Why flashy websites lose local leads

[SiteCraft]

I see so many local service businesses spending a fortune on web design, only for the agency to deliver a heavy site packed with sliding graphics, video backgrounds, and complex fade-in animations.

It looks great to a designer, but on a spotty 4G mobile signal at a job site, it takes 6 seconds to load.

A local customer looking for a quick service doesn't care about a smooth fade-in effect. They care about finding a phone number before their screen locks. If you are building a site for a local service, strip out the visual fluff. Speed and a massive click-to-call button will beat a pretty, slow website every single day.

Would you agree and what is your experience with web design and website creation?

 

[fisicx]

Don’t see many local business sites like that anymore. Can you point to such a site?

 

[SiteCraft]

Don’t see many local business sites like that anymore. Can you point to such a site?

Tysm for commenting. I would say the reason may be for exactly the fact that the websites with less flashy animations that cause friction to purchase are the most popular, get the most leads and are what more and more businesses are shifting towards

 

[fisicx]

That may be so. But you said:

I see so many local service businesses spending a fortune on web design, only for the agency to deliver a heavy site packed with sliding graphics, video backgrounds, and complex fade-in animations.

Can you link to some of these sites.

But even simple non-animated site have multiple issues. Mainly because they are homemade by trades with little experience of marketing.

 

[SiteCraft]

That may be so. But you said:


Can you link to some of these sites.

But even simple non-animated site have multiple issues. Mainly because they are homemade by trades with little experience of marketing.

I am unable to post links but these appear mainly in pages 4,5+ of local small business searches.
Yes I agree that even some simple non-animated sites can have issues eg buttons not working, slow loading if the trade business owner is no where near skilled in website creation.

 

[EnterprisePro]

@SiteCraft it feels like there's something you're looking for in terms of an answer or some kind of validation.

What I will say from my experience when listening to other business executives, is I feel there's a confusion in the whole idea of a website, brand positioning, marketing etc. and I think there's a education gap, which is what @fisicx has been saying here and in other threads.

Sites like Red Bull Racing, Rolls Royce etc. will prefer visual effects. They're not looking to sell from their websites but only to exude their brand experience and to wow you. The small businesses you're probably thinking of are getting mixed with this idea and having a purposeful UX to generate leads or to orders.

What is it you're looking to hear?

 

[SiteCraft]

@SiteCraft it feels like there's something you're looking for in terms of an answer or some kind of validation.

What I will say from my experience when listening to other business executives, is I feel there's a confusion in the whole idea of a website, brand positioning, marketing etc. and I think there's a education gap, which is what @fisicx has been saying here and in other threads.

Sites like Red Bull Racing, Rolls Royce etc. will prefer visual effects. They're not looking to sell from their websites but only to exude their brand experience and to wow you. The small businesses you're probably thinking of are getting mixed with this idea and having a purposeful UX to generate leads or to orders.

What is it you're looking to hear?

Oh ok I see what I have done. No, I'm not looking for validation at all. I was just trying to have an honest discussion about layout styles and web design, but I can't edit my original post to clarify what I meant.

I am specifically talking about small, local trade industry businesses eg plumbers, electricians etc, I completely agree that global brands like Rolls Royce or Red Bull Racing use visual effects for a brand experience because they aren't trying to generate direct leads from a web page.

My point is that small local trades do not have that kind of corporate budget. For a local plumber or electrician, their website needs to act purely as a direct utility to help local clients find them and call them fast when they have an active problem.

If there is still a gap in what I am thinking versus what you are thinking or anything else, please reply. I’m genuinely interested in hearing your experience and/or closing that education gap if there is something I am not seeing. Thxs for commenting

 

[fisicx]

I’m not sure there is a gap. Most sites do just fine, mainly because the business owners don’t employ fancy agencies to build their site. In fact I’d suggest many sites are just basic Wordpress installs which don’t have all the fancy animations.

Using a site builder is often the worst thing you can do.

 

[fisicx]

I am unable to post links but these appear mainly in pages 4,5+ of local small business searches.
Yes I agree that even some simple non-animated sites can have issues eg buttons not working, slow loading if the trade business owner is no where near skilled in website creation.

Just post the name of the business or the url with a space instead of a dot.

 

[martin_shl]

I think some "site builder" tools suck people in, offering a flashy experience with fading and sliding graphics for free, then upsell people on the features that actually matter.

 

[EnterprisePro]

For a local plumber or electrician, their website needs to act purely as a direct utility to help local clients find them and call them fast when they have an active problem.

Assuming this is B2C. It may differ for B2B.

If there is still a gap in what I am thinking versus what you are thinking or anything else, please reply. I’m genuinely interested in hearing your experience and/or closing that education gap if there is something I am not seeing. Thxs for commenting

I’m not sure there is a gap.

The gap I was referring to was understanding the difference between lead capture sites, functional sites/web-apps, brand positioning websites etc. I've seen people try to bung it all together in one site and its trying to be everything to everyone, when microsites on subdomains or separate domains could have worked better, but this is an extreme edge case I'm talking about. The education gap I was thinking about was little knowledge can be dangerous knowledge.

Using a site builder is often the worst thing you can do.

Worse than picking up a 9+ year old Angular web app with all secret env vars buried in source code and committed to Github? (not a made-up example sadly).

 

[SiteCraft]

I’m not sure there is a gap. Most sites do just fine, mainly because the business owners don’t employ fancy agencies to build their site. In fact I’d suggest many sites are just basic Wordpress installs which don’t have all the fancy animations.

Using a site builder is often the worst thing you can do.

Ok I agree if the Site Builder causes the website to load slowly due to heavy code and slow speed as people often leave if loading takes too long.

 

[SiteCraft]

Just post the name of the business or the url with a space instead of a dot.

I would say business.hub.services.co.uk

 

[SiteCraft]

Assuming this is B2C. It may differ for B2B.




The gap I was referring to was understanding the difference between lead capture sites, functional sites/web-apps, brand positioning websites etc. I've seen people try to bung it all together in one site and its trying to be everything to everyone, when microsites on subdomains or separate domains could have worked better, but this is an extreme edge case I'm talking about. The education gap I was thinking about was little knowledge can be dangerous knowledge.



Worse than picking up a 9+ year old Angular web app with all secret env vars buried in source code and committed to Github? (not a made-up example sadly).

OK I see thank you for replying

 

[fisicx]

I would say business.hub.services.co.uk

There is no such website. I'm looking for the URL of an actual local business website that has all the bells and whistles you describe.

PS: might be worth getting a review of your carrd.co website. Spotted all sorts of issues - first one being your anonymity.

PPS: You might get a cease and desist from these guys: https://www.sitecraft.agency/

 

[fisicx]

Ok I agree if the Site Builder causes the website to load slowly due to heavy code and slow speed as people often leave if loading takes too long.

Your site is 9.9 seconds according to Lighthouse

 

[martin_shl]

PS: might be worth getting a review of your carrd.co website. Spotted all sorts of issues - first one being your anonymity.

And the site also seems to have the fades, slides and special effects that the OP says is a problem on local business sites

 

[SiteCraft]

And the site also seems to have the fades, slides and special effects that the OP says is a problem on local business sites

Sorry this was the Waitlist not the actual website

 

[DavidReed]

For a plumber, locksmith or electrician I'd take “loads fast, tells me the area covered and has a phone number I can actually find” over a clever animation every time. I don't think flashy is automatically bad though. If it doesn't slow the site down or hide what I'm supposed to do next, no problem. It's when the design gets in the way that it becomes annoying.