Ocean County NJ Website Design: Evaluation of the Best and Worst

For almost a year now, DotCom Global Media has been gathering info and reporting on Ocean County NJ website design, based on comprehensive evaluations intended to uncover the best and worst local websites in the business world. Over 350 business websites were selected for this NJ Website Design study, which included a full analysis and report of each website. Grades were assigned in the areas of design, features, content, and authority.

This article provides an in-depth analysis of the websites for businesses, organizations, and associations located in Ocean County NJ. This article is intended to be a resource for business owners and website design companies looking to create a new website, or redesign a current Ocean County NJ website design.

In this article we have included the following information:

1. Brief Overview of the County from a business perspective, and the need for an excellent Ocean County NJ website design.
2. Best Website Design examples in Ocean County New Jersey
3. High Potential Examples of Ocean NJ Website Design that would do very well with some strategic design/development changes
4. Worst Website Design examples in Ocean County New Jersey
5. Simple Directory of Web Designers in Ocean County New Jersey, or web design companies known for their Ocean County NJ website design work.

Local Towns Evaluated for Ocean County NJ Website Design:

This study is ongoing, and new towns are evaluated by DotCom Global Media each week. There are thirty-four different towns in Ocean County NJ including the six boroughs on Long Beach Island. So far, we have combed through the business websites in five of these towns. 

Here are the towns that were evaluated for Ocean County NJ Website Design, as of the publishing date:

Brick NJ

Long Beach Island NJ

Seaside Heights NJ

Toms River NJ

Tuckerton NJ

Opportunity/Need for Ocean County NJ Website Design

Analyzing the current business environment and growth opportunities in Ocean County New Jersey

Ocean County NJ is a district full of beach towns, impressive marinas, great restaurants, and safe residential areas. Many of the towns in Ocean County are inhabited by year-round residents who are actively into boating and family-friendly entertainment. Besides the amusement parks and family recreational opportunities throughout Long Beach Island, there are also plenty of places to party and ride motorcycles with your friends- especially in Tuckerton and Seaside Heights- the latter of which gained national fame over a decade ago through the hit reality TV series The Jersey Shore. Ocean County is a great place to raise a family especially in the laid back residential town of Brick- recently named the safest town to visit in the country.

The business scene throughout Ocean County is ripe with opportunities and current success stories. Some incredible restaurants and beautiful beachfront hotels are scattered all throughout the county and there are many tourist attractions around the boardwalks and downtown shopping districts. Like most places at the Jersey Shore, Ocean County NJ is busier in the summer months and the off-season population drops dramatically when the towns wind down for winter. Many businesses are seasonal and they rake in enough sales from May-September to sustain them through the winter. Other local businesses are open year-round, catering to the locals on a regular basis. There’s a rich sense of community spirit in many of the towns in Ocean County NJ.

Read through this article carefully if your business is located in Ocean County NJ, or if you are planning to establish a company there. Your online presence is a huge piece of your business image and identity- Even if you’re NOT paying attention to it, your website says something about your business, good or bad.

Best Examples of Ocean County NJ Website Design

In addition to the most obvious features, there are many little things that make a website design great and effective. Top marks go to beautiful websites that have useful information AND are doing the types of things that make them attractive to Google, while also providing a positive user experience. Through our search, we came across some good and bad local examples of Ocean County New Jersey websites. Here’s what we found:

1. Spray Beach Hotel, Long Beach Island – www.spraybeachinn.com 

Numerical Score: 84/100

Design Grade……… B

Features Grade…….B

Content Grade……..B

Authority Grade…..B

Excellent photos, though we would like to see more photos with people.  The navigation is excellent (we love the attention to detail in the dropdown menus).  The design is ultra-modern and they took a lot of time on many of the inside pages including photos, icons, interesting layouts, and more.  They should consider including testimonials, ratings, and reviews on the main page.  This sort of social proof is an important factor as people make decisions about where to stay.  Their Google ranking, their domain authority, and their directory listings are all very solid.  This business is making their digital marketing a priority and based on the traffic patterns and ranking, it seems to be paying off big time!

2. Windward Tavern, Brick – www.windwardtavern.com

Numerical Score: 78/100

Design Grade……… B

Features Grade…….B

Content Grade…….. C

Authority Grade……F

The homepage is impressive and the high quality videos of steaming hot food and bubbling beer with text overlays draws you right in. The design and visual content on this website is very effective but it’s definitely too light on content. It looks like a blog was set up but there aren’t any real posts yet. This site has all of the right features including an updated calendar of events and musical performances. The menu is easy to read and there are a handful of testimonials loaded onto the page. The website scored poorly in authority because there’s not an effective marketing plan in action based on the report that we ran. Overall, this is one of the best websites on Ocean County NJ, but there is plenty of room for improvement if they want to draw more traffic and covert to leads and customers. That’s really the ultimate goal of a professional website, anyway. 🙂

3. Panini Bay, Tuckerton – https://paninibay.com

Numerical Score: 70/100

Design Grade……… B

Features Grade……. C

Content Grade…….. D

Authority Grade…… F

Here’s a restaurant with a beautiful and creative website design. The page layouts are clean and easy on the eyes and there’s no shortage of tastefully displayed high quality imagery. There is very little written content which serves the overly minimalistic web design but that seems to take a major toll on the content and authority scores. There’s nothing to speak of in terms of features, either. The main purpose this website serves is to provide the menu and there’s a third-party service for online booking. By far, the most information is on the Contact Page where the directions are provided. This waterfront restaurant has a dock so customers can pull up in a boat and walk to the restaurant. Judging from the photos, this seems like a great place for a summertime date or a private party.

By Location: Best/Worst NJ Website Design

High Potential Examples of Ocean County NJ Website Design

There are a lot of websites that kind of fall in the middle. They’re not good, but they could be worse. Most of these “high potential” website design examples are placed in this category because they scored low on our evaluation, but the businesses themselves are so great that we see a huge opportunity for success. Here are the local websites we found that don’t stand on their own yet, but could be absolutely killer if they made the right moves.

4. Cool Beans, Toms River – https://www.coolbeanstr.com 

Ocean County NJ Website Design Grade C

• The homepage is a great design, at a glance. The colors and imagery all work together.
• For some reason, despite looking modern this website isn’t compatible with mobile devices.
• The menu is nicely put together. It would be good to offer a printable option as well as the digital.
• While the photos aren’t bad at all, there are absolutely no people. Only empty cafe shots. NO human connection.

5. Kline Bros. Landscaping, Long Beach Island- http://www.klinebrothers.com/

Ocean County NJ Website Design Grade C

• Photos of the landscaping work help to “save” this website from a failing score.
• There appears to be talent and quality on the business end, but the website is mediocre.
• This website has huge potential, but it needs work, both on the design and SEO.
• Social proof and testimonials would be an obvious step if they want to improve this website.

6. Tuckerton Seaport, Tuckerton – www.tuckertonseaport.org

Ocean County NJ Website Design Grade C

• The homepage displays interesting photos showing people having fun at the Tuckerton Seaport
• There is a updated blog with posts talking about this business and the events they host- good use of content marketing. The format and optimization is far from ideal but it’s a better effort than we’ve seen on most other Ocean County websites.
• This site works on mobile devices which is good for the user experience AND for ranking higher in Google.
• Social media integration is moderately well done. Again, it’s better than most other local businesses.

7. The Boardwalk of Long Beach Island – http://www.theboardwalklbi.com

Ocean County NJ Website Design Grade C

• The images are large and attractive. Creative use of graphic design for the homepage.
• Unfortunately, there’s an absence of human connection. It would be easy to get a ton of great photos and a ton of great testimonials and reviews.  We recommend they get busy improving these items.
• There are too many navigation options, they are too close together, the text is too small.
• Their overall domain authority and Google ranking is weak. We recommend adding a blog and begin publishing interesting content regularly.

8.  YMCA of Ocean County, Toms River – http://ocymca.org

Ocean County NJ Website Design Grade D

• There’s nothing special about the website design for this business, but the site is packed with information and everything seems to be updated, so we include it on our list of “high potential websites.”
• All of the imagery appears to be stock photography which is a missed opportunity to show off this location and the staff and members that frequent this YMCA.
• The site doesn’t load properly on mobile devices- that’s a problem that should be addressed immediately.
• The nav bar is slightly more crowded than we’d like, but all of the pages are nested beneath the menu options and it’s easy to find what you’re looking for.

9. The Crystal Point Yacht Club, Point Pleasant – https://www.thecrystalpoint.com

Ocean County NJ Website Design Grade C

• This yacht club is using this website to promote their location as a wedding venue and they do a good job.
• The design is elegant and there are very few images but the ones they selected are great quality.
• There are some outgoing links to bridal resources such as bakeries and caterers, but there could be a lot more done here to establish this yacht club as a local bridal authority and a wedding planning go-to.
• It appears that there is an adjoined inn, but there is a problem with the messaging. It was unclear, even after looking for the information, that the Crystal Point Inn and the Crystal Point Yacht Club are one in the same.

10. Ocean Hockey Supply, Brick – https://www.oceanhockey.com

Ocean County NJ Website Design Grade D

• The homepage has a boring products page feeling to it, especially the bottom half of the page (below the fold).
• There seems to be a blog format used for the news page but the last post is from over a year ago.
• On the e-commerce side of things, the site is organized very well and the product database is thorough and seems to function seamlessly. Hopefully they do well in online sales.
• Authority-wise, this site performs very poorly. Getting targeted traffic onto this site is probably their biggest challenge.

11. River Lady Cruises, Toms River – http://www.riverlady.com

Ocean County NJ Website Design Grade C

• This site follows most of the typical “rules” – there are 6 nav items, testimonials, and a call to action.
• Unfortunately, the design is drab and the colors, fonts, and styles are so generic that it doesn’t feel like branding.
• There isn’t a Contact Page which makes it inconvenient for someone looking to visit or get in touch with someone.
• There is a so-so FAQ page but there aren’t any outbound links or helpful resources to help prepare or convince a visitor to go on a cruise.

12. BestofLBI.buzz, Long Beach Island – http://bestoflbi.buzz

Ocean County NJ Website Design Grade C

• Very high quality content and info. It’s a thorough blog site dedicated to the community of Long Beach Island.
• The photos on this site are good quality and fast loading. Most images in the mix look like stock photos but some are original shots taken at the actual locations and shops.
• Thankfully, this website works famously on mobile devices.
• The authority for this website should be better, especially considering the consistency of their posts and the formatting and keyword optimization. There are some things that would improve this domain’s trust score.

13. Acme Beach and Bike, Long Beach Island – http://AcmeBeachandBike.com 

Ocean County NJ Website Design Grade D

• Great photos, thankfully, and they are placed nicely throughout the website.
• The main goal is to call the visitor to action, but this website misses the mark in a terrible way. From the home page, all of the “view products” buttons are broken! Absolutely needs to be addressed if they want to do any sales.
• Why is there virtually no way of contacting this company besides a phone number? Not acceptable – especially as an e-commerce site.
• There are a few outbound links, but not as many as we’d like to see.

14. Marine Max, Long Beach Island – https://www.marinemax.com/

Ocean County NJ Website Design Grade D

• This is a so-so website design. Not bad, it’s but nothing to write home about.
• There is a ton of web pages here, and from a user experience perspective, it’s not too bad of a layout.
• The site loads on a mobile device, which is good, but it’s tough to use.
• The call to action on this site is not very effective. It needs work.

15. Ship Bottom Shellfish, Long Beach Island –  http://shipbottomshellfish.com

Ocean County NJ Website Design Grade D

• Thankfully, this website works on mobile devices, unless you want to see the menus. The web designer took a shortcut and uploaded images. It’s impossible to read the small writing, especially on a smartphone.
• The homepage is fun and interesting- good layout and nice animation on the text.
• There are a few outbound links, but not as many as we’d like to see.
• These photos suck. I’m not going to sugarcoat it. The photos need to go.

16. Mariner Inn, Long Beach Island – http://marinermotellbi.com

Ocean County NJ Website Design Grade C

• The visual design of this website is terrific. It’s easy to see where everything is at a glance- easy to navigate!
• The pages are full of content, so there is no shortage of information here, but it’s also organized in a way that’s it’s not a turnoff to a visitor.
• This website could use some testimonials or other form of social proof, preferably right on the homepage so there is credibility and reputability right off the bat.
• The booking process is somewhat confusing. The promotions are also far from clear. There are some issues with the messages and/or the offers themselves.

Worst Examples of Ocean County NJ Website Design

Choosing the worst websites in a town like this is painful. As a web designer in the Ocean County NJ area, I’ve seen these types of mistakes over and over that are wreaking havoc on these businesses and killing their SERP ranking. Some of these websites are so terrible that I’m assuming they came free and ready-made with a domain purchase. The mistakes are numerous and easy to avoid if you’re a web designer who know’s what you’re doing.

17. The Grapevine Restaurant, Long Beach Island – http://thegrapevinenj.com

Ocean County NJ Website Design Grade F

• The design of this site looks so amateurish that we were surprised to see a web design company listed in the footer.
• Not only are there way too many colors and fonts used here, but they’re clashing with each other. It’s not a smart way to layer in content. The colors don’t pop and they take away from the imagery.
• There is so much crap thrown onto the bottom half of the homepage. It looks like a catch-all for everything.
• The user experience is terrible. Where is the contact page and restaurant info? How come it’s so hard to find what you’re looking for? This restaurant looks like it could be an awesome place but this website just fails it miserably.

18. Bella Donna Salon & Spa, Long Beach Island – http://www.belladonna-salonandspa.com

Ocean County NJ Website Design Grade F

• The white little text on the black background is NOT encouraging people to read it. This website design is poorly executed.
• The photos are a poor choice, except for that one hero image at the top of the homepage. All of the others seem to be randomly selected and lined up along the edges of the pages for no good reason.
• Even though this site has an online gift card ordering option, my guess is that no one uses it. There are so many unnecessary steps and fields and it’s not user friendly. It also doesn’t feel secure- there’s nothing to show the visitor that this site is legit.

19. Viking Village, Long Beach Island – http://vikingvillage.homestead.com/

Ocean County NJ Website Design Grade F

• This site is ugly- there is no better way to say it. Everything from the colors to the gross looking photo of unidentified seafood in a sack, to the crinkle-paper background- the whole design is really not attractive.
• The style and layout wastes space and falls flat in a major way. Nothing compelling, nothing pretty, and nothing that makes me want to click to learn more.
• There are some good ideas scattered around this website to make it a go-to authority site for the local fishermen but the execution is the worst of the worst. An overhaul of the design, a content marketing strategy and high quality imagery would do wonders for this website. It would be like night and day. I hope they revamp this soon.

20. Insectropolis, Toms River – http://insectropolis.com

Ocean County NJ Website Design Grade F

• I bet when this website was first developed (probably 15 years ago) it was the cat’s pajamas! It’s got really creative features and everything is nicely branded. However, the site is very much outdated both in design aesthetics and functionality.
• There is no shortage of info! Someone took time to write out a ton of helpful content for this site, but the problem is that it’s not very legible. The font is tiny and there’s not much white space and virtually no headers to balance it all out.
• This site works on mobile devices which is good for the user experience AND for ranking higher in Google.

21. Jersey Shore Pirates, Brick – http://jerseyshorepirates.com

Ocean County NJ Website Design Grade F

• Here is another outdated web design. It’s not compatible with mobile devices, and it’s visually an old design.
• The features on this site are no good, either. There’s a printable brochure but it’s not at all printer-friendly. The web form to sign up for the mailing list is not embedded on the website. Instead, it sends you to another website to collect data.
• Most of the written content on the site is in italicized font which makes it’s hard to read, especially because the type is so small. Some of the lines of text are slightly crooked which must be intentional but not a good approach.

22. Baker’s Water Street Bar & Grill, Toms River – http://bakerswaterstreet.com

Ocean County NJ Website Design Grade F

• Here’s another outdated website design where there’s so much wasted space in the margins. The whole website is scaled down and constrained to the center of the website.
• It’s not responsive and doesn’t function properly on mobile devices.
• The menu is the most modern feature but it doesn’t match the rest of the site at all. They need to revamp this old design.

23. Holgate H2O Sports, Long Beach Island – http://www.holgateh2osports.com

Ocean County NJ Website Design Grade F

• This is such a boring homepage for a boat rentals and watersports business. It fails to capture the excitement and fun of the sport. The layout and style is so generic, it could double as a maintenance repair service. There’s no wow factor.
• The call to action is kind of a cheating move. Buttons say to “check the availability” of a model but clicking through just leads to a contact page. Not a good user experience.
• A modern design would include a responsive design so this site would work on smartphones and tablets. Modern elements include a hero image and nicely organized sections, bullet pointed lists of features, and many other things. At a glance, people can see that this website is basic and outdated, and that will lose their attention.

24. Lorry’s Island End Motel, Long Beach Island – http://www.lorrysmotel.com

Ocean County NJ Website Design Grade F

• This is hands down one of the very worst websites in LBI! It’s so horrible, I’ve had to share this with others as an example of what NOT to do with your business site.
• The homepage is a mess of journal entries and rambling paragraphs. Nothing appealing that makes someone want to visit or stay overnight.
• The sidebar is an absolute mess of random buttons that leads to more nonsense.
• It’d suggest a total overhaul, but part of me expects this business to fizzle out based on the updates we see on this website.

25. Shut Up And Eat!, Toms River – http://www.shutupandeat-tr.com

Ocean County NJ Website Design Grade F

• There is absolutely nothing positive that we can praise about this website. It’s an absolute mess.
• While the logo graphic is interesting and memorable, the photos are horrific. Poor quality, pixelated, and unattractive.
• It looks like someone hired their teenage nephew to make this website. There is nothing professional about it. We could list all of the things wrong and make suggestions, but it doesn’t seem like this business cares to invest any money or time into their website or digital marketing.

Directory of local Web Designers serving Ocean County NJ

Below is a profile of each website designer in Ocean County New Jersey (list physical address is located in Ocean County) or web company who is known for their Ocean County NJ website design work.

While there is no shortage of business activity in Ocean County NJ, companies actively operating in this town are lacking in the area of effective web presence. This is a missed opportunity both for businesses and for potential customers. Most Ocean County NJ websites are poorly designed, and worse- they’re virtually impossible to find through online search.

To up your chances for success, get your Ocean County NJ website design set up the right way on the right platform, with an approach that draws targeted traffic. A beautiful website that’s supported with smart tools and a digital marketing strategy will drastically help your local NJ-based business to thrive.

By Location: Best/Worst NJ Website Design