the pages on your website, ask yourself this question, If I removed that header, would it confuse visitors? And If the answer is no, then the headers are not meaningful. It’s adding visual noise, not value.
3) Dates on the blog
If your content strategy is like mine, you write and share helpful, how-to articles that are useful to your audience. and they don’t go out of style. These articles are “evergreen.” The time travel well. They’ll be just as helpful in a month or a year. Adding dates to the blog design or in headlines just makes the content look old later on. If it’s not relevant, why show your age?
4) Long paragraphs
Some visitors read. All visitors scan. Short paragraphs are one of the best ways to make your content scannable. Compare these two pages. The page with the shorter paragraphs is far more likely to keep the visitor.
5) Ads for your own stuff
We’ve all conditioned ourselves to look away from ads. If it looks like an ad, we ignore it. It’s called “banner blindness.” But many website owners still put banner ads for themselves on their websites. It’s the worst way to get visitors’ attention.
6) Testimonials
Testimonials are “social proof” which is a key aspect of web design. Smart marketers support every marketing claim with evidence. But this evidence should be close to the claim, which makes it visible and keeps it in context. If it’s far away (on a separate page) and out of context (not specific to any claim) then it’s weak social proof.
7) Call to action
A call to action is an opportunity to tell the visitor what benefit they’re about to receive. Or, at least, what action they’re taking. A good CTA is specific and benefit-driven. A bad call to action says nothing. For example, a button that just says “submit.” It doesn’t really tell the client what to do or expect.
