As soon as I see a big PHP error message on a website I leave straight away. It means something isn’t working and the webmaster obviously isn’t on top of everything. Always concentrate and do everything you can to avoid errors on your website.

When installing new designs in the past I have had PHP errors on my own websites. Once I had entered a small bit of ’php include’ code into a file and spelt it wrong. The site was producing big fat errors for about 4 hours, by then my error_log was massive! Hundreds of visitors had been to the site during that time, and no doubt they all left within a couple of seconds, costing me in revenue, potential return visitors and credibility with those who may stumble across my site again.

So, the lesson is clear: whenever messing with your design or coding always create separate folders to test everything before making it live on your website. When you do make it live also keep checking it is all working fine, you don’t want to do what I did as the effects are very negative!

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