Embedded Files
One of the most common questions I hear is:
"What pages do I actually need?"
It's a good question.
There are plenty of websites telling you that you need a homepage, About page, services, blog, resources, landing pages, lead magnets and goodness knows what else.
You probably don't.
A good small business website should answer the questions your customers have and make it easy for them to take the next step.
Here's where I'd start.
1. A clear homepage
Your homepage needs to answer three questions quickly:
What do you do?
Who do you do it for?
Where do you operate?
For example:
Local electrician providing domestic electrical work across Whitley Bay, North Tyneside and surrounding areas.
That's much more useful than:
Welcome to our website.
People shouldn't have to work out what your business does.
2. Your services or products
Tell people what you actually offer.
You don't necessarily need a separate page for every tiny service.
If you provide three or four main services, explain them clearly.
For each one, think about:
What is it?
Who is it for?
What does it involve?
Where do you provide it?
What questions do customers usually ask?
How do people get started?
Don't worry about making the page sound clever.
Make it useful.
3. An About page
People often want to know who's behind a small business.
Your About page is your opportunity to explain:
Who you are
What you do
Why you started
Where you're based
Your experience
Anything that makes your business different
You don't need to write your entire life story.
A few genuine details can tell people much more than a page of corporate-sounding copy.
4. Contact information
Make it easy for people to get in touch.
That might mean:
Phone number
Email address
Contact form
Booking link
Physical address
Service area
You don't necessarily need all of these.
Use the options that make sense for your business.
And make sure your contact details are easy to find on a phone.
5. Reviews and testimonials
If customers have said nice things about you, don't hide them.
Reviews can help someone decide whether to contact you.
You don't need twenty testimonials on every page.
A few genuine comments from real customers can be enough.
6. Information about where you work
If you're a local business, tell people where you're based and where you provide your services.
Don't just assume Google will work it out.
For example:
Based in Whitley Bay, serving customers across North Tyneside and the wider North East.
Make sure this information matches the details you use elsewhere online.
7. A clear next step
Every page should give people somewhere to go next.
That might be:
Call me
Request a quote
Book an appointment
See my work
Get in touch
Don't make visitors hunt for what to do.
What you probably don't need
This is just as important.
You probably don't need:
A blog if you aren't going to write one
Dozens of pages because someone said more is better
Complicated animations
A customer login system if nobody needs one
Five different ways to contact you
Stock photos of people shaking hands
Pages full of marketing phrases that don't actually say anything
Your website should be as complicated as it needs to be.
No more.
A simple website can be a good website
For many small businesses, I'd start with:
Home
About
Services
Contact
Then add other pages when there's a genuine reason to.
You might eventually need FAQs, case studies, individual service pages, online booking or other features.
That's fine.
Your website can grow with you.
A quick test
Open your website on your phone and pretend you've never seen it before.
Can you answer these questions in a few seconds?
What does this business do?
Where do they work?
Why should I choose them?
How do I contact them?
If the answer to any of these is no, that's probably a good place to start improving.
You don't necessarily need a new website.
You might just need to make the existing one clearer.
Good websites aren't complicated. They're useful.
[Need some help with your website? →]
Need some help getting found?
If you're not sure why your website isn't appearing for the searches you care about, let's take a look.
I can review your website and online presence and give you some straightforward advice about where I'd start.
No hard sell. No confusing SEO package. Just a conversation about what's actually going on.
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