The short answer: most tradesmen do, but not all. Homeowners check you out before they ring, and in a year of enquiries we counted, about half arrived outside 8am to 5pm. If you’re booked months ahead on word of mouth, a website can wait. If you want more work, or more of the work you actually like doing, it’s the one salesperson that keeps going while you’re on a job.
I get asked this a lot by tradesmen who’ve done fine for years without a website. Fair enough. Word of mouth is still the best work going. But even a customer who’s been recommended to you will often look you up first, and what they find decides whether they ring you or the next name.
The same goes for every other way work comes in. Whether they spotted your van or your ad, plenty of people search your name before they get in touch. Our guide to getting roofing leads covers where the enquiries come from. This one is about what they find when they go looking.
When do homeowners go looking for a tradesman?
Mostly when you can’t answer. We counted the time stamp on every Facebook lead form our clients received in a year: 67,379 enquiries to UK trades between 13 Oct 2025 and 11 Oct 2026.
To be straight about it, these are form enquiries, not website visits. They don’t tell you how many people look at a website. What they do show is when homeowners sit down and sort out a job: in the evening and at the weekend. That’s when you’re off the tools, or still on them and can’t pick up.
Someone who looks you up at 9pm on a Sunday isn’t going to ring you. They will read your website. If it answers their questions and makes getting in touch easy, they send a message and you wake up to it. If there’s nothing to find, they try someone else.
This is what it looks like from the tradesman’s side. Adam sent us this gone 10pm on his first day live with us:
… we had two leads come through within the last hour or so so I’ll ring them first thing in the morning looking good.
Adam, roofer, Queensferry · WhatsApp, 22 Apr 2026, 22:09
Those came from his Facebook ads, but the timing is the point. Work turns up late in the evening. Whatever the homeowner finds at that hour has to do your selling.
What does a homeowner check before they ring you?
From what we see on our clients’ leads and on our own site, it comes down to four things. Get these right and the website is doing its job.
Proof that you’re real and you’re good
Photos of your own jobs, not stock pictures. Reviews, and your customers’ own words. Homeowners are wary of cowboys, so real proof does more than any slogan ever will.
On this site we show clients’ WhatsApp messages word for word, with the date and time they were sent, like the one above. We’re rated 5.0 from 19 reviews on Google, and that sits near the top of the page. A homeowner wants the same from you: evidence that people like them have used you and were happy.
Speed on a phone
Your customers search on their phone. If your page hangs, they tap the next name on the list. Check your own site on your phone, on mobile data rather than your home wifi, and be honest about how long it takes.
Google has a free test for this called PageSpeed Insights. When we ran leadwave.co.uk through its mobile test on 15 Oct 2026, it scored 96 for speed, 100 for accessibility, 100 for best practice and 100 for SEO. Run your own site through it. If the mobile speed score is low, that’s the first thing to fix.
Clear services and a clear area
A visitor should know what you do and where you work before they scroll. Name the towns you cover in plain words. A page for each main job you do (flat roofs and re-roofs, for a roofer) helps people find the one they want, and helps Google match each search to the right page.
Vague pages like “all aspects of building work undertaken” leave the homeowner guessing whether you do their job. Plenty won’t bother asking.
Easy to get in touch
One tap to ring you or message you, on every page, so nobody has to hunt for a number. On this site every page has a WhatsApp button with the first message already written. Getting in touch takes one tap and no typing.
If your contact page is a long form full of boxes, plenty of people will give up halfway through on a phone.
Isn’t a Facebook page or a Google profile enough?
They’re both worth having, and your Google Business Profile should come first. It’s free, it’s what shows on Google Maps, and good reviews on it carry a lot of weight. When we build a website for a trade, the profile gets set up alongside it.
Where they fall short is that you’re working inside someone else’s layout. You can’t build a page for each job you do, and you can’t see which search brought an enquiry in. A website is yours. You decide what goes on it, and you can see what’s working.
The two also back each other up. If you run Facebook ads for your trade, people who see the ad often look you up before they reply. A website with real proof on it backs up what the ad says. It’s the same reason we only run Google Ads on a website we’ve built: every click needs a page made to win the job.
When don’t you need a website yet?
Honestly, a website isn’t always the next thing to spend on. I’d leave it for now if one of these sounds like you.
- You’re booked solid on word of mouth. If the diary is full months ahead and you’re happy with the work, more enquiries just means saying no more often. A Google profile with good reviews will look after the people who check you out.
- You mostly work for other firms. If your work comes from contractors who already know you, homeowners aren’t the ones searching.
- You can’t answer the enquiries you already get. A website that brings in more messages won’t help if they sit unanswered. Sort out how you reply first. Our cost per job calculator shows what slow replies cost you, using your own numbers.
- You’re just starting out with nothing to show yet. Get your Google profile up, do some jobs, and collect photos and reviews. A website with real proof on it is worth far more than one built on stock photos.
If none of those is you, and you want more of the work you choose rather than whatever comes along, a website is usually worth having.
What makes a trade website worth having?
A website on its own doesn’t bring in work. Most trade websites are built once and never touched again, so Google has no reason to show them. A good one gets looked after: pages checked, and new pages added for the jobs you want more of.
Be realistic about the timescale. Google’s own guidance says SEO usually takes four months to a year. So turning up on Google for searches from strangers is a slow build. The part that works from day one is everyone who already knows your name, like the neighbour who recommended you or the person who saw your ad and searched you before replying.
Be wary of anyone who promises you first place on Google. Nobody can promise that. What you can expect is the work: a fast site, real proof, a page for each job, one-tap contact, and someone improving it as the months go on.
That’s how we build and look after websites for trades. We write every page from a short chat, you approve it, and nothing goes live until you say yes. This site is built the same way, so if you’re reading this on your phone, you’re looking at the example. You can see everything that comes with a Lead Wave website on one page.
Not sure if you need a website yet? Message Nick with your trade and your area. He’ll tell you straight whether it’s worth it for you right now. See what’s included
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