On the first screen of your home page
If someone lands on your site and cannot tell what you do and where within a few seconds, they leave. Everything else on the site comes after this.
- What you do, in plain words a customer would use
- Where you do it: your town, city or area
- One main button: call, book or get a quote
- A reason to trust you: years trading, reviews, accreditations
The pages most small businesses need
- Home: the summary above, then a short tour of the rest
- Services: each one named, with what is included and a price or starting price
- About: who you are, how long you have been doing it, and photos of you
- Reviews: real words from real customers
- Contact: phone, email, a form, your address or area, and your hours
The details customers look for
- Prices, even rough ones: people use them to decide whether to call at all
- Opening hours, kept up to date, including holidays
- Photos of your real work, premises and team
- Answers to the questions you are asked most
- Your phone number on every page, one tap to call on a phone
What Google needs to match you
Google matches searches to pages that clearly say what they are about. Give each main service its own heading or page, name the places you work, and make sure your business name, address and phone number are exactly the same as on your Google Business Profile.
Each page should also have its own clear title, the line that shows in Google's results. Our free SEO audit checks this and more on the site you have now.
The legal bits for UK sites
If your site collects personal details, for example through a contact form, you need a privacy notice that says what you collect, why and for how long. If it uses cookies that are not strictly needed, such as analytics or advertising cookies, you need visitors' consent first. The Information Commissioner's Office publishes free guidance for small businesses on both.
If you trade as a limited company, show your company name and registered number on the site.
What to leave out
- Pop ups that cover the page before anyone has read it
- Big claims with nothing behind them, like best in the UK
- Old offers, old prices and old opening hours
- Long walls of text: short paragraphs and clear headings are easier on a phone