In the previous article I wrote about why most small-firm websites don't bring in clients. The reason almost always comes down to the same thing: the owner looks at the site differently than a potential client does. To you, everything "looks fine". To a client — it doesn't.
This article is a self-audit. Open your site on a phone, not a computer, and walk through these five checks. If you recognize yourself in any of them, you know what the next step is.
1. The year in the footer is not this year
Scroll to the bottom of your home page. What does it say next to the copyright symbol? If it says 2023, 2022, or worse — you're done. The visitor won't consciously think "this site hasn't been updated", but they'll feel something is off. Does this firm even still operate? Will they reply to my message? Is the email address listed still active?
Doubt alone is enough for the client to move on. And you lost the business because of two characters in the footer.
This is the smallest possible problem to fix, and the loudest signal of disinterest you can leave.
2. The contact form doesn't work — and you don't know it
Send yourself a message through the contact form on your own site. Wait ten minutes. Did it arrive in your inbox?
In at least half the websites I audit, the answer is no. The form "works" in the sense that after clicking submit, it says "thank you" — but the message never arrives. Sometimes it's an SMTP configuration issue, sometimes the receiving email address is outdated, sometimes messages end up in a spam folder nobody checks.
Think about what that means: every client who contacted you through the form in the last year — never heard back from you. They assumed you weren't interested. They went to someone else.
Try it now. Seriously.
3. The site doesn't work properly on a phone
Open your site on a mobile device. Not in your browser's "responsive mode" — on an actual phone.
Check:
- Is the text large enough to read without zooming?
- Can buttons be clicked with a finger, or do you need to be very precise?
- Do the menus work properly?
- Do images load, or do they take up too much space?
- When you click the phone number, does it open a call?
More than sixty percent of visitors come from a phone. If your site on a phone looks like a shrunk-down version of the desktop site, the visitor won't try again from a computer — they'll leave.
This is, today, the biggest difference between a site that converts and a site that doesn't.
4. The visitor doesn't know what to do next
Open your home page and pretend you're seeing it for the first time. What do you want the visitor to do?
Call you? Send an email? Fill out a form? Book a meeting? Read more about your service?
Now look at the site — is that one thing obvious in the first few seconds? Or does the visitor have to scroll, search, guess?
The most common mistake isn't a lack of calls to action — it's too many of them. "Contact us", "Learn more", "Our services", "Our team", all at once, all weighted the same. A visitor with too many choices picks none. Closes the tab.
A good website has a clear hierarchy: one primary action, visible immediately, that leads to contact. Everything else is secondary.
5. The site loads slowly
Go to PageSpeed Insights and enter your site's address. Test the mobile version. If your score is below 50, or the site takes longer than three seconds to load — you lose half your visitors before they ever see your home page.
The reasons are almost always the same: oversized images nobody optimized, too many scripts and plugins, cheap hosting that responds with a several-second delay.
The visitor doesn't wait. A client looking for a lawyer or accountant typically searches three or four firms at once, opens them in different tabs. The one that opens first gets the advantage. The one that doesn't open at all — loses.
What now
If while reading this you opened your site and recognized at least one of these five things — it doesn't mean all is lost, but it does mean you're losing clients right now, while you read.
The hardest part isn't the fix. The hardest part is recognizing the problem, because you've looked at the same website for five years and gotten used to it. The client is seeing it for the first time.
In the next article we shift the angle: we stop looking at what's wrong and start looking at what a good site actually looks like — from the client's perspective, not the owner's.
If you'd like a direct audit of your site covering these five points and others, get in touch. The review is free and takes about one working day.