A real sample scan
This Is What a
$99 Scan Looks Like.
This is a real scan of a real business's public website, prepared in the same format every client receives within 48 hours. Identifying details are redacted. The subject is a residential interior design studio; it is not an Articulate Digital client.
No sound. The full scan is written out below.
Snapshot
Business
business name redacted, a residential interior design studio in the mid-Atlantic, in business for about a decade.
Who the site seems to be for
Homeowners planning renovations, new construction, or full-room furnishing. Most visitors seem to come from referrals and Instagram. The services page also mentions business clients.
What the site wants visitors to do
Send the new-client form.
Overall read
The work is ready to sell. The site is not doing the selling. Strong photos, an unusually honest new-client form, and real proof that people trust the studio. But nothing on the site says why to get in touch, or how to start.
What's working
The new-client form names real numbers: ballpark figures for typical rooms and renovations, with budget ranges up to six figures. Almost no studio in this category is this direct about money. It screens out people who aren't a fit, and takes the fear out of the hardest conversation, money, before it starts.
The project photos are real proof: an active portfolio feed, a project the site shows did well on social media, and a named partnership with a specialty builder.
The client testimonial is specific about what the designer contributed rather than generic praise.
The studio has history: over a decade in the industry, and a feature in the press.
What keeps getting in the way
The pattern is misplaced confidence: the site counts on the photos and on referrals to do what words and layout have to do for a first-time visitor. It shows up three ways: the top of the homepage names where the studio works, not what it offers; the new-client form, the site's best tool for winning clients, is one of three ways to get in touch, with none shown as the main one; and when someone sends the form, they get a catchphrase instead of being told what happens next.
Top priorities
Priority 01
The inquiry moment sets no expectations
What is happening
There are three ways to get in touch, and nothing points a new client to the right one. Nothing at the top of the homepage asks you to get in touch. The new-client form asks serious questions (project type, budget, timeframe), and after you send it, promises only that the studio will be in touch "shortly." No reply time, nothing on what the first conversation is like, nothing about what happens next.
Why it matters
A homeowner about to tell a stranger their five-figure budget is at the most hesitant moment of the whole process. Not knowing what happens next, right there, is where serious inquiries quietly die.
What visitors likely do
Visitors who weren't referred, and so aren't sold yet, get stuck choosing how to get in touch or give up on the form. Those who send it wait with no idea whether "shortly" means hours or weeks.
Effort level
Low
What I recommend
One main way in for new clients, called the same thing everywhere. Before and after the form, say what happens next and when: who replies, how soon, and what the first conversation is like.
Priority 02
The words leave the photographs to do all the selling
What is happening
The main headline is the service area in capital letters, then a three-adjective tagline that could open any design studio's site. Services are listed as tasks, not as what the client ends up with. No page states, in words, why this studio over the one in the next search result.
Why it matters
Referred visitors arrive convinced and just need contact details. Visitors who have never heard of the studio, the ones a website is for, need a reason to get in touch, in words. Right now the site gives them a portfolio and a location.
What visitors likely do
New visitors look through the photos, don't remember what makes the studio different, and leave without getting in touch. The site works like a photo album, not a front door.
Effort level
Medium
What I recommend
Lead with the one thing the new-client form already proves the studio believes: honesty about how working with a designer actually goes, including money. Say who the studio is for and what a client walks away with. The tagline can stay; it cannot be the whole argument.
Priority 03
Eight paths with equal weight, one that pays
What is happening
The menu offers eight or more links, including a shop, a blog, a press page, and a branded loyalty program, all the same size and prominence. The path that brings in money, the new-client form, gets no extra weight anywhere on the page.
Why it matters
Attention is the scarcest thing a first visit has. The shop and the loyalty program are for existing fans. For everyone else, they pull attention away from the new-client form.
What visitors likely do
First-time visitors click around the extras, spend their visit in the shop or blog, and leave without ever seeing the new-client form.
Effort level
Low to medium
What I recommend
Make the new-client form the easiest thing to find on every page. Keep the shop, blog and loyalty program, but move them to less prominent spots, where they serve returning visitors instead of competing for new ones.
Leave alone for now
The budget figures on the new-client form. Showing six-figure ranges can look like it scares people off. It is the most persuasive thing on the site.
The tagline. It can stay; it just can't be the whole argument.
The shop, blog and loyalty program. Don't remove them; existing fans use them.
Recommended next moves
Fix the inquiry moment first: one way in, and say what happens next before and after the form. Least effort, most direct effect on inquiries.
Then make the new-client form easier to find than everything else.
Then rewrite the front-door words around what sets the studio apart, its honesty, so new visitors get a reason to get in touch, not just a portfolio.
The order matters: better words before the way in is fixed would send more interested visitors into the same confusion.
See yours.
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