5 Signs Your Website Isn't Working

Most people know when their website isn’t doing what they need it to do, but it can be difficult to figure out why. In the ever-changing digital landscape, it can be hard to know where to start, let alone find the answers. But don’t worry, that’s where we can help.

If You Recognise These Signs, Your Website Will Be Losing You Leads

First things first, when it comes to your business, you know it better than anyone on the outside. This means that if you feel like something isn’t working as it should be, it needs to be looked at.  This can range from low leads to a drop in website traffic to a change in the way customers are interacting with you online, but if you notice any of the five following things, you will know it's time to do something about it.

Do any of these sound familiar?

You’re getting traffic… but no enquiries

If you are seeing a good level of visitors on your site but no conversions, your website isn’t doing its job.

You may have heard people in the marketing sphere refer to websites as funnels, but have you ever wondered why? The reason for the name is that a site's primary function is to guide (or funnel) your traffic towards a purchase or sign-up. So, if your enquiries aren’t coming in, your first step should be to interrogate your users' experience.

To do this and create an effective marketing funnel, you need to understand the customer journey and map it out so you can identify where potential friction will be in their experience. We know that some business owners can struggle to do this, especially when they are familiar with their sites set up, so we always recommend a fresh pair of eyes to go through the process with you and navigate the site pretending to be a real customer. This will give you the insight into where your sticking points are, and get suggestions on what the smoothest user experience looks like.

Your site doesn’t look good on mobile

As of 2026, 60% to 64% of all online visits come from mobile. This means that if your site is optimised for a desktop or laptop computer screen, rather than a phone's display, you are not catering to the largest market.

So when you are visiting your site yourself, it is always a good idea for your default device to be a mobile phone so you can review what the majority of your users are seeing.

Visitors leave pages within seconds

There can be a myriad of reasons that a person may click off your site. Most commonly, these will be because of the load speed, a lack of relevant information, or the site not being about what the user expected.

So, if you haven’t already, you need to find out the average time a person spends on each of your website's pages, as this will give you the data on which pages are the most engaging vs which pages are underutilised. As you may expect, the most important page to optimise is your home page. It’s the page that the majority of your traffic will pass through on the way to the rest of your site, and updating it will make the biggest impact on your viewer retention.

Touching back on our previous point, the type of device that your visitor is using will influence the average time they spend on each page. As a general rule, mobile users spend less time on web pages than desktop users, so don’t be disheartened if you see this. It’s just all the more reason to optimise your site for mobile users.

It’s unclear what you actually offer

Clarity and simplicity are much more valuable on your website than most people think. Unfortunately, no amount of amazing design or beautiful photos can make someone a customer if they don’t know what it is you are offering.

It is a good idea to look at the content laid out on your site and see what information is placed where. As a general rule of thumb, the most basic and important information should be at the top, with it getting longer and more in-depth as you scroll down. If you are unsure what information would be the most important to a website visitor, go back through your recent enquiries and see what themes are most frequently discussed or take a look at your competitors and see what the top 5 of them include at the top of their sites.

You’re embarrassed to send people to it

Ultimately, if you don't want to look at your own website, then why would anyone else?

If you feel like your website is subpar, don’t just ignore it. Take an hour or two to sit with your site and make a note of exactly what it is that means you don’t want others to see it. Once you have figured out your issues with it, that is the first step towards improvement. Your website should always be your business's best foot forward, so you need to make sure that it’s going to present you to the world in a way that you are happy with.

But Why Does Any Of This Matter?

In this day and age, users search and buying habits are changing all the time. People don’t just use traditional Google searches to find businesses anymore, as more and more turn to AI tools and chat-based searches to look into products and services.

On top of that, attention spans are dropping, so businesses have less and less time to grab users' attention and convince them to stay. You may have heard people say that in the modern age, we operate in an ‘attention economy’ and that has never been more applicable than in the digital world. The faster you can grab attention, the more likely you are to turn it into engagement and eventually, profit.

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