What Should a Tradesperson's Website Include? (Checklist)

What Does a Tradesperson's Website Need to Include?

At minimum, your website needs: your phone number visible on every page, a simple contact form, an SSL certificate, your services listed clearly, the areas you cover, and real customer reviews shown on site. Get these right and your website will actually bring in work.

Too many trade websites look fine on the surface but fail at the one thing they're supposed to do — turn visitors into enquiries. A visitor lands on your site, can't immediately see your phone number, can't figure out if you cover their area, and leaves. That's a lost job, and it happens dozens of times a month on most trade websites.

This checklist covers everything your site needs, in order of importance.

Does My Phone Number Really Need to Be on Every Page?

Yes. Your phone number should be at the top of every single page, and it must be clickable on mobile. This is the single most important element on your entire website.

Over 70% of people looking for a tradesperson are searching on their phone. If they have to scroll or hunt through a contact page to find your number, they'll hit the back button and call someone else.

Put your number in the header. Make it big. Make it clickable.

What Makes a Good Contact Form for a Trade Website?

A good contact form has three or four fields maximum: name, phone number, and a short message. Every extra field you add loses you leads.

People want to describe their problem quickly and hear back. They don't want to fill in their full address, choose from a dropdown of 15 service categories, or answer budget questions before they've spoken to you.

Keep it short, put it on every page, and make sure you actually receive the submissions. Test your own form right now from your phone. If you don't receive the message within a minute, fix it today.

Why Does SSL Matter for a Trade Website?

An SSL certificate means your website shows a padlock in the browser bar instead of "Not Secure." Without it, visitors see a warning that actively tells them not to trust your site.

Every major browser now flags sites without SSL. For a trade business where trust is everything, that warning is devastating. The good news: SSL is free with most hosting providers (via Let's Encrypt). Your host can usually enable it in a few clicks.

What Should I Put on My Services Page?

List every service you offer with a short description of each. Don't just put "Plumbing Services" and leave it at that — be specific.

Instead of one vague page, list out your individual services:

Boiler installations and repairs
Emergency callouts
Bathroom fitting
Central heating
Leak detection and repair
Power flushing
Unblocking drains

Each service should have a paragraph explaining what you do and what's involved. This is how Google understands your business and shows your site in relevant searches. If you specialise in something, give it its own page — specialised pages rank well because fewer competitors have them.

Do I Need an "Areas Covered" Section?

Absolutely. Listing the specific towns, cities, and postcodes you serve helps Google show your site to people searching in those areas. It also immediately answers the visitor's first question: "Do they come to me?"

Don't just say "We cover the North West" — list the towns: Bolton, Bury, Rochdale, Oldham, Wigan. For bonus points, create individual pages for your busiest areas. A page titled "Plumber in Harrogate" will rank far better than a generic services page for people searching there.

How Should I Display Reviews on My Website?

Pull your best Google reviews onto your homepage and services pages. Real reviews from real customers build trust faster than anything else you can put on your site.

You can embed Google reviews using free widgets, or simply copy and paste your best ones with the customer's first name and the star rating. Having 5-10 strong reviews visible on your homepage immediately tells visitors that other people have hired you and been happy.

Don't hide your reviews on a separate testimonials page that nobody visits. Put them where people actually look — on the homepage, on service pages, and near your contact form.

Does My Website Need to Be Fast?

Yes. If your site takes more than 3 seconds to load on a phone, roughly half of your visitors will leave before they see anything. You've lost them before they've even read a word.

Common speed killers on trade websites:

Oversized images — photos straight from your phone are often 3-5MB each. They should be compressed to under 200KB
Cheap hosting — budget hosting packages often put hundreds of sites on one server. Your site loads slowly because it's sharing resources with everyone else
Too many plugins — if you're on WordPress, every plugin adds weight. Deactivate anything you're not actively using
No caching — caching stores a ready-made version of your pages so they load faster for repeat visitors

Test your site speed at Google PageSpeed Insights (pagespeed.web.dev). It's free, and it'll tell you exactly what's slowing you down.

Does My Website Need to Work Well on Mobile?

Non-negotiable. The majority of your visitors are on their phones. If your website is hard to read or the buttons are too small to tap, people will leave.

Check your own site on your phone right now. Can you read everything without zooming? Can you tap the phone number? Can you fill in the contact form? If any answer is no, your site needs work. Google also ranks mobile-friendly sites higher, so a poor mobile experience hurts you twice.

What About an About Page?

An about page builds trust. People want to know who they're letting into their home. A photo of you, how long you've been in the trade, and what you stand for goes a long way.

You don't need a corporate bio. A couple of paragraphs about who you are and your experience is plenty. If you're a family business or you've been in the trade for 20 years, say so.

The Bottom Line

A trade website doesn't need to be flashy or expensive. It needs to load fast, show your phone number clearly, make it easy to get in touch, and prove you're worth hiring. That's the whole job.

If you're not sure whether your website is doing these things properly, SwiftLead offers a free audit that checks every item on this list and shows you exactly what needs fixing. Most trade websites have two or three quick wins that make an immediate difference to enquiries.

Go through this checklist today. The fixes are often simpler than you think.

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