UX audit in Kropyvnytskyi — for agro, B2B portals, e-commerce

UX audit in Kropyvnytskyi: why it's not worth spending on traffic without it

A Kropyvnytskyi business owner spends 30-80k UAH/month on Google Ads, SMM, SEO — and complains there are few leads. In 8 of 10 cases the problem isn't traffic but the site: traffic arrives, but users don't understand the offer, don't find buttons, don't trust the brand and leave. A UX audit is a tool showing exactly where the money is lost. Spending 30-50k UAH on an audit to fix the site and gain +30% conversion is economically more profitable than increasing the ad budget by the same amount month after month.

I've been doing UX audits for Kropyvnytskyi businesses since 2020, when I started with an agro-holding in Kirovohrad oblast. Since then I've added cases for ag-machinery dealers, B2B portals, agro-product e-commerce, a dental network, local manufacturers and two KNTU IT startups. The general principle is the same: I check the site across 80-120 points, talk to real users, analyze competitors, write a report with priorities and a developer checklist.

What a UX audit includes

Technical block

Lighthouse audit, Core Web Vitals (LCP, FID, CLS), mobile optimization, image size and format, font performance, CDN, cache, JS/CSS minification. For many Kropyvnytskyi sites (especially on WordPress) the technical part is the main barrier. Fast site = higher conversion, better SEO, lower traffic cost.

Information architecture

Navigation structure, menu logic, breadcrumbs, internal linking, sitemap, catalog filters. If a user can't find the desired product in 2-3 clicks — you've lost them before they even saw the offer.

Homepage

USP (unique selling proposition) above the fold, block hierarchy, CTA clarity, presence of trust anchors (reviews, cases, legal info, phone). Most Kropyvnytskyi sites start with a beautiful slider that says nothing about the product — a classic UX mistake.

Product and catalog pages

Card completeness (photos, description, specs, availability, price), variants, add to cart, licenses and certificates, delivery, warranty. For agribusiness — separate section on technical characteristics and trials.

Forms and checkout

Number of fields (fewer — more conversions), real-time validation, error messages, progress bar in multi-step forms, guest checkout (without mandatory registration). Bad checkout kills up to 50% of e-commerce purchases.

Trust anchors

Legal entity details, physical Kropyvnytskyi address, phone in header, real client reviews (not stock), cases with numbers, certificates, guarantees. For regional business trust is half the sale.

Mobile UX

Responsiveness, finger-friendly CTAs (44x44 px minimum), mobile menu, mobile forms, speed on 3G/4G. 70-80% of Ukrainian traffic is mobile, you can't ignore it.

Accessibility (a11y)

Text contrast, image alt-tags, semantic HTML, keyboard navigation, screen-reader compatibility. In the EU it's law, in Ukraine still a recommendation, but it affects SEO and reputation.

Analytics and metrics

GA4 setup, goals and conversions, Hotjar or Microsoft Clarity for heatmaps and session recordings, UTM-tag correctness, duplicate check, internal-traffic filtering. Without analytics UX decisions become guesses.

SEO foundation

Meta tags, H1-H6 headings, URL structure, robots.txt and sitemap.xml, schema.org markup, speed, mobility. UX and SEO are tightly linked — Google considers behavioral metrics in ranking.

Usability tests with real users

An expert UX audit finds 60-70% of issues. The remaining 30-40% are seen only by real users. In the extended package I organize usability tests: 5-7 respondents from your target audience pass pre-formed scenarios on your site. The session is recorded in Zoom or UserTesting, I analyze where users get stuck, which elements they ignore, what they read carefully, what they don't understand.

For Kropyvnytskyi agribusiness I find respondents through client networks and farmer Facebook groups. For clothing e-commerce — through audience targeting. For clinics — through familiar doctors and patients. This adds 15-25k UAH to the base audit but gives multiples deeper understanding — you see your site through a real person's eyes.

Competitor analysis

I select 3-5 competitors — local in Kropyvnytskyi or Ukrainian industry leaders — and compare with your site across 15-20 parameters: USP, catalog structure, product cards, trust anchors, technical quality, content, CTAs, mobile version. Output — table of strengths and weaknesses with concrete recommendations: what to borrow from competitors, where you're ahead but don't communicate, what to do radically better.

For agribusiness I often include European competitors (Bayer, Syngenta, Pioneer) — that shows what world-standard UX looks like in the industry and where Ukrainian business can stand out. For local e-commerce I compare with Rozetka, Epicentre, Prom — market leaders often do simple things a regional shop doesn't.

Final report

Notion or PDF report document, 40-80 pages. Structure: summary (3-5 key issues affecting conversion most), detailed section-by-section breakdown with screenshots and notes drawn directly on images, concrete recommendations (not "improve navigation" but "move categories from header to side menu, add seasonal filter, merge two contact pages into one"), prioritized fix map (high — critical, medium — important, low — cosmetic), developer checklist of 50-80 tasks with complexity in hours, appendices with usability-test data and competitor analysis.

The report comes with a 60-90 minute video review where I walk through key conclusions, answer questions, discuss priorities. The recording stays with you. After the presentation — 14 days for chat questions without additional payment.

What's next after the audit

Depending on scope and your resources — three scenarios. First: you take the report and implement everything yourself through your developer. The checklist makes this possible — each task is formulated as a technical brief. Second: I do Figma design for critical pages (homepage, catalog, product card, checkout) and hand off to developer. Faster and more effective because I already know all pains. Third: full redesign via web design — new structure, new design, new developer (if needed). Which scenario fits — discussed based on audit results.

Integration with other services

UX audit often pairs with SMM (because social traffic lands on the site, and weak UX destroys SMM efforts) and email marketing (because letters lead to landings, and a bad landing reduces email conversion). For full-package clients — 15-25% discount on the UX portion depending on scope.

How to start a UX audit

First step — free 30-45 minute call. I'll ask about your business, target audience, current site metrics (if GA4 exists), what you've already tried to improve, which metric matters in business goals. On this same call we walk through the site together, I give 5-10 express remarks free — so you can assess my approach before signing a contract. If we start — sign contract, you give analytics and CMS (optional) access, in 7-18 working days you get the report. Book — /contacts. See previous works — /projects.

Audit methodology for ag-machinery dealer B2B portals

B2B portals of John Deere, Claas, AGCO dealers in Kropyvnytskyi are a separate site class with specific tasks: show machinery availability in showroom and warehouse, let a farmer quickly compare models, get an individual lease offer, request service. I audit such portals against a separate extended checklist of 140-180 points where additionally evaluated are: machinery card completeness (key specs, in-cab photos, in-field videos, user reviews, lease documents), lease and trade-in calculator (instant calculation without "we'll call back"), Kirovohrad-oblast dealer-center and service-point map, regional manager contacts with photos and LinkedIn, test-drive schedule integration.

A separate audit section — the client personal account: ability to see purchase history, order parts by serial number of own machinery, view maintenance schedule, download Ukrainian-language manuals. Without these functions a B2B portal turns into a 2010s online catalog and loses to competitors from Poland, Czechia, Germany who have these functions as standard.

Usability test scenarios for agro B2B

Standard scenarios I give Kirovohrad farmer respondents during testing: "find a 200-250 hp tractor on the site with up to 5-year lease", "order a part for a specific combine model", "book a test drive next week", "find the nearest service point to your farm". The session is recorded, I track seconds to task completion, clicks past the needed element, returns to homepage, search openings. On average 3 of 5 respondents don't complete at least one scenario — and these places become priority 1 in the report.

UX audit for agro portals and production sites

Large Kirovohrad-oblast agro-holdings — from those processing 5000+ ha to grain exporters — have a separate class of business-card sites with emphasis on B2B communication with traders, processors, investors, media. I audit such sites with focus on 4 user groups: a trader looks for volumes and logistics, an investor looks for financial reports and ownership structure, a journalist looks for press releases and PR contacts, a potential partner looks for cases and reputation proof. The site must serve each quickly — and that's exactly where most agro portals fail, because made for one averaged "visitor" audience.

A separate block — multilingualism. A Kirovohrad agro-product exporter without an English site version is invisible on the world market. I check not only the translation's presence but also its quality: are prices in EUR/USD with conversion translated, are there English Incoterms, are batch sizes correctly indicated in metric and American units. Small things that cost contracts.

Audit of landing pages for paid traffic

A separate product — quick audit of a specific landing page for an ad campaign. If you launch Google Ads or paid social to one page — that's a separate task, because a paid-traffic landing differs from a regular site page by strict rules: one CTA on screen, minimum distracting elements, match between ad promise and landing content (Quality Score in Google Ads directly depends on this), critical load speed. Landing audit — from 18,000 UAH, 5-7 days. Often the fastest way to raise ad ROAS by 1.5-2x without changing the ads themselves.

Forms and conversion-path testing

One of the most frequent Kropyvnytskyi-site problems — bad checkout and unoptimized forms. I separately test each form on the site: contact, order, service request, consultation booking. I check field count (often half can be removed), real-time validation, error messages (without vague "something went wrong"), post-submit feedback (email confirmation, processing queue), mobile convenience (correct keyboard types for phone, date, email). Form improvement is the cheapest way to raise conversion on sites already getting good traffic.

Real-user behavior analysis via heatmaps

Expert evaluation gives 60-70% of UX conclusions. The rest come from real behavioral data. In the extended package I install Hotjar or Microsoft Clarity for 14-30 days and collect: click heatmaps (where users press, even where there's no button), cursor movement and scroll heatmaps (how far they scroll, where they stop), session recordings (full video of real visits — a golden source of insights). Based on this data I form final conclusions together with expert analysis.

For Kropyvnytskyi businesses with low traffic (1-3k visitors/month) I extend the data collection period to 30-45 days — otherwise statistics aren't representative. For sites with 10+k/month — 14 days are enough to collect 200-400 session recordings and 5-10k clicks for heatmaps.

Audit for redesign and new site

A separate scenario — audit before launching a new site or redesigning the current one. This isn't "finding problems with the current site" but "defining requirements for the new one". I do interviews with the owner and team (sales, marketing, customer service), analyze the audience, competitors, current analytics (if site exists), define key new-site usage scenarios and success metrics. Output — a 30-50 page technical brief for designer and developer with clear business requirements, user stories and wireframe notes. This saves weeks of approvals during development and prevents reworks after launch. Often such an audit transitions into a full web design, but sometimes the client takes the brief and goes to their developer — that's normal, the audit's purpose in this case is to give a clear roadmap.