What should a tradesman website include? The 12-point checklist

Most answers to this question are written for any small business, with the word "tradesman" added afterwards. This one starts from how a homeowner actually finds a plumber, electrician, roofer or builder: on a phone, often with the problem in front of them, checking three things before they ring. Can I call you right now, are you legitimate, and have you done this job before. Every item on the list below exists to answer one of those three.

The checklist at a glance

1. A phone number you can tap, visible on every screen.
2. One page for each service you want more of.
3. Service-area pages only for the towns you actually work in.
4. Your accreditations, each linked to the register it can be checked on.
5. Google reviews shown on the site and kept current.
6. Before-and-after photos of your own jobs, labelled by job and town.
7. A quote form that can be finished on a phone, with a photo upload.
8. Pricing signals: a call-out fee, a day rate or "from" prices.
9. A Google Business Profile that matches the site exactly.
10. An about page that says who will turn up at the door.
11. The basics behind the scenes: speed, HTTPS, titles, legal details.
12. Ownership: the domain, hosting and files in your name.

Tick what your current site already has. If it is missing more than three, the rest of this guide tells you what to ask for; if it has all twelve and still does not bring in work, the problem is more likely ranking than content.

1. A phone number you can tap, on every screen

The number goes in the header as a real tap-to-call link, not a picture of a number, and it stays on screen as the page scrolls on a phone. Say when it is answered: "7am to 7pm, seven days" beats "call us any time" because it is a promise you can keep.

If you take emergency call-outs, say what happens out of hours and give a signal of what it costs to get you out, because that is the first thing someone with water coming through the ceiling wants to know. If you do not, say that too, so the 2am caller does not leave you a bad review for not answering.

Put a WhatsApp link next to the number. A lot of customers would rather send a photo of the problem than describe it, and a photo lets you quote from the van. A separate number for the website, even a cheap diverted one, tells you which jobs came from the site.

2. One page for each service you want more of

A homeowner searches for the job, not the trade: "boiler replacement", "fuse board upgrade", "flat roof repair", "block paving". A single Services page with a bulleted list cannot rank for any of those and does not tell the customer you do the job they need.

Each service you want more of gets its own page:

• what the job involves, in the words a customer would use
• what changes the price (access, scaffolding, materials, the state of what is there now)
• how long it usually takes and what the customer needs to do beforehand
• photos of that job type, not a general gallery
• the accreditation that applies to it
• its own quote button and the phone number again

Start with the three or four jobs that make you the most money, not everything you have ever done. If you cannot write two hundred honest words about a service, it is not ready for a page.

3. Service-area pages only for the towns you actually work in

Area pages are how one site gets found across a patch rather than a single postcode. They are also the most abused item on this list. Google's spam policies name "doorway pages", near-identical pages created for every town, as something it acts against, and a footer stuffed with forty town names gets the same treatment.

The rule is simple: build an area page only for a town you work in regularly, and put on it things you could only know from working there. Jobs you have done in that town, with photos. The housing stock and what it means for the job: 1930s semis with original lead pipework, Victorian terraces with no access to the rear, new-build estates with builder-grade fittings. Parking and permit notes. How quickly you can get there. Three real area pages beat thirty thin ones.

Your area pages, the service area on your Google Business Profile and the "areas covered" line in your footer should all say the same thing.

4. Your accreditations, linked to the register

This is where the generic checklists fall down, and it is the item a nervous customer checks first. A badge on its own proves nothing; a badge with your registration number and a link to the scheme's own register proves everything in ten seconds.

Mark	Who checks for it	What to show
Gas Safe Register	Anyone booking gas work; registration is a legal requirement for gas work in the UK	Badge, your registration number, and a link to the Gas Safe Register's check-a-business page
NICEIC, NAPIT (and Part P)	Homeowners and landlords who need electrical work certified	Badge, registration, and a link to the scheme's find-a-contractor search
TrustMark	Homeowners who have read "use a TrustMark-registered business" on a council or consumer site	Badge linked to your TrustMark listing
FENSA or CERTASS	Anyone replacing windows or doors	Badge and scheme number; explain that you self-certify the work
CompetentRoofer, NFRC	Roofing customers and insurers	Badge and membership number
FMB, CHAS, Constructionline, SafeContractor	Builders' customers; CHAS and Constructionline are what commercial clients and main contractors ask for	Badge and membership number, on the pages for the work they relate to
MCS	Heat pump and solar customers, because grant-funded installs need an MCS-certified installer	Badge, certificate number, link to the MCS installer search
OFTEC, HETAS	Oil and solid-fuel heating customers	Badge and registration number
Manufacturer accreditations (Worcester Bosch, Vaillant, Marshalls, Bradstone)	Customers comparing guarantee length	Badge on the relevant service page, with the guarantee that comes with it
Public liability insurance	Almost everyone, once they think of it	The insurer and the cover level, on the about page

Put the badges near the top of the page, next to the phone number and the quote button, not in the footer. Never show a mark you do not hold: a customer who checks the register and cannot find you will not ring, and will tell people why.

5. Google reviews, shown on the site and kept current

Reviews decide the call. Show your Google reviews on the site, pulled in live rather than typed in three years ago, with the reviewer's name and the date, and a link to leave one.

If you have a Checkatrade, Trustpilot or Which? Trusted Trader profile, link to it rather than copying the reviews across. A customer trusts a review they can see on the platform more than one on your own page.

Recency matters more than volume. A review from last month says you are still trading and still good; fifty reviews that stop in 2023 say the opposite. Ask for the review on the day the job is signed off, from your phone, with a direct link to your Google Business Profile, and ask the customer to add a photo of the finished work.

6. Before-and-after photos of your own jobs

A homeowner can spot a stock photo instantly, and it tells them you have nothing of your own to show. You already have better material on your phone.

• Take a before and an after of every job, from the same spot, in daylight where you can.
• Organise photos by service, so the bathroom page shows bathrooms and the rewire page shows consumer units, not a single gallery of everything.
• Label each one with the job and the town: "Full rewire, 1930s semi, Sale". Those labels double as evidence for your area pages.
• Compress them before upload. A page of full-size phone photos is slow, and slow loses the call.

For bigger jobs write a short case study on the relevant service page: what the customer needed, what you found when you opened it up, what you did, how long it took, and what it cost if you are happy to say. Ask the customer for a sentence while you are still on site; it is much harder to get a week later.

7. A quote form you can finish on a phone

Most enquiries from a trade website are phone calls. The form catches the people who are at work, on a train, or ringing round several firms at once, so it has to work standing on a driveway with one thumb.

Field	Why it earns its place
Name and phone number	So you can ring back; make phone the required one, not email
Postcode	So you can say no to jobs outside your patch before you drive anywhere
Job type	A short dropdown that mirrors your service pages, so the enquiry lands in the right place
A few words about the job	One box, no minimum length
Photo upload	Optional, but a photo often means you can quote without a visit

Anything beyond that costs you enquiries. Under the button, say what happens next: who will ring, and when. Send an automatic confirmation so the customer knows it went through, make sure the form emails you and stores a copy where it cannot be lost, and test it from your own phone once a month. Forms break quietly, and nobody tells you.

8. Pricing signals

You do not have to publish a price list, but a site with no pricing signal at all attracts people who were only ever going to pick the cheapest, and puts off people who are worried about being ripped off.

The signals that work for a trade: a call-out fee, an hourly or day rate, a "from" price on each service page in your own numbers, a minimum charge for emergency work, and a plain line on whether quotes are free, fixed and in writing. On each service page, say what changes the price. A customer who reads that scaffolding adds to a roof repair does not feel ambushed when it appears on the quote.

If you are deciding what to spend on the site itself rather than what to charge through it, that is a different question, answered in how much a tradesman website costs.

9. A Google Business Profile that matches the site

For a "plumber near me" search, Google shows a map with three businesses above the normal results. That is the Google Business Profile, it is free, and for local work it often matters more than the website itself. The two need to point at each other.

• The profile links to the site, and the site's footer carries the same business name, address, phone number and opening hours as the profile, word for word.
• The profile's services list mirrors your service pages, and its service area mirrors your area pages.
• Reviews are asked for on the profile, then shown on the site.
• The same job photos go on both.

Getting the profile and the site to rank higher over time is a separate job from building them. That is SEO for trades, and the site's page structure is what makes it possible.

10. An about page that says who turns up

A customer is letting a stranger into their house. The about page is where they check who.

Put a photo of you and anyone who works with you, the van, the town you are based in and how long you have been at it, only where it is true, because a limited company's history is a two-minute check on Companies House. Say what you specialise in and what you turn down. Name your insurer. If it is just you, say so; some customers specifically want the person quoting to be the person doing the work.

11. The basics behind the scenes

None of this is visible to a customer, and all of it costs you calls when it is missing.

• Speed on a phone signal. Test the site with Google's free PageSpeed Insights on the mobile setting. Large images and builder templates are the usual culprits.
• HTTPS. The padlock. Browsers warn people off sites without it.
• A title for every page that says the service and the area, because that is what appears in the Google result.
• Structured data that tells Google your business type, opening hours and area.
• The legal bits. A privacy notice that covers the quote form. If you are a limited company, the registered name, company number and registered office somewhere on the site; the footer is fine. Your VAT number if you are VAT-registered.

Keeping all of this working after launch, with backups and updates, is what a hosting and care plan is for.

12. Ownership: the domain, hosting and files in your name

Settle this before anything is built. The domain registered to your business, with your own login. Hosting you can get into. The site files, the words and the photos yours to take to another host or another developer. Pay-monthly and "free build" deals often keep all three, which is fine until you want to leave.

Ask in writing, before the deposit: is the domain in my name, do I keep the site if I stop paying, and do I get the files and full admin access at launch? The cost guide explains the three ownership models and what each one costs over three years.

Handing this checklist to a designer

Print the twelve points, tick the ones your current site has, and give the list to whoever quotes you. A quote against a named page list is comparable with the next quote; a quote for "a website" is not.

Then ask for three things. A site they have built for a trade, opened on your phone, with each item visible. A written scope that lists the pages by name and says who writes the words. And straight answers to the three ownership questions. Vagueness on any of them is your answer.

What to leave off

The generic checklists tell you what to add. Many trade sites would do better by removing things:

• stock photos of a smiling man in a hard hat
• a badge you do not hold, or one without a number to check
• a "News" or "Blog" page with one post from the year the site launched
• a "Coming soon" page of any kind
• a quote form with more than six fields, or one that demands an email address before a phone number
• a pop-up that appears before the page has loaded
• video that plays itself, with sound
• a chatbot that cannot book anything or give a price
• reviews with no name and no date
• prices hidden in a PDF that will not open on a phone
• "we cover the whole of the UK" when you cover one county
• a list of forty towns in the footer
• a contact page with a form and no phone number

If your current site has several of these, and the pages underneath are sound, that is a redesign rather than a rebuild.

How many pages a trade website needs

As many as you have real services and real areas, plus the four every site needs: home, about, reviews and contact. A rough guide:

Business	Pages	What they are
Sole trader, one main service, one town	Five or six	Home, the service, about, reviews, contact, privacy
Small firm, three or four services, a handful of towns	Ten to fifteen	Home, a page per service, two or three area pages, about, reviews, contact, privacy
Firm with a team, six or more services, a wide patch	Fifteen to twenty-five	The above plus more service and area pages and a case-study section

The number is a result, not a target. Add a page when you have something specific to put on it, and not before.

Where each trade differs

The twelve points hold for every trade. What goes on them does not, and the trade pages on this site go into the detail:

• Plumbers and heating engineers: the Gas Safe number goes next to the phone number, the emergency line needs its own out-of-hours wording, and boiler-brand accreditations decide the guarantee a customer gets. See websites for plumbers.
• Electricians: NICEIC or NAPIT registration and Part P certification on every page, a landlord-facing page for EICRs, and EV charger installs as a service in their own right. See websites for electricians.
• Roofers: storm-damage response and what you do about insurance claims, roof photos from up the ladder or a drone, and CompetentRoofer or NFRC membership where the customer can see it. See websites for roofers.
• Builders and construction firms: project case studies with a timeline, CHAS or Constructionline for commercial enquiries, and plain wording on planning and Building Regulations. See websites for construction companies.
• Landscapers and gardeners: photos by season so a winter enquiry can still see a finished garden, design drawings alongside the built result, and Marshalls or Bradstone installer status next to the guarantee it brings. See websites for landscapers.

Whichever trade you are in, the customer's three questions are the same. Build the site to answer them and the rest is detail.