I think you agree that it's hard enough to bring people to your little slice of cyberspace, and once they're inside, you have just a very few brief seconds to catch their attention. If your site is not prepared enough, a simple click and your site visitor is gone!

It's hard to give a perfect solution to all above points. But I can help you with some main blunders you should avoid in order to keep as many interested prospects on your site.

1. Slow downloading.

Most of the time the visitor is in a big rush. S/he knows that time is money and s/he think that in every situation moving fast means to earn more. The visitor in looking for a big goal and, from this big rush perspective, if your site is running very slow that means there is nothing interesting inside. Then take care to avoid big pictures or large pages. Do not use too many sophisticated scripts and applets, they work slow as well.

2. Multiple popup and popunder windows.

Is fact that most people simply do NOT appreciate multiple popups or popunders! Try to guess what will think a visitor coming to your site when s/he sees a lot of windows popping like crazy. With no doubt this visitor will be confused, scared maybe, and his choice will be to go anywhere, just to find an escape.

3. Unreadable text.

Certain texts are easier to read than others. For example, everybody knows that dark text on a light background is the easiest to read. The reverse -- like white text on black background -- can cause fatigue when reading large pages of text. This technique is better used just to highlight a portion of the page, but not very often. On the other hand, a text that is too small can cause problems.

As a general rule try to avoid everything that could make people feel uncomfortable, because they will choose to leave your cyber-island.