How to tell whether your website is actually working

Most website reporting measures activity rather than outcome. Four numbers tell you what you need, and three of them are free.

1. Enquiries per month, by source

The number that matters. Split by how they arrived — search, referral, direct, social, advertising. Without this you cannot tell whether the site is working or your networking is.

Practical method: ask on the form, and check the analytics source. Both are imperfect; together they are enough to act on.

2. Enquiry-to-client rate

If the site produces thirty enquiries and one becomes a client, the site is attracting the wrong people. That is a copy and positioning problem, and more traffic will make it worse rather than better.

3. Cost per enquiry

Total annual website cost — build amortised over three years, plus hosting, maintenance and content — divided by annual enquiries. If the site costs €4,000 a year and produces 40 enquiries, that is €100 each. Compare it against what a lead costs you through advertising or events. This single calculation ends most arguments about whether a redesign is worth it.

4. Impressions and average position in Search Console

Free, and the only honest view of search performance. Rising impressions with flat clicks means you are being found and your titles are not persuading. Flat impressions means the content is not competing yet.

What to stop measuring

Bounce rate on its own — a visitor who read your one relevant page and phoned you is a bounce. Time on page for a page whose job is to be read quickly. Total page views without segmenting. And any metric nobody would change a decision over.

The review that takes twenty minutes

Once a quarter: the four numbers above, the three pages that produced the most enquiries, and the one page that should be working and is not. Then fix that one page. Done four times a year, that is a better content strategy than most agencies sell.