Webmasters of all skill levels are attracted to the adult Internet space because of the opportunities it provides to individual entrepreneurs. While our industry does get credit for some of the more creative and intuitive websites on the Internet, we also get credit for cluttering the Web with sites that suffer from a number of common usability problems.A poorly designed website can be fatal to the user experience, and therefore to conversions.

If you’re designing your own website then you have to spend some time thinking about the usability topic. Here you’ll be asking yourself what happens when your target audience actually makes it to your website. Will they find what they’re looking for with minimal fuss? Or will they have to spend too much time trying to figure out how your site works?

If you’re running a simple website then your task is simple as well. Most independent adult webmasters build sites that fall into this category. For a more complex site like YNOT.com, which offers a lot of different content options, your task is a bit more challenging. But either way, the principles are the same.

Here’s are a few common usability problems that seem to pop up again and again with adult websites.

Problem 1: Your page is littered with pictures and text that just aren’t necessary. Take a look at your website and ask yourself whether everything you have on the page NEEDS to be on the page. Anything you have on the page should be serving an important purpose. If you can cut back on clutter and keep your page focused then you’ll improve the experience for your users, and likely up your conversions as well.

Problem 2: It’s hard to understand what your site offers. This is a common usability problem for webmasters of all skill levels. Again, this can be tricky with a large site like YNOT.com, since we offer a variety of content features like message boards, webmaster articles, industry news, professional service listings, etc. Even if your site is complex like YNOT.com, each page of your site needs to be focused on its own individual purpose. Before building a page, think long and hard about what purpose that page serves, and how you can get that purpose across to visitors through multimedia and/or text, the most common tools at your disposal.

Problem 3: Your visitors can’t find the desired content. Let’s say a visitor arrives on your website after searching for “free porn pictures,” but on arrival all he or she can find is reviews of premium porn sites. Where’s the free porn? This is where good analytics software can come in handy. Know what your visitors are searching for when they arrive at your website, then make sure to design your pages in such a way where the user is connected to the desired content in a minimal number of clicks.

Problem 4: Your visitors think your site is something it’s not. Let’s say I built an adult dating website. As part of an SEO campaign, I built a section on the site that offers free advice about how to impress women on a first date. That’s certainly reasonable content for a dating site, and might actually bring in some additional traffic. But what happens if the people who arrive at this page think my website is about relationship advice rather than dating? If you build support pages, make sure the overall purpose of your website is still clear on each and every page.

Problem 5: The text on your website is too small or too big. Another common usability problem. If your text is too big, it will make your website look unprofessional and turn off a lot of visitors. If the text is too small, you’re making it hard for most visitors to read your website. You know that small text they use in the disclaimers they put at the bottom of some advertisements? Yeah, they don’t INTEND you to read that text. Even if you put text on a page largely for SEO campaigns, you should still find a way to utilize that text in support of a positive user experience.

Problem 6: Your website’s navigation menus are confusing. This can be anything from poorly designed buttons, poor choice of text labels for buttons, poor use of conventions like pull down menus, or too many choices on your top level of navigation. As an example, until recently YNOT.com’s navigation was much smaller, and more confusing. Our online message boards were labeled as “Chat,” which while technically accurate was confusing to a lot of visitors. Chat can be associated with things like live chat rooms, video chat, etc. We recently changed the menu system to make the buttons simple and clear, and labeled the button for our message boards “YNOT Forums,” which is a lot less confusing.

Remember that websites are dynamic, and you’ll need to change your website regularly to respond to the data that you collect from its operation. Website usability isn’t just a concern when you’re building pages. It’s a topic that you need to revisit from time to time as your knowledge changes, and as the habits and expectations of your visitors change as well.