I analysed the homepages of almost 900 companies in the staffing industry for Brand and CRO excellence — with the help of AI and lots of calibration, of course.
The headlines
- Staffing companies are pretty bad at CRO. 4.8/10 on average to be precise.
- They’re better at Brand, coming in at 6.6/10 on average.
Translation: most companies have decent-looking websites that don’t convert. Good first impression; fumbled follow-through.
More stats
- 80% of companies scored below 7/10 for CRO. Half scored below 5/10.
- Brand fares better: 43% below 7/10, only 16% below 5/10.
- The gap between brand and CRO? A consistent 2.5–3 points.
This is pretty sad when you take into account that 5/10 for CRO here is just the basics:
- Explain clearly what you do (no pizzazz needed)
- Obvious CTA that indicates what happens next
- Some degree of trust, credibility, or social proof
- Clean visual hierarchy and legibility
- No competing or incongruent CTAs
Nothing clever. Yet 50% of the sector isn’t hitting this.
The inverse correlation
Here’s what I find most interesting. When you overlay these distributions, a pattern emerges: as brand scores increase, CRO scores actually decrease.
This tracks with what I’ve seen time and again. Successful companies fall into a branding trap:
- Clear headlines become abstract corporate waffle
- Value props turn meaningless
- CTAs stop explaining what happens next (or disappear entirely)
- Form gets prioritised over function
The data proves it: 39% of companies score 7+ on Brand but below 7 on CRO. Only 1% manage the inverse.
The takeaway
In this fragmented, competitive industry, achieving merely “good” CRO puts you in the top 20%.
If your website looks nice, make sure it’s still doing the job of, y’know… telling people what you do and how they can contact you.