Learn how to create a website that works when you're not working by leading visitors along a natural, perfect-fit path to conversion.
Your website isn’t just a digital business card — it’s the foundation of your online business and your most powerful sales tool. When someone wants to research you, they check your website. When they’re deciding whether to hire you, they comb through your site. If you don’t have one, or worse, if it’s slow, outdated, or confusing, you’re likely losing business.
A great website must do more than look good. It needs to be fast, mobile-friendly, and accessible to everyone. It should guide visitors through a seamless journey that leads to conversion. Yet too many freelancers fall into common traps of bad advice, cheap shortcuts, or hiring so-called “experts” who don’t follow best practices.
And that’s where things go wrong.
I’ve been hired by far too many business owners to fix websites that were sabotaging their success — hurting visibility, killing conversions, and making it harder to land clients. Most times the problems didn’t stem from the design but from the wrong priorities, inexperience, and a lack of proper strategy.
When you hire the right partner who starts with strategy, your website can be an asset that works for you when you’re not working, to attract leads, build trust, and turn browsers into buyers and the curious into clients.
The Wrong Approach To Building A Website
A poorly built website actively works against you.
A slow, clunky, or confusing site frustrates visitors, drives away potential clients, and tanks your credibility before you even get a chance to make your case. Even worse, if your site sort of works, you might assume that’s just how it is — meanwhile, you’re losing leads, missing out on opportunities, and unknowingly settling for mediocrity when a well-optimized, strategically designed site could be attracting and converting clients with ease.
Here are three common website mistakes to avoid when building your freelance website:
1. Prioritizing “Cool” Over Conversions
Too many freelancers obsess over looking cool rather than focusing on what actually gets results. They want people to see their website and think, “Wow, that’s cool. They do good work.” Or, “I want to know them.” Or, “They’re legit. What talent!”
But here’s the truth:
- It doesn’t matter if your industry peers think your site is cool. They’re not your clients.
- It doesn’t matter if your web designer wins an award for their cutting-edge or cool design work. Awards don’t pay your bills.
- It doesn’t even matter if you think it’s cool. You are not your target audience.
This isn’t high school. Bells and whistles aren’t what sells. And no one cares that you won an award, especially when so many awards these days are fabricated or bought. What they do care about is figuring out what your website is about, whether or not they are in the right place, and how you can help them.
Your website should be clear, strategic, and conversion-driven — not an ego project.
A conversion-driven website:
- Positions you as a trusted authority and opens doors to new and exciting opportunities.
- Shares your offers and communicates the value and impact of your work.
- Makes it easy for potential clients to connect with you and take the next step.
2. Hiring An Inexperienced Designer
Yes, working with a professional web designer is an investment — it will likely cost more and take longer to build. But hiring your neighbor’s kid, a random Fiverr freelancer, or an inexperienced web designer to build your site on the cheap? That’s a shortcut to frustration.
I know it’s tempting.
The thing is, going with a less experienced partner to save a few bucks upfront will likely create far more than a few headaches for years to come, which can quickly make your website more expensive than it would have been if you’d just hired that experienced pro.
What’s the difference?
It’s not always cost. Cheap doesn’t always mean crappy. It’s also not always experience, as an inexperienced designer can design a beautiful website.
The differences often are what’s under the hood or behind the scenes — the information hierarchy, conversion strategy and content strategy, and considerations for performance, scalability, user experience, and accessibility.
3. No Website Strategy
Smart, savvy freelancers with great clients understand one thing: Closing a sale is far easier and much faster when a lead shows up having already made the decision that you’re the person or brand they want to work with.
To attract all the clients you need and host sales meetings that feel nearly effortless, you need:
- A solid marketing strategy to bring new people to your website.
- A website strategy to convert them once they arrive.
The last thing you want to do as a website owner is to invest in driving traffic to your website only to have those same people do nothing, leave, and forget all about you — especially if they fit your ideal client profile. And even the best marketing can’t overcome a website that fails at converting traffic.
Your website strategy is what ensures that when potential leads find your website, they:
- Feel like it’s their lucky day because they finally found exactly what they have been looking for.
- Breathe a sigh of relief because you “get them” — it’s as if your services and packages were created just for them.
- Binge your copy and content until there’s nothing left.
- Self-identify as a perfect fit or near-perfect fit.
- Take action and reach out to learn more or book a conversation.
Now, you might be wondering, “How do I get website visitors to realize they’re a perfect fit, identify as an ideal client, and take action?”
Here’s the answer…
The Right Approach To Building A Website
Your website’s primary job is to sell for you. It should be your best salesperson, working 24/7 to attract, educate, pre-sell, and convert ideal clients. But in client services, people want to do business with people they know, like, and trust. They want to have a connection with the experts they hire and feel comfortable and confident investing their hard-earned money.
Your website must embrace the four-step Know, Like, Trust, Convert framework — a client attraction and conversion strategy that helps your audience connect with you and your brand on an emotional level, get to know you, decide they like you, and feel like they trust you.
Here’s how it works:
1. Know: Help Visitors Get To Know You
You want the right website visitors to stick around. You want those who are interested and curious to browse, buy-in, and buy. But first, they need to know if you can help them.
Your website must help them quickly know:
- What you do and the problems you solve and that they’re in the right place.
- Who you work with and that they’re a good fit.
- The type of results they can expect so they know what’s in it for them.
As visitors get to know you, their connection with you strengthens, they begin to care more about what you have to say, and they get more comfortable engaging with you, your content, and your offers. This is why it’s so important to infuse your personality, voice, and uniqueness into every aspect of your brand, website, and marketing.
Review your most important web pages — your home page, about page, services pages, contact page, and thank you pages — and ask:
- Is it crystal clear that I can solve their most pressing problem?
- Are there opportunities for ideal clients to self-identify as ideal clients?
- Can a stranger easily understand what I do and how I am different?
- Are the potential results and what’s possible if they say yes obvious?
2. Like: Build Connection And Personality
People work with people they like. They want to enjoy the process of working with you, which is why your website needs to reflect your personality, opinions, perspective, and approach. It needs to give people opportunities to connect with you and find something in common with you.
You can help visitors figure out they like you by:
- Going beyond your professional credentials to tell your story in your own words and showcase your personality throughout your website copy, especially on your home page, about page, and services page.
- Using your portfolio and case studies to tell compelling, vivid stories future clients can see themselves in — stories that also give people a glimpse into how you think.
- Including professional headshots and more casual lifestyle photos or photos of you in action that give people a glimpse into who you are and how you work.
- Letting your voice, personality, and quirks shine bright in the articles, podcast episodes, tutorials, and educational content you publish on your website.
3. Trust: Establish Credibility And Authority
People hire service providers they believe to be trustworthy experts who can deliver on their promises. Your website needs to establish credibility, reliability, and trust. It must position you as an expert and demonstrate a history of success and proven results — results your leads want to experience themselves.
Truth: It’s up to you to help visitors feel confident that you can walk your talk and back up your bold claims if they hire you.
You can do that with:
- Testimonials and case studies that highlight real-world success stories.
- Media features, guest expert spots, and trust logos that show prospective clients that other people trust you and consider you an expert.
- FAQs and SAQs that handle hesitancy and answer common concerns upfront.
- Your about page, portfolio, work samples, and comparison pages, as well as your privacy page and other legal pages.
- Articles, videos, and podcast episodes that showcase your thought leadership.
4. Convert: Guide Visitors To Take Action
Ultimately, your website exists to drive conversions. Make it easy and irresistible for visitors to take the next step — contact, click, register, enroll, sign up, buy, inquire, book, subscribe, download, opt-in, call, email, or join — by ensuring your call to action copy uses action-oriented language and tells visitors exactly what to do next.
Different types of CTAs work best for different audience segments:
- First-time visitors: Use low-commitment calls to action to capture leads who aren’t quite ready to hire you or buy from you. Invite them to register for a webinar, download a freebie, or subscribe to your email newsletter.
- Warm leads: Offer mid-tier actions to deepen engagement. Invite them to book a free consultation, read a case study, or sign up for a live demo.
- Hot prospects: Encourage high-commitment actions to close the deal or generate a new lead. Invite them to get started today, submit an application, book a call, or share their project details.
And where you place your calls to action matters.
- Keep the CTAs in your main sales funnel focused on moving visitors toward a buying decision to hire you. Avoid diluting your message or distracting them with competing CTAs for free offers or your email newsletter.
- Use the rest of your website — the pages and posts used for education and positioning — to display CTAs that move people into your sales funnel and promote your free offers that bring people into your community or onto your email list.
A Website That Works When You’re Not Working
To build a full and steady pipeline of leads who can’t wait to work with you and are happy to pay your full fee, you need to provide opportunities for prospects to get the information they need to make a buying decision and hire you.
A high-converting freelance website doesn’t rely on tricks, gimmicks, or dark patterns that feel icky and gross. Instead, it informs, educates, and strategically guides visitors through a natural buying journey from stranger to believer to lead to client.
By following the Know, Like, Trust, Convert framework, you ensure your freelance website attracts and resonates with your ideal audience to build relationships and establish credibility, then persuades visitors to take the logical best next step.
- Those ready to learn more about working with you and hiring you, are guided to a booking form or new project inquiry form.
- Those who are interested but not quite ready, are invited to stay in touch and stay engaged by joining your community, subscribing to your email list, or taking advantage of a free resource.
The result? A steady pipeline of qualified leads who arrive ready to hire you.
When your website does its job, sales calls become effortless, and growing your freelance business feels easier than ever. And that makes investing time, effort, energy, and resources in brand awareness tactics, marketing campaigns, and lead generation activities that position you and your brand as the best choice worth every penny.
