Jonathan Clark of Diginovas, the small business website experts, spoke to our CHAMPS Member Lunch and Learn this week on 3 Critical Website Tips Every Business Owner Needs to Know.

The takeaways straight from the Diginovas presentation:

It’s fairly simple to build a website in this day and age. But it’s not so easy building an exceedingly good one that fulfills its purpose and meets business goals.

While I’ve seen many mistakes people make in the course of developing a website, like poor navigation, too much clutter, or inconsistent branding, I’d like to share with you what I believe to be the most critical pitfalls.

1.  SCAMS

DOMAIN SLAMMING SCAMS

Your domain name is critical to your business.  Know where your domain is registered and do not fall prey to domain slamming scams.  The easiest way to protect yourself from a domain name scam is knowledge. You know, or someone you trust knows where and how your domain name is registered.

If you are unsure, your website provider should be able to tell you who your domain name is registered with and clarify if the letter or email you’ve received is legitimate.

SEO SCAMS

This is from Google’s SEO guidelines:

Beware of SEOs that claim to guarantee rankings, allege a “special relationship” with Google, or advertise a “priority submit” to Google.

There is no priority submit for Google.

In fact, the only way to submit a site to Google directly is through their Add URL page or by submitting a Sitemap and you can do this yourself at no cost whatsoever.

No one can guarantee a #1 ranking on Google or Bing.

2.  CHOOSING THE WRONG PLATFORM

It’s important to understand that not all website platforms are the same and there are thousands from which to choose.

The main consideration is that the CMS should fit the business objective of the website. For example, if your objective is to sell products online, you should use a CMS built for e-commerce — not a blogging CMS that’s been modified for e-commerce.

While there are many good options, hiring a consultant for a business case analysis is money well-spent because migrating site content from one system to another after the fact can be a tricky proposition and one that can get expensive in a hurry.

3.  UNFRIENDLY SCREEN RESOLUTIONS

The personal computer is no longer the only device customers have at their disposal to browse the web.

A website that is not ready for mobile devices such as smart phones and tablets will likely turn away visitors. More than half of all the traffic on the web today originates on a mobile device.

And mobile traffic is increasing exponentially. Ignoring these devices puts a business at huge competitive disadvantage.

The best practice for a mobile-friendly site is through a design process called responsive web design.

This allows a website to adapt to different screen resolutions through a “fluid” design that either nudges content down on smaller screens or completely hides it.

SUMMARY

Today, websites vary from simple, one-page brochures to complex, cloud-based sites integrated with dissimilar software.

And clearly, there are many other details for consideration other than what I’ve discussed today.

But there are few factors that can have such an impact on the success of a website than falling prey to scams, choosing the wrong platform, or ignoring your mobile audience.