What we found on bathtune-up.com
Bath Tune-Up is a bathroom remodeling franchise operating under the Home Franchise Concepts umbrella (same parent company as Kitchen Tune-Up, which we are also tearing down in this batch). According to Ahrefs, bathtune-up.com pulls 2.2K monthly organic visitors with an estimated traffic value of $8.3K. Smaller footprint than most brands in the CRO Index. But we picked the three highest-traffic pages we could verify and ran them through the standard protocol anyway.
The pages we tore down:
- McKinney TX location page (255 monthly organic visitors, 14% traffic share, scored 20 out of 100 on Google's mobile lab test)
- Charlotte NC location page (186 monthly visitors, 10% share, scored 29 out of 100)
- Blog page (126 monthly visitors, 7% share, scored 56 out of 100)
And the story on this one is simple. The McKinney TX location page scored 20 out of 100 on Google's mobile lab test. That is the lowest score we have recorded across every brand in the entire CRO Index series. Not by a small margin. Twenty. Out of a hundred. The Charlotte page is marginally better at 29, and the blog pulls a passable 56. But the location pages, the ones that actually need to convert a homeowner searching "bathroom remodel McKinney TX," are the worst-performing franchise pages we have measured.
"25% of homeowners say trusting contractors is their top challenge when planning home improvement projects."
— Houzz Inc. (2025)
Performance: 20 out of 100 on the location page
Quick framing note before we dig in. Google's mobile lab test runs a simulated slow-phone scenario, so the scores it reports are worst-case numbers, not what a real user on a fast phone with good WiFi experiences. The site probably feels fine on your phone. But Google uses these lab scores as a ranking factor in its search results, which means every page scoring below 50 is eating a real search-ranking penalty.
The McKinney TX location page scored 20 out of 100. For context across the CRO Index: the previous lowest score was in the high 20s. Bath Tune-Up just set a new floor. The Charlotte NC location page scored 29, which is also deep in the red zone. The blog page scored 56, which is the only page in this set that clears the "at least it is not failing catastrophically" bar.
"53% of mobile users abandon sites that take longer than 3 seconds to load."
— Google / SOASTA (2017)
But the real problem on both location pages is not the lab score itself. It is the layout shift. Content jumps around as the page loads. The McKinney page has a layout shift score of 0.273, which is nearly three times Google's threshold of 0.1. The Charlotte page is even worse at 0.342. That means a homeowner opening either page sees text and buttons physically moving around while the page finishes loading. They try to tap a phone number and the page shifts. They try to scroll to the form and a banner pushes everything down. That is the one performance metric homeowners can actually see and feel, regardless of their connection speed.
The blog page, by contrast, scores 0.041 on layout shift. Clean. Stable. So the template is capable of rendering without visible jumping. Something specific on the location pages (likely the form modules, the chat widget injection, or the image loading sequence) is causing the instability. And it is fixable.
Compounding effect
"Conversion rates drop approximately 12% for each additional second of page load time."
— Google / Deloitte (2020)
Lead capture: 5 form instances, one well-built contact form
Bath Tune-Up runs 5 form instances per page. That is the same franchise template pattern we have seen on every Home Franchise Concepts property. But there is a difference worth noting. The primary contact form asks for five fields: first name, last name, email, phone, and zip code. All five fields have proper names in the markup, which means they are structured correctly for the browser's autofill to work. A homeowner who has saved their contact details in their phone can tap into the first field and have all five populated automatically.
Five fields is still more than the three we recommend (name, phone, zip), but it is a reasonable ask for a bathroom remodel lead. And compared to the 9-field forms we saw on the Neighborly franchise brands (Mr. Electric, Aire Serv, Mr. Rooter), five fields is practically streamlined.
"68% of users would not submit a form if it required too much personal information."
— Baymard Institute (2024)
The chat widget is present on the pages we tested. That is a second conversion path beyond the form, which is good. But neither path is positioned with any urgency or clarity. The form sits in the page body without a clear headline telling the homeowner what happens after they submit. "Request a consultation" or "get your free estimate" would go a long way. Right now the form just exists. No promise. No next step. No reason to fill it out instead of closing the tab.
One quirk in the audit data: the phone number rendered as (288) 856-92367, which is a parse artifact. The real number is 888-569-2367. The number itself is fine on the live site. But the fact that the underlying data parses it incorrectly suggests the phone number markup could be cleaner, which matters when Google reads the page to build the business listing.
Trust signals: zero reviews, zero badges, decent code labels
The trust signal audit on Bath Tune-Up is sparse. Across all three pages:
- Google Reviews: Chrome verification found 19 review elements and a "Testimonial" section rendered via JavaScript.
- Star rating: Not found on any page.
- Review count: Zero on every page.
- Review widgets: Present (detected via Chrome browser verification, missed by initial scraper due to JavaScript rendering).
- BBB badge: Not found on any page.
- Trust badges: Not found on any page.
- Chat widget: Present on all three pages.
No social proof of any kind. A homeowner lands on the McKinney TX location page, sees no reviews, no star rating, no badge from any authority, and has to decide whether to hand over their name and phone number to a company they have never heard of. The chat widget is the only signal that says "there is a real person on the other end."
Comparison
"83% of consumers use Google to find local business reviews; 74% use two or more review platforms when researching."
— BrightLocal (2025)
But the hidden code labels tell a different story. Both location pages carry LocalBusiness and Organization labels in the invisible markup Google reads. That is actually better than what we found on several of the Neighborly franchise brands, which only carried the most basic "where this page lives" label. Bath Tune-Up is telling Google "this is a local business" and "this is an organization," which helps with local search results and knowledge panel features. Not perfect (there is no specific "bathroom remodeler" label, no FAQ labels, no review labels), but it is a real step above the bare-minimum approach.
What Bath Tune-Up does well
A teardown that just lists problems is not useful. Bath Tune-Up does a few things well, and they are worth noting even on the lowest-scoring site in the series.
The contact form is well-structured. Five fields (first name, last name, email, phone, zip) with proper field names. Browser autofill works. That is better than most franchise forms we have audited, and it is the right foundation. Trim it to three fields (name, phone, zip) and you have something genuinely competitive.
Hidden code labels are above average for a franchise. LocalBusiness and Organization labels on the location pages. Most Neighborly brands only carry the basic navigation label. Bath Tune-Up is giving Google more to work with, which helps in local search results.
The blog template is dramatically faster. The blog page scored 56 out of 100 versus 20 and 29 on the location pages. The blog template is lighter (fewer modules, fewer widgets, fewer third-party scripts), and it proves the underlying technology can render at a reasonable speed. The location page template is the bottleneck, not the hosting or the platform.
Chat widget is consistently present. Every page we tested has a chat widget. That is a second conversion path that runs independently of the form, and it catches homeowners who do not want to fill out fields. Consistency matters. If the chat only appeared on one page out of three, it would not count. It is on all three.
"64% of homeowners say having recommendations or references is a top-three factor in choosing a contractor."
— Houzz Inc. (2025)
What the gaps mean for local kitchen and bath contractors
Bath Tune-Up is a national franchise. You are a local kitchen and bath contractor. And the competitive gap here is as wide as we have seen in this entire series.
Beat them on Google's mobile test by 60+ points. Bath Tune-Up's location pages scored 20 and 29 out of 100. Yours should score 85+. That is not an aspirational target. That is a realistic number for a well-built local contractor page with compressed images, minimal third-party scripts, and a clean layout. The franchise is handing you a 60-point head start on the ranking factor that Google uses to decide who shows up first.
Fix what homeowners can actually see: layout stability. Both Bath Tune-Up location pages have content that jumps around as the page loads (layout shift scores of 0.273 and 0.342, both well above Google's 0.1 limit). Your page should load cleanly with no visible shifting. Set image dimensions in advance. Load fonts before text renders. Make sure the chat widget does not push the page down when it appears. A stable page feels professional. A jumping page feels broken.
Display Google Reviews on every page. Bath Tune-Up has zero reviews on every page we tested. Your site should have a Google Reviews widget with the star count, review count, and a "read all reviews" link under your headline on every service page. Above the fold. If you have 15 reviews with a 4.8-star average, that is infinitely more social proof than zero.
"48% of customers say that if a site does not work well on mobile, it signals the company does not care about their business."
— Google Consumer Insights (2018)
Add the specific business-type code label Google supports. Bath Tune-Up uses generic LocalBusiness and Organization labels. Your site should tell Google specifically that you are a "HomeAndConstructionBusiness" or the closest match for kitchen and bath remodeling. Plus mark your FAQ sections as FAQs so Google can pull them into expanded search results. These are invisible labels a developer can add in an afternoon, and they give you richer search listings than a franchise running generic labels.
The positioning angle is direct. Bath Tune-Up scored 20 out of 100 on Google's test on their most important page type. You do not need to be perfect. You just need to be dramatically better than 20. And that bar is low enough that any competent local contractor site clears it without breaking a sweat.
Frequently asked questions
How does Bath Tune-Up score on Google's mobile test?
Bath Tune-Up's McKinney TX location page scored 20 out of 100 on Google's mobile lab test. That is the lowest score we have recorded in the entire CRO Index series. The Charlotte NC location page scored 29. The blog page scored 56. So the blog is passable, but both location pages (the pages that actually need to convert homeowners searching for bathroom remodels in those cities) fail badly.
Does Bath Tune-Up show Google Reviews on their pages?
No. The audit found zero Google Reviews widgets, zero star ratings, and zero review counts displayed on any of the three pages we tested. No review platform of any kind is rendering on the page. A chat widget is present across all three pages, but the social proof a homeowner looks for when picking a bathroom remodeler (visible star rating, review count, link to read reviews) is completely absent.
Why is Bath Tune-Up's blog so much faster than their location pages?
The blog template is lighter than the location page template. Blog posts typically carry fewer third-party widgets, fewer form modules, fewer image carousels, and fewer embedded chat components. The 36-point gap between the blog (56 out of 100) and the McKinney location page (20 out of 100) confirms that the underlying platform can render at a reasonable speed. The location page template is the bottleneck. The specific modules loading on those pages (forms, chat, images without set dimensions) are what cause the score to crater and the layout to shift.
How much organic traffic does bathtune-up.com get?
According to Ahrefs data from our March 2026 collection, bathtune-up.com receives approximately 2.2K monthly organic visitors with an estimated traffic value of $8.3K. The McKinney TX location page accounts for 255 of that (14% share). The Charlotte NC location page accounts for 186 (10%). The blog accounts for 126 visitors (7%).
