Are You Making These 5 Costly Website Mistakes That Drive Away Local Customers?

A café owner in Watchet rang me about six months back, frustrated that her website wasn't bringing in any new customers. She'd spent good money on it, but footfall hadn't increased. When I looked at her site, I found the same problems I see time and time again — simple mistakes that actively push customers away rather than welcome them in.

After four decades helping Somerset businesses get online, I've noticed patterns. The same handful of errors crop up whether you're a plumber in Taunton or running a B&B near Minehead. The good news? They're all fixable, and most won't cost you a fortune to sort out.

1. Your Contact Details Are Playing Hide and Seek

This drives me mad. I visited a local electrician's website last autumn — spent five minutes hunting for a phone number before giving up and calling his competitor instead. If I can't find your contact details in under 10 seconds, neither can your customers.

Your phone number should be in the header of every page. Not buried in the footer. Not hidden on a contact page three clicks deep. Right there at the top where people expect it.

For local businesses, I always recommend including:

• Phone number (clickable on mobile)
• Full address with postcode
• Opening hours
• Email address
• A Google Maps embed showing your location

One of my clients, a garage in Bridgwater, saw a 40% increase in phone enquiries after we moved their number from the footer to the header. Such a simple change, but it made all the difference.

2. Your Website Takes Forever to Load

Three seconds. That's how long people will wait for your site to load before they leave. Google's own research shows 53% of mobile users abandon sites that take longer than three seconds to load. In rural Somerset where mobile signal can be patchy, a slow site is even more damaging.

I tested a local restaurant's website earlier this year — 12 seconds to load on 4G. Twelve! They were using massive, uncompressed images straight from their camera. Each photo was 5MB when it could've been 200KB with no visible quality loss.

How to Check Your Site Speed

Head to Google's PageSpeed Insights and pop in your website address. It'll give you a score out of 100 and specific recommendations. Anything under 50 needs urgent attention.

Common speed killers I see:

• Huge image files (resize and compress them)
• Too many plugins (especially on WordPress)
• Cheap hosting (you get what you pay for)
• No caching enabled
• Embedded videos that autoplay

3. You're Invisible on Google Maps

When someone searches "plumber near me" or "café Minehead", Google Maps results dominate the top of the page. If you're not there, you're invisible. Yet I'd estimate half the local businesses I work with haven't even claimed their Google Business Profile.

Setting this up is free and takes about 20 minutes. You'll need:

• Your business name and address
• Phone number and website
• Business hours
• A few photos of your premises
• To verify your address (Google sends a postcard)

A B&B owner near Dunster set up their profile back in spring after I nagged them about it. They're now getting 15-20 extra bookings per month directly from Google Maps. That's thousands of pounds in revenue from 20 minutes' work.

4. Your Site Looks Terrible on Mobile

Over 60% of local searches happen on mobile phones. If your site doesn't work properly on a phone, you're turning away more than half your potential customers. I see this constantly with older websites — they look fine on desktop but fall apart on mobile.

Common Mobile Mistakes

• Text too small to read without zooming
• Buttons too close together (fat finger syndrome)
• Forms that are impossible to fill in
• Horizontal scrolling (drives people mental)
• Pop-ups that can't be closed on mobile

Test your site on your phone right now. Better yet, ask a friend to try booking your service or buying something. Watch them struggle and you'll quickly spot the problems.

When I redesigned a hair salon's website in Taunton last summer, their mobile bookings increased by 75%. Same services, same prices — just a site that actually worked on phones.

5. You're Not Telling People What You Actually Do

This sounds daft, but you'd be amazed how many websites forget to clearly state what the business does. They assume everyone knows. They use industry jargon. They waffle on about their "passion for excellence" without mentioning they're a plumber.

Your homepage needs to answer three questions immediately:

• What do you do?
• Where do you do it?
• How can people buy from you?

I worked with a shop in Williton whose homepage said "Welcome to Smith & Sons - Serving the Community Since 1952". Lovely sentiment, but what do they sell? Turns out they're a hardware shop. Once we changed the headline to "Hardware & DIY Supplies in Williton", their website enquiries tripled.

Don't Let These Mistakes Cost You Another Customer

Every day these problems persist, you're losing money. The café owner I mentioned at the start? After fixing these five issues, her weekend trade increased by 30%. She's had to hire extra staff to cope with demand.

Start with the easiest fixes — add your phone number to the header, claim your Google Business Profile, compress those images. You don't need to tackle everything at once. Pick one problem and sort it this week.

If you're not sure where to start, grab a cuppa and spend 10 minutes on your own website. Try to book your service or find your opening hours. If you find it frustrating, imagine how your customers feel. Then get to work fixing it.

Your website should be your hardest-working employee — on duty 24/7, never calls in sick, never takes a holiday. Make sure it's doing its job properly.

Sources

• Google Mobile Speed Study — Research on mobile page load times and abandonment rates
• UK Government Internet Access Statistics — Data on UK internet and mobile usage patterns
• BrightLocal Consumer Review Survey — Research on how consumers use online reviews for local businesses

About the Author: Marcus Knapman has been designing websites since the mid-1980s. Based in Williton, Somerset, he runs Exmoorweb — helping small businesses across Minehead, Watchet, Taunton, Bridgwater, and the wider South West build their online presence. With a BSc (Hons) and over 40 years of hands-on experience, he combines technical expertise with practical business sense.