The 12-Point Small Business Homepage Checklist

Score your homepage in 5 minutes. If it fails more than three of these, you're leaving customers on the table every day.

The 12 points

1. A stranger can tell what you do in under 3 seconds. No jargon, no clever taglines, no "empowering excellence."
2. Your city or service area is on the page — above the fold. Local intent is 60%+ of small-business searches.
3. One primary call-to-action repeats down the page. Not five competing buttons.
4. Phone number in the header. Tap-to-call on mobile. Non-negotiable for service businesses.
5. Real review count and star rating near the top. "5.0 from 128 Google reviews" beats a wall of testimonials.
6. Real photos of your team, van, storefront, or work. Stock photos torch trust.
7. A 3-step "how it works" section so first-time buyers know what happens after they click.
8. Services listed with a link to a dedicated page for each. Google needs those pages to rank you.
9. Fast on mobile — under 3 seconds on 4G. Test at pagespeed.web.dev.
10. Simple form with 3–4 fields max. Name, phone, email, what you need.
11. Trust bar: BBB, warranty, "family-owned since," insurance, guarantees — the reasons someone should trust you specifically.
12. Footer with NAP (Name, Address, Phone), hours, and service area. Helps SEO and answers the question every visitor eventually asks.

The one-question test

Show your homepage to someone who's never heard of your business for 5 seconds, close the tab, and ask: "What does this business do and how would you contact them?"

If they can't answer both, fix the homepage before you spend another dollar on ads or SEO.

Next step

Get a personalized score across all 12 points — plus the exact fixes — in our free Growth Blueprint.