Websites for contractors and trades.
Homeowners hiring a contractor are about to spend a lot on their house, and they check before they call. They look for a license, a few finished jobs that resemble theirs, reviews from neighbors, and some sign that you work in their town. A site that shows all four, with a quote form that accepts photos of the problem, turns that research into a phone call.
Homeowners search for the trade and the town.
Most trade searches name the job and the place. Some are planned months ahead, like a kitchen remodel or a new roof before the rains. Others are urgent: a failed water heater, a leaking roof in January, a septic alarm on a Sunday. Planned searches read and compare, while urgent ones call whoever shows up first with a number that answers.
Searches like these:
- "roofer santa rosa"
- "electrician near me"
- "general contractor sonoma county"
- "kitchen remodel petaluma"
- "septic pumping ukiah"
- "well pump repair mendocino county"
- "fence contractor windsor"
- "emergency plumber near me"
Prove the license and show the work.
Start with the license. California's contractor law requires your CSLB license number in all advertising, and the state board treats a website as advertising. It goes in the header or footer of every page, with a link to the board's license lookup so a careful homeowner can check it in one tap. Insurance, bonding, and workers' comp details go nearby.
Then the work. A gallery of finished projects, each captioned with the town and the job, says more about a contractor than any amount of copy, and before-and-after pairs say it best. If your crew already shoots job photos with an app like CompanyCam, the best of those can feed the gallery as part of the plan's content updates.
Give each service its own page: roofing, remodels, panel upgrades, drain cleaning, whatever you want more of. Add a service-area page naming the towns you drive to. The quote form asks for the job address, a short description, and a few photos, so you can price the job or decide it needs a site visit before you get in the truck.
A trade business working from a shop or a home office usually runs its Google Business Profile as a service-area business, with the address hidden. The map pack stays anchored near your base, which is why the website and its service-area pages carry the work in towns farther out. The local SEO work is built around that split.
Quotes and photos from the tools your crew already uses.
Plenty of trade businesses already run scheduling and invoicing through field-service software. The website feeds requests into it, and the job photos it collects become the gallery.
- Jobber
Quote requests, scheduling, and invoicing for small crews, with a request form that embeds on your site.
- Housecall Pro
Online booking, estimates, and dispatch for home service companies.
- ServiceTitan
Dispatch and customer management for larger outfits running several trucks.
- CompanyCam
Job photos from the field, organized by address, ready to become before-and-after pairs.
- Houzz
Portfolio and reviews, widely used by remodelers and designers.
- Nextdoor
Neighbor recommendations, and a free business page worth claiming.
A service-area business with the right category.
Pick the primary category for the work you want more of, since that decides which searches you compete in. A remodeler who also does some roofing should still lead with Remodeler or General contractor if remodels are the business. Set the service area to the towns you actually serve, turn on Online estimates if you quote from photos, and post project photos regularly. Reviews that mention the town and the job tend to help the most.
Primary category
Choose the one that fits the work you want most
- → General contractor
- → Remodeler
- → Roofing contractor
- → Electrician
- → Plumber
- → HVAC contractor
Secondary categories
Add only what you actually offer
- → Kitchen remodeler
- → Bathroom remodeler
- → Concrete contractor
- → Fence contractor
- → Septic system service
- → Well drilling contractor
Attributes and links
Set every one that is true of you
- → Online estimates
- → Onsite services
- → Online appointments
- → Identity attributes, such as veteran-owned, where they apply
Google offers different attributes for different categories and revises the list from time to time, so your own profile shows which of these apply to you.
From fire rebuilds to long rural drives.
The fires of 2017 and 2020 reshaped Sonoma County's trades market. Rebuilds, then home hardening and defensible-space work, kept contractors busy for years, and the map pack around Santa Rosa is crowded as a result.
North and west of there the work spreads out. Around Cloverdale, Willits, and across Mendocino County, septic, well, roofing, and solar jobs sit at the end of long rural drives, and homeowners search for someone willing to make the trip. Competition is thin in those markets, and a contractor with a clear service-area page and a complete profile can show up for towns well beyond the one they live in.
One plan, $200 a month.
The build is included, there is no setup fee, and the plan runs month to month. It covers hosting, maintenance, content updates, and your Google Business Profile. Field-service software stays on your own account, billed by that company.
See what the plan covers →Contractors and Trades: common questions
- Does my CSLB license number have to be on my website?
- Yes. California Business and Professions Code section 7030.5 requires a licensed contractor to include the license number in all forms of advertising, and the Contractors State License Board counts websites and online listings as advertising. We put it on every page and link it to the board's public license lookup.
- I work out of my truck and my house. Can I still show up on Google Maps?
- You can. Set up the Google Business Profile as a service-area business, verify your address privately, and list the towns you serve. Google ranks the map listing from that verified address, so for towns farther out the website does the heavy lifting with service pages and a service-area page.
- Do lead sites like Angi and Thumbtack replace a website?
- They can fill gaps, and they come with trade-offs. You usually pay for each lead, the homeowner is often comparing several contractors at once, and the reviews you earn stay on their platform. A website and a strong Google profile bring in people who searched for you specifically, and those calls come without a per-lead fee.
- How should I use before-and-after photos?
- Caption every pair with the town and the job, like "Bathroom remodel, Petaluma" or "Roof replacement, Ukiah". Captions give search engines something to match and show homeowners you work near them. Ask the homeowner before posting, and crop out house numbers or anything else that identifies the address.
We also build for these trades.
- Massage and WellnessSession pages, prices in plain sight, and a Book button wired to the calendar you already keep.
- Salons and BarbershopsA page for every chair, each with its own booking link, plus the photos that sell the cut.
- Auto Body and Auto RepairPhoto estimates, plain answers about insurance, and the phone number in easy reach.
- Nonprofits and Community OrganizationsDonations, volunteers, and events, on a site the next board can still log into.
- Wineries and Tasting RoomsTasting reservations, club sign-ups, and a visit page that answers the dog question.
- Restaurants and CafesA current menu, an order button that skips the marketplace cut, and hours people can trust.
Want to know what homeowners see when they search for your trade?
Send us your URL. We run it through Lighthouse, SEO scans, and a Google Business Profile check, then email you a plain-English report within 24 hours. No pitch attached.