You need fewer things than you think
Ask ten web designers what a tradesperson needs and you will get ten different answers, most of them expensive. In practice, a website for a plumber, electrician, builder or roofer has one job: turn someone who is already looking for your trade in your town into a phone call or a form submission.
Everything that does not help that is decoration.
The five things that matter
- 1.Your trade and your area, above the fold. "Gas Safe registered plumber in Chesham and Amersham" beats "Quality you can trust" every time. People searching are checking two things — do you do this, and do you come here.
- 2.A phone number that dials on a tap. Most visits come from a phone, often at an awkward hour. Make calling a single tap and put the number in the header on every page.
- 3.One simple enquiry form. Name, phone, and "what do you need?" is enough. Every extra field loses you enquiries. It should land in your inbox instantly.
- 4.Proof you are real. A handful of genuine reviews, your registration numbers, a few photos of finished work. This is what closes the decision.
- 5.Pages that load fast. If it takes more than a couple of seconds on 4G, they have gone back to Google.
What you can ignore
- Long "About us" essays. Nobody chose a roofer because of a mission statement.
- Sliders and video backgrounds. They slow the site down and hide the phone number.
- Live chat. You are up a ladder. It will sit unanswered and look worse than no chat at all.
- A blog you will never write. An empty blog is worse than none.
- Booking software you do not need yet. If your diary works, leave it. Fix the enquiry leak first.
Where the money actually goes wrong
The common mistake is not spending too little — it is spending on the wrong thing. A £3,000 site with a slow-loading gallery and a broken contact form loses more work than a £400 site with a clear number and a form that arrives.
Start with the smallest version that answers the question "does this person do my job in my town, and how do I reach them?" Then add things only when a real problem shows up: too many time-wasting calls, no-shows, quotes taking your evenings.
A quick test for your current site
Open it on your phone, on mobile data, and time it. Then ask someone who does not know your business to find your phone number and tell you which towns you cover. If either takes more than five seconds, that is your first job — not a redesign.
If you would rather see what better looks like before spending anything, Ownistry builds a free working prototype after a short call, usually within a week. You look at it, and decide.