Web Design
7 min read
Your site is not ugly. It is confusing.
Owners almost always blame the visuals. In the audits we run, the visuals are rarely the problem. The problem is that the page never says plainly what you do, who it is for, or what happens next.
The short answer
Websites usually fail to convert because of unclear messaging and a missing next step, not poor visual design. Say what you do in the first sentence, put one obvious action on every page, make the phone number tappable on mobile, and remove anything that competes with the action you want.
Five seconds to say what you do
A visitor who lands from a search gives you about five seconds before deciding whether they are in the right place. In that window they need to know what you sell, roughly who it is for, and whether you are near enough to matter.
Most homepages spend that window on a slogan. “Building relationships since 2008” tells the visitor nothing they can act on. “Roof repair and replacement across Monmouth County, usually on site within 24 hours” tells them everything.
One obvious action per page
Every page should have a single thing you most want the visitor to do, and it should be visible without scrolling and repeated near the bottom. Two equally weighted buttons is not a choice, it is a delay.
On a phone, the phone number should be tappable and above the fold. We still find businesses whose only number is an image in the footer.
Cut what competes
Rotating hero sliders, autoplaying video, three-column feature grids that repeat the same claim in different words. Each of these was somebody’s idea of thoroughness, and each of them costs attention that was going to be spent on your call to action.
When we rebuild a page, we usually remove about a third of what was there. Conversion rate almost always goes up, and clients almost always tell us afterwards that the page feels bigger.
Write like a person who answers the phone
The most persuasive copy on most service sites is a paragraph that sounds like the owner explaining something to a customer. Read your page aloud. Anywhere you would not say the sentence out loud, rewrite it.
This also happens to be what search rewards now. Clear, direct answers are what gets lifted into AI results and featured snippets, so writing for the customer and writing for search have finally stopped pulling in opposite directions.
We run this review free, on any site, whether or not you hire us. Call 732-398-6700.
Follow-up questions
Show the homepage to somebody outside your industry for five seconds, then ask them what you sell and who you sell it to. If they cannot answer, it is messaging.
It matters enormously for trust, and trust is a conversion factor. But a beautiful page that does not tell people what to do still fails, and an ordinary page that does can work fine.
One primary action per page, yes. Secondary actions are fine below it. Two equally weighted buttons is a decision you have handed to the visitor, and they usually decline it.
Let’s build something.
Twenty minutes on the phone and you’ll know whether we’re the right fit. Either way you’ll leave with something useful.