We audit around forty websites a year. The problems repeat with unnerving regularity, and almost none of them are matters of taste. They are structural decisions that quietly cost enquiries every day. A structured audit takes two to four days and costs 1,800 to 4,500 EUR. You receive a prioritised list separating quick wins from structural work, annotated screenshots, and a rough effort estimate per item. Most clients implement the first third themselves, which is exactly the point. Here are the seven findings that appear in almost every report.
1. The hero says nothing
A headline like Welcome to our website or Your partner for the future tells a visitor nothing. The first screen has one job: say what you do, for whom, and what happens next. Replace the slogan with a plain sentence and put one primary action next to it. In tests this single change regularly lifts scroll depth by 20 to 30 percent. A useful check: cover the logo and read the headline aloud. If it could belong to any company in your industry, it is not a headline, it is decoration.
2. Navigation built around the org chart
Menus that mirror internal departments force visitors to guess. Name items after the problems people have, not after your divisions. Seven top-level items is the practical maximum; beyond that, recognition drops sharply and the menu becomes a wall of text. Test the labels with three people outside the company: give them a task and watch where they click first. Every hesitation is a naming problem, not a user problem.
3. Forms that ask too much
- Every optional field costs completions. Remove anything sales can ask later.
- Label fields above the input, not inside it, so the label stays visible while typing.
- Validate on blur with a clear message next to the field, never with an alert box.
- State what happens after submission and how quickly you reply.
4. Contrast that fails on a sunny day
Light grey text on white is the most common accessibility failure we see. WCAG 2.1 AA requires a contrast ratio of at least 4.5 to 1 for body text and 3 to 1 for large text and interface elements. This is not only a legal matter under the German Accessibility Strengthening Act: it also determines whether your text is readable on a phone outdoors.
If a design only works in a dark office on a calibrated screen, it does not work.
5. Invisible focus states
Removing the focus outline because it looks untidy breaks keyboard navigation entirely. Design a focus style that matches your brand instead: a two-pixel outline with sufficient offset and contrast. Test the whole page with the tab key only, from the first link to the submit button.
6. Mobile treated as an afterthought
Between 60 and 75 percent of visits to a German SMB site come from a phone. Yet tap targets are often under 44 pixels, tables scroll horizontally off-screen, and the phone number is not tappable. Design the small screen first and the desktop layout will follow naturally. Check the site on a real mid-range device over a mobile connection, not in a resized browser window on a fast office line.
7. No visible proof
Claims without evidence read as noise. Named references with a company name and a role, a number that can be verified, a project photo taken on site: these outperform stock photography and adjectives every time. If a client will not be named, an anonymised but specific case description still works better than nothing. Place the proof next to the decision, not on a separate references page nobody visits. A single quote beside the contact form does more than twenty logos in the footer.
