We reviewed fifty local business websites, from Milton Keynes, Bedford, St Albans and their surrounding areas, to see what a prospect would actually find. The results say more about missed reputation than bad design.
We picked an honest cross-section, not a shortlist of the best or worst. Most of the businesses behind these sites are genuinely solid. Plenty of the websites don’t show it.
In Summary
- Most businesses we reviewed had real credibility, long trading histories, named accreditations, but the website rarely made that case clearly.
- Nearly six in ten sites were barely visible in search, so that reputation isn’t reaching many people online.
- About half relied on stock or generic imagery instead of showing the real business.
- One in seven sites had a fault serious enough to stop a visitor getting past the front page.
Why we did this
We kept hearing the same thing from business owners across the region: strong reputation, steady referrals, but a nagging doubt about the website. So we picked fifty real businesses, none of them clients, and reviewed each site cold, exactly as a prospect would land on it.
The businesses are often better than their websites let on
Eighteen per cent of the sites were strong all round. Fifty eight per cent were mixed. The rest, about a quarter, had real problems.
About one in five had strong trust signals and proper photography of their own, and still turned up for almost nothing in search. The credibility was there. It just wasn’t reaching anyone.
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Where the gaps actually sit
Search visibility was the biggest issue. Fifty eight per cent scored poorly for organic visibility. Just over half had a weak or missing page title. Six in ten showed clear signs of being out of date, an old copyright year or a news page nobody had touched in years.
Photography told a similar story. Close to half leaned on stock imagery or had none at all, even where the business had plenty worth showing.
One in seven had a website that simply wouldn’t load, usually an expired security certificate. For a visitor, that’s not a poor first impression. That’s no impression at all.
What’s actually working
Mobile browsing held up well almost everywhere, and contact details were usually easy to find. It’s the ongoing upkeep, especially photography and search visibility, that slips once a site goes live and nobody’s watching it.
The pattern worth paying attention to
The businesses in this study mostly earned their reputation through the work itself, not the website. And when someone looks you up before making contact, the website is often the only chance to confirm what that reputation already promised.
A strong reputation carried by a weak website still leaves something on the table. Of the two, the website is the one thing a business fully controls, and in this study it was very often the part getting the least attention.
If you’d like an honest look at how your own site would come across to someone who’s just found you, give us a call on 0800 690 6250 or drop us a message.
About Lemongrass Media
Lemongrass Media is a boutique website design agency based in Milton Keynes. We design corporate websites that look great, work hard and deliver real results for your business.
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