While a poorly designed website is a wasted opportunity for any business, it is a particularly costly one for an Internet marketing business.
We want visitors to feel good when they visit our sites - good enough to stay around and find out what we have to offer.
If you cannot create a user-friendly site, your potential customers will not stay around.
We have all visited websites that test our patience by making it hard to navigate or to find what we want.
We need to learn from these sites and make sure the ones we build are user friendly.
Here are some things we should avoid, as they are pet hates of many site visitors.

1. Playing a video as soon as a visitor lands on the site, particularly when it is difficult to stop it.
   Sometimes the stop or exit button on the video is hard to find and they cannot react fast enough to turn it off.
   It is easier to push the back button or exit the page.
   It is doubly annoying if they are caught with the sound turned up and they cannot get to the volume control quickly.
   Particularly if they do not want others to know what they are viewing.
   That's when it is easier to close the page.
   
2. Having a pop-up ad just as they are starting to read the content.
   This may not be as annoying as a video but it can still be off-putting.
   The pop-up interrupts their train of thought.
   If they came to the site for specific information and they find the pop-up annoying, there are probably plenty of other sites that will have the same information.
   However, many marketers swear pop-ups do work if done correctly.
   For example, if they help provide the information people are looking for or if they are asking visitors to join an email list.
   There is strong agreement that exit pop-ups do work.
   So, while pop-ups may seem annoying, you need to use them intelligently and with discretion.
   
3. Most people will not work their way through a page full of content with closely written text and very little white space.
   They have to work their way through the text to get the gist of it.
   There may be long sentences, long paragraphs or both.
   Maybe there are no headings, so a reader cannot scan their eyes down the text and quickly locate the information they want.
   If they have to work too hard, they will simply look for the information on another site.
   
4. Do your visitors know what you want them to do? Is it clear what your website is about and what action you want them to take? Have you clearly identified the problems they might have and the solutions you can provide or the benefits they can get by taking some action now? Have you asked them to take that action now so it is obvious to them what you want them do?

Building a user-friendly site may seem very basic but many Internet marketers get this wrong.
While your site may not pass the test with every Internet guru, it should at least provide a pleasant and satisfying experience for anyone who visits it.
Otherwise, they will move on and take their money with them.