10 Design Decisions That Annoys Readers

As a member of multiple social media networks, I end up at various different blogs reading articles. I have noticed alot of decisions that designers make which really annoys the readers. I know as a reader I get annoyed and after reading multiple forum posts, talking to webmasters, and reading the tweets, I know that some of these decisions really annoys others as well.

1. Contextual Ad Pop-Ups

Many bloggers are now implementing this feature in their blog. Whether it is by contextual ad, infolink or another service, they all look ugly and they are annoying. These ads are popups that appear when you bring your mouse over a hyperlinked text.

Most of the time these ads are not the most relevant ones, and they just make your website look more spammy.

2. Auto Music Plays

This is probably one of the most retarded think you can do on your website. It is so annoying when you have an automated song. This was something that teenagers like on Myspace. Which is one of the reasons why I don’t go on myspace page. Users don’t have an option to never listen to it. Which often takes your reader away from your site.

3. PopUp Ad Window

Any ad that is a popup ad is annoying. With the new technology of tabs, most users don’t open the new site in a new window. So when you force them to see a popup ad in a new window it gets really annoying. I suggest get rid of all pop up ads from your website because you will end up losing users.

4. Not Visible Search Bar

Why would you put your search bar in the footer? That is the worst place to put a search bar. You want to cut your bounce rate? Then put a search bar towards the top, preferably above the fold. Because if the user doesn’t find the right article, they can search for it. I get really frustrated when I can’t find the search bar on a site. Most likely, I end up leaving. So make your search bar visible.

5. Obtrusive Subscription Request

I told you guys once about how annoying Shoemoney, JC and other blogs are when they put a pop out asking you to subscribe to their feed and newsletter. I see a trend in more and more blogs asking users to subscribe to their feed at the top of the post, at the bottom of the post, in the post and more. Do you understand how annoying it is if a person is already a subscriber? I was subscribed to Shoemoney’s newsletter, but Aweber system didn’t recognize me and kept showing that popup. So I ended up unsubscribing and stop going to his site.

Users who choose this decision on their blog should just put “Please Subscribe to My feeds, otherwise I will keep nagging you, and even if you do, I will keep nagging you with this message”. This is just annoying. Don’t do it.

6. Obtrusive Advertisement

I am seeing this on blogs and myspace type sites too. You will get to a page and all of the sudden, there would be an advertisement page with a button, skip to the website. Often bloggers and webmasters think that by adding this, it will make them a few extra bucks. Or sometimes they don’t even bother reading the whole ad page, and just grab the code. I know it happened to me when I was on Adbrite, I did that. I didn’t read the whole page, and continued to get the code. It turned out, I didn’t turn off this feature. It was so annoying to my readers that I got emails from them asking me to turn this off.

7. Hidden Subscription Option

Sometimes I get to a blog that I really like. And guess what. I can’t find a subscription option. Your feeds are not visible. There is not even an option to subscribe. Guess where I will go if I don’t find that. Not to your website again!

Make sure that you make your feeds visible. Don’t use feed:http://feedurl.com << Instead use the normal feed url because otherwise it requires the feed reader. In my computer it starts launching Outlook which is really annoying.

8. Small Font Size

Ok not everyone has 20/20 vision. I know alot of older readers read my site. That is the reason why I have my text size at a decent size. I know in some designs it looks really good to have smaller font size, but think about your readers. If they can’t read your website, then they will not read. They will just leave. Try to have a reasonable font size for users.

9. Talking Advertisement

If you have this advertisement in your design then get rid of it. Because by doing this you are telling your users to turn off their speakers. It is so annoying when I hear “Congratulations, You have won a free Apple Ipod”….

It is just one of the most frustrating part of a design if you add it.

10. Snap Preview

I have seen sites using this Snap Preview feature quite alot now. It is annoying because I don’t want to see a mini popup showing me a website’s screenshot when I bring my mouse over the URL. I want to have an option to not see that site. So get this feature out of your design. It just gets annoying and sometimes freeze older computers. I have that happen in my High School lab computers. So avoid this.

The Bottom Line

Before you Make any decision about your site and the design structure, make sure you evaluate the pros and cons. You can argue either for and against each point that I mentioned above, but that is how I think. I just want you to think about your readers not just about your pocket.