The number one sign of an amateur website is clutter. It’s the digital equivalent of a messy shop floor.
We’re talking about too many colours, five different fonts, flashing banners, and a homepage that tries to tell you everything all at once. It's overwhelming, and visitors will just click away.
The Fix: Be ruthless. Give your homepage a good spring clean. Ask yourself: "What is the one thing I want someone to do when they land here?" Is it to call you? Fill in a form? Buy a product?
Make that one thing the absolute focus. Everything else on the page should support that goal. If it doesn't, get rid of it. White space is your best friend, it makes your site look clean, confident, and a lot more high-end.
This one isn't technically on your website, but it’s a huge part of your professional image.
If your contact page says "Email us at [email protected]" or [email protected], you’re instantly losing trust. It screams 'one-man-band-working-from-a-shed' (even if you're not).
The Fix: Get a professional, domain-based email address. You already own yourbusiness.com, so you should be using [email protected]. It’s almost always a very cheap, simple add-on from your domain provider, and it makes you look 100% more credible overnight.
Nothing says "nobody's home" like a website that's gathering dust.
Go and look at the copyright notice in your website's footer. Does it say "© 2019"? Is your 'Latest News' section proudly showing a post from two years ago? Does your team page still have someone who left in 2022?
The Fix: Go through every single page. Update all your dates. Fix spelling mistakes. Remove out-of-date offers or services. This basic housekeeping shows visitors that your business is active, current, and paying attention to detail.
You know the ones. The perfect, multi-ethnic team smiling at a laptop. The generic woman in a headset.
Bad stock photos are worse than no photos. They make your business look completely generic. The same goes for blurry, dark photos you took on your phone.
The Fix: You don't need a massive budget. A few, high-quality, real photos can transform your site. If you're a local business in South Wales, show it. Get a decent photo of your team (even if it's just you), your premises, or your actual work. It builds instant, authentic trust.
All these tips will help. They will absolutely make your site look better. But, it's often just papering over the cracks.
You can wash and polish an old car, and it will look great on the drive. But if the engine is failing and it’s built on a rusty chassis, it's not going to win any races.
It's the same with your website. These fixes are great, but they can't solve a bad foundation. If your site is built on a clunky, bloated template, it's still going to be slow. If it's held together with dozens of old plugins, it's still a security risk. If it's impossible to update, you'll just be frustrated again in six months.
So by all means, get polishing. But if you find you're fighting the system at every turn, or these changes don't fix the real problem (it's just not bringing you any customers), you'll know it's time to stop tweaking and start thinking about a proper, custom-built solution.
We're proud to have been recognised as Wales' Most Trusted Web Design & Development Company for 2025. This award reflects our commitment to delivering exceptional digital solutions and outstanding client service that sets the standard for excellence.
He is able to understand what I want and need from AI and IT in general. I have established a trusted and supportive relationship with him and I can't recommend him more than I do. He explains what he is doing and delivers what is needed.