Small business website design: what to look for before you pay
How to judge a small business website design before you commit — the checks that predict whether a site will bring in enquiries, and the red flags to walk away from.
Judging a website design is hard when you are not a designer. So most people judge on looks — which is the one criterion that correlates weakly with whether the site brings in work.
Here is what to check instead. None of it requires design knowledge.
The five-minute assessment
- Open it on your phone. Not a laptop. Is anything cut off? Do you have to zoom? Is the phone number tappable?
- Time the load. Count seconds until you see real content. Over three, that is a problem.
- Read the first line only. Can you tell what the business does and where? If not, no customer can either.
- Find the phone number. How many taps? It should be zero — visible without scrolling.
- Check the footer for a date. "© 2022" tells you nobody has touched this site in years.
What good small business design actually means
Clarity over cleverness
A clever headline that takes a moment to decode costs you customers. "Emergency plumber in Manchester, 24/7" is not creative, and it is exactly right.
One obvious next step per page
Every page should make one action obvious — usually call, book or enquire. Pages offering five equal options get none of them clicked.
Proof close to claims
A promise of quality work means little on its own. Put a photo of the work and a real review next to it and it becomes credible.
Designed for a phone first
Most local searches happen on a phone, often outdoors on patchy data. A design that was conceived on a wide desktop screen and squeezed down afterwards always shows.
Red flags when hiring
- No recent examples. Or examples that are no longer live.
- Vague about what is excluded. The exclusions are where the surprise bills live.
- No answer on post-launch changes. Ask the price of changing one line in month six.
- The domain in their name. It should be in yours, always.
- Design-only conversation. If nobody mentions speed, mobile or search, the site will be a portfolio piece rather than a business tool.
Ask to see a site they built two years ago. Whether it is still live, still accurate and still fast tells you more than any portfolio shot.
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Design decisions that change enquiries
| Decision | Weak version | Strong version |
|---|---|---|
| Headline | "Welcome to our website" | "Emergency plumber in Leeds — 24/7" |
| Phone number | Buried on the contact page | In the header, tappable, on every page |
| Services | A list of one-word nouns | Each service with a price and timeframe |
| Photos | Generic stock handshakes | Your actual work, well lit |
| Proof | "Quality guaranteed" | A named review next to the relevant service |
| Next step | Five equal buttons | One obvious action per page |
How to test a design before it goes live
- The five-second test. Show someone the homepage for five seconds, then ask what the business does and where. If they cannot say, the design has failed regardless of how it looks.
- The thumb test. On a phone, one-handed — can you reach the phone number and the main button?
- The mobile-data test. Turn wifi off. Count the seconds.
- The stranger test. Ask someone outside your industry to find your prices. Watch where they look.
Accessibility, briefly — and why it is commercial
Reasonable contrast, readable type, labelled form fields and real alt text are not just ethics. They make sites usable for older customers, in bright sunlight, on cheap screens — and they help search engines and AI assistants understand your pages.
The three-year question
Before you commit, ask: in three years, who will still be maintaining this? If the answer is nobody, you are not buying a website — you are buying a snapshot of one, and it starts ageing the day it launches.
Common questions
What makes a good small business website?
Fast loading on mobile, an immediately obvious statement of what you do and where, easy contact, proof of your work, and accurate information that is kept up to date. Visual polish matters far less than these.
How do I choose a website designer?
Look at sites they built two or more years ago and check they are still live and current. Ask what is excluded from the quote, what a change costs after launch, and whether you own the domain and content. Confident designers answer all three immediately.