5 Ways to Make People Leave Your Site

Whenever I visit other sites to get news for my blogs or just to read the latest stories, the Monetizer always takes note quickly of website annoyances. These most likely aren't just irking the Monetizer but the majority of visitors and it makes you wonder why the site owners are running a site without thinking of how they want to be seen. Here's a quick list of 5 major annoyances Monetizer has noticed amongst some poorly set up sites.

1) Make it hard to find information - If the Monetizer was looking for something and visits a site then sees absolutely nothing related, he's leaving. Some people believe in "tricking" the system by loading up on meta keywords unrelated to their site page just to get traffic. Big mistake, play by the rules if you want real traffic. It's understandable if you want to just attract traffic for Adsense, but be realistic about the audience you want continuously visiting your site. This is especially true if you're blogging. The inability to find something a search engine produced isn't always the site's fault though. Google or other search engines may be somewhat to blame in the search results they are returning.

You could add to this tip the concept of "poor site navigation". If someone arrives at your site and can't find their way around in a relatively easy manner, they're probably leaving (which probably goes back to the trick of setting up sites just for Adsense).

2) Use those Dreaded Pop-Up Ads - Believe it or not, there's some sites (and I won't name names) that still believe in tricking visitors with HUGE pop-up ads. The question becomes do you want people visiting your site or not? When they go to the site to read an article and have a huge wall blocking their view, why would they want to come back again? When their purpose for visiting your site is to read what you have to say and then they have to try to click out of a huge box in their face, is that fair to them? One site I can recall has this happening constantly whenever you try to move to another part of the site. The year is 2007 and it's time to ditch that tactic in lieu of keeping people coming back to your site and allowing them to see what they want.

3) Create Overloaded, slow loading sites - This works in conjunction with #2 sometimes, but there are some sites that just are set up so poorly it takes forever to finally see some info you want to read. The site keeps loading and loading, because it has a ton of java script ads, pictures and other items installed. The person who designed it thinks they've jammed it full of cool, attractive stuff, but in reality it's a major pain to their visitors. Take some time to research ways to make your site load quickly, then worry about sponsorship ads and java tricks. Also, there are ways to put java code into seperate files versus right into the site's HTML code.

4) Use redirects to unrelated pages - Again there are some sites that redirect you away from what you clicked on to visit or read. You may have seen a headline, clicked it and then all of a sudden you're taken away from the page you were on or wanted to see. It makes little sense and this will only serve to irritate a visitor and make them "click out" or away from your site because they aren't getting what they came for.

5) Use Fakeness or Copycatting - Monetizer has visited sites with fake headlines at the end of a news story or entry which seem set up just to get people to visit another site. You take the "bait" click on the headline and arrive at a site full of more headlines that are real, but don't see the one you wanted to read about. This is a VERY poor tactic because while it may capture someone's short term interest, it will really irritate a person when they get to a site and find out that info was fake.

You could add to this point the concept that abounds on the internet of people stealing other people's blog entries and copying site design so they can make a fast buck. Very uncool and most likely when you get found out, things will just come crashing down. Avoid it. In keeping with politeness, John Cow has a post written prior to this about 5 Reasons he Stopped Reading Your Blog.

Amazingly, the Monetizer found all 5 of these mistakes listed above on just one website alone. Rest easy though, it was not a "Make Money" or "SEO" blog, but a totally different niche. The lesson here is to always view your site just as you were the customer or reader visiting it. Does it meet your expectations and standards for a site you want to check out further?

Basically if you're running a website the best policy is "do unto others as you would have done to you". It's a simple rule to go by, think about yourself as the reader when visiting a site and what you would really want to tolerate. Would you want to have to click out of Pop Up ads or wait up to 30 seconds or a minute to get the info you want, when you're using high speed internet? It's common consideration but more importantly it's what will keep people returning to your website because you've designed it to be"user friendly".