E-commerce entrepreneurs have many things to consider when having their retail, wholesale or affiliate website built and designed. An e-commerce storefront, like its brick and mortar real-world counterpart, is the physical representation of the company. As such, it must be an accurate reflection of the image the entrepreneur would like customers to see.

E-Commerce Web Development Management Pro Shares Tricks of the Trade

Bill Snowman owns a full service website design, print media and graphic design company. His company, CreateSource.com, caters to a variety of individuals, small businesses, corporations and other organizations. When asked to identify the top mistakes these entities make when having a website built, Bill had no trouble creating a list. In fact, he could have mentioned several more!

After paring the list down to the most critical, absolute worst mistakes e-commerce entrepreneurs can make with their website - the types of mistakes that cost businesses money, negatively impact their reputation, or send customers running in the other direction - Snowman shared the Top 3 E-Commerce Website Mistakes.

Accessibility and Usability Fall to the Wayside in Favor of "Cool" Effects

This is probably the biggest mistake made in all types of web design, Snowman points out, but it is rampant in e-commerce web design.

He notes that the "Web 2.0 crowd" love to use Ajax, Javascript, Flash and other widgets to make their site look cool. However, visitors with Java or Flash disabled lose not only aesthetics, but functionality.

Snowman recommends that e-commerce entrepreneurs disable all Flash, Javascript, images and even CSS style sheets to test their website. It might not be pretty, but if the forms work and the text is legible, it's functional. If it's not, it needs to be fixed so all visitors have access. Don't cut customers off in order to have a prettier website.