Imagine this: you've poured months into launching your business, fine-tuned your product or service, and now it's time to show the world. You build a website—either yourself or with help—and hit publish, confident it's doing its job. But then, silence. The traffic barely trickles in. Leads are nonexistent. Or worse, people are visiting your site, but taking no action.
As someone who builds websites for a living and spends a good chunk of time acting like a marketing therapist, I’ve witnessed the frustration that comes when a site just doesn’t convert. And it’s rarely just about the visuals. Underneath the hood, many sites suffer from critical usability, messaging, and SEO mistakes that hold them back from becoming the powerful business tools they were meant to be.
In this post, I want to walk through some of the most common website design mistakes I see—especially from service-based businesses, creatives, and local entrepreneurs. My goal isn’t to call anyone out, but to guide you through the perspective shift that empowers better design decisions. Mistakes are fixable, but only if we spot them first.
This is a trap nearly every business owner has fallen into at least once. You finally get to bring your vision to life, and it’s tempting to make design choices based on your personal preferences: your favorite colors, layouts, even song lyrics as headlines (yes, I've seen it). But here's the thing—your website isn't for you. It's for the people you're trying to reach.
A while ago, I worked with a therapist who wanted a minimalist black-and-white site that felt “edgy” and abstract. It looked cool—but completely alienated her target clients: anxious, middle-aged women looking for emotional safety. After gathering feedback and digging into the emotional context of her brand, we shifted toward soft colors, warmer copy, and photos that felt nurturing. Bookings picked up immediately.
This isn’t just about color palettes. It’s about examining every design and messaging element through the lens of your user. What state of mind are they in when they land on your site? What are they looking for first? What would help them feel seen and understood?
Your taste is important—but it should be filtered through empathy and strategy. A home builder might love brutalist industrial design, but wouldn’t use concrete walls in a nursery. The same thinking applies online.
Yes, design matters. But what matters more is how your design performs. I’ve reviewed plenty of beautifully designed websites that completely fall apart when users try to navigate or take action. Aesthetics without usability is like a sports car with no engine.
One client I worked with had a site built on a popular template from a no-code builder. It had full-screen video backgrounds, long transitions, and disappearing menus. It looked incredible on desktop. But on mobile, it was a nightmare to use. The menu was hard to find, calls to action were buried, and users had to scroll forever to reach key content.
After running a Google Lighthouse audit and diving into user behavior with Hotjar, we realized that 70% of visitors were bouncing within 10 seconds. By simplifying navigation, speeding up load time, and making the mobile experience seamless, bounce rate dropped dramatically, and engagement skyrocketed.
Great design isn't how flashy your hero section is. It's how efficiently it guides someone from confusion to clarity.
This one's close to home. I specialize in building beautiful sites, but I also help clients get found online. And I've lost count of how many visually cohesive websites launch without basic search engine optimization in place. No meta titles, generic image alt text, no heading structure—Google doesn’t stand a chance.
A client in Nashville hired me to revamp their Squarespace portfolio site. It looked sharp, but wasn’t showing up in any searches related to their niche (real estate photography). Turns out everything was built on one long page, with vague headers like “Work” and “Offerings.” No one googles “Offerings.”
We broke the content into categorized service pages, added location and keyword-optimized headings, and submitted it to Google Search Console. Within two months, their site started appearing on the first page for “Nashville real estate photographer.” Structured content works.
You don't need to be an SEO expert to implement strong fundamentals. But ignoring SEO altogether guarantees you're invisible to organic traffic, no matter how great your site is.
Imagine walking into a coffee shop where the barista says, “We offer solutions that facilitate dynamic outcomes.” Weird, right? And yet, so many websites are full of corporate jargon that might impress your peers—but completely baffles your audience.
I once worked with a local home services company whose homepage headline read: “Dedicated to Quality and Excellence in Client Solutions.” That could be literally any business. Instead, we reframed it to say: “We keep Franklin homes safe, warm, and running—24/7.” Specifics create trust.
Most of the time, vague copy comes from fear—trying to sound professional, not wanting to commit to a niche, or assuming customers already “get it.” But effective messaging clarifies at every opportunity.
Clear always beats clever. And clarity comes from understanding who you're talking to, why they care, and what they can expect next.
In 2024, speed isn’t a luxury—it’s essential for both user experience and SEO. According to Google PageSpeed Insights, the probability of bounce increases exponentially as page load time goes from 1 to 5 seconds. Yet I still see sites weighed down by massive background videos, oversized images, and scripts that don't do much for users.
One ecommerce client came to me because their conversion rate was lagging. Their store was built on WooCommerce, but it used a bloated theme filled with sliders and animations. We ran tests and found that their homepage was 6.4MB and took 7.3 seconds to load on mobile. After optimizing images, replacing the slider with a static image, and moving to a lightweight theme, we cut load time in half. Sales improved that very week.
A fast website not only pleases your visitors—it sends a positive signal to search engines and even improves mobile search rankings. If your site lags, you’re leaving money on the table.
On the surface, every page of your website should answer one big question: “What do I do next?” Unfortunately, many sites present content without any hierarchy, logic, or flow—leaving the user unsure of where to scroll, click, or even look.
Think of your homepage like a sales conversation. You don’t greet someone with all your pricing, then interrupt them to talk about your mission statement, then show testimonials randomly. You guide them gradually: attention, interest, desire, and then action.
I recently rebuilt a site for a massage therapist who had 14 sections on her homepage, all laid out with no real order. We restructured the site to follow a simple story:
The goal is more than just "a nice layout." It’s to create a rhythm that earns trust and nudges people forward—without making them think too hard.
This one’s for my fellow Nashville and Franklin small businesses: if you serve a local audience, your website needs to reflect that. I’m amazed by how many sites miss this completely—generic language, no location signals, or trying to compete nationally when they should dominate locally first.
One of my clients is a mobile dog groomer based here in Williamson County. Her old site was optimized for general terms like “dog grooming services” which had lots of volume, but crazy competition. By shifting the strategy to focus on “Franklin TN mobile dog groomer” and similar variants, and embedding her site with local references (Google Maps embed, local testimonials, neighborhood names), her business started ranking almost immediately. She’s now booked out weeks in advance.
Design doesn’t exist in a vacuum. It’s one part of a larger ecosystem—and when you connect your site to your physical community, all ships rise.
A great website isn’t just pretty. It listens. It leads. It clarifies. It serves both real-world users and search engines without sacrificing either. But getting there requires a shift in mindset—from focusing on what looks good to what actually works.
To recap, the most common mistakes I see fall into one of several categories:
Your website is the one employee who works 24/7 without complaining. It either builds trust and drives conversions—or quietly turns people away. Small changes can have an outsize impact.
Whether you’re just starting out, or auditing an old site with fresh eyes, don’t just aim for pretty. Aim for purpose. That’s where real results start.
– Zach
Copyright © Zach Sean Web Design
