Websites for driveway and patio companies
Driveway and patio company websites: win the thirty-second decision
A driveway is bought fast, on price per square metre, in spring, from the map on a phone. The buyer looks at three firms, checks the photographs, looks for a price, checks the firm is real and nearby, and rings one. A driveway company's website has thirty seconds to show all four. We build the site that does: a page per surface with the price logic on it, the planning rule answered, the finished drives photographed from the pavement and from above, and a quote form that reaches you on site. From £599 as a one-off.
What the buyer checks in thirty seconds
- 1. The photographs. Is that the surface I want, on a house like mine, finished well at the edges?
- 2. The price. A figure per square metre, or at least what decides it.
- 3. Is the firm real? A name, a town, a number that answers, reviews with dates.
- 4. Is it near? The towns you work in, named, and a map pin that agrees.
What is different
A fast, price-led, seasonal search
An extension buyer reads for a month. A driveway buyer reads for a minute. The job is a known thing with a known price band, the decision is made from the map pack on a phone, and the three quotes are compared on price per square metre. That means the site does not need to teach; it needs to show, price, and reassure, in that order, above the fold.
The season shapes everything. Searches climb in February, peak from April to July, and fall away in autumn. A site that is ready in February, with the profile posting finished drives and the reviews from last summer visible, takes the spring. A site that is built in May has missed most of the year. The monthly work, for firms that take it, is laid down in the winter for that reason.
And the buyer has a question a general builder's site never faces: whether the new drive needs planning permission. The firm whose website answers it in two sentences is the firm that knows the rules, and that is worth more than any claim about quality.
The searches
One page per surface, because that is what people search for
Nobody searches “driveway company” and stops there. They search the surface, with the town, and each one deserves the page that shows it laid properly.
Block paving
The most searched surface and the most photographed. The page shows patterns, edging, the sub-base you lay, and how you deal with the old drive.
Resin bound and resin bonded
Two products that get confused, and a page that explains the difference wins the reader. Permeable when laid on an open base, which matters for the planning rule below.
Tarmac
Price-led and quick. The page says what a proper base looks like and why the cheap quote cracks in two winters.
Gravel
The budget drive, and the one that needs a stabilising grid to stop it migrating. Honest pages about the upkeep win here.
Indian sandstone patios
The garden job. Colour, sealing, the pointing that fails in year two, and photographs in sunlight.
Porcelain patios
The premium patio: thinner, harder, needs the right adhesive bed. A page that shows you have laid it properly gets the higher-value garden.
The rule
The planning question the site answers before the customer asks
In England a new or replacement driveway of more than five square metres needs planning permission if the surface is impermeable and the water runs to the road. Lay a permeable surface, or drain the water to a lawn, a border or a soakaway inside the boundary, and it does not. That is the whole rule, and most homeowners have never heard it.
A dropped kerb is separate. It needs the council's approval, sometimes a licensed contractor from the council's list, and it is the part of the job that takes weeks rather than days. The site says so, so the enquiry arrives knowing.
Sustainable drainage, SuDS, is the reason the rule exists, and the reason permeable block paving and resin bound laid on an open base are the surfaces a careful firm leads with. Say that on the page and the buyer learns something from you, which is how they decide you are the firm.
On every surface page
What each page carries
- The surface, what it suits, and what it costs to keep
- A from-price per square metre, or the list of what decides it: excavation, removal, sub-base depth, edging, drainage channels, sealing
- The planning rule and the dropped-kerb line, in two sentences
- Photographs from the pavement before and after, and one from above where you have it, captioned with the town and the month
- The guarantee you give, in your words, with what it covers
- The Marshalls Register or Brett Approved installer status where you hold it, matched on the Google profile
- A quote form that takes a photo of the current drive and the rough size
Sound familiar?
Why driveway and patio firms come to us
- The phone rings in March and April, and the website is the same all year
- The site needs the season built in: spring pages ready in February, a booking horizon stated, and the profile posting finished drives when the sun comes out.
- Three quotes, cheapest wins
- The buyer is comparing price per square metre. A site that explains what the price includes, and what the cheap one leaves out, changes the comparison from price to base depth.
- Your best drives are on a phone in the van
- Before and after from the pavement, and one from above, captioned with the town. Twenty of those beat any strapline.
- The council question comes up on every job
- Dropped kerbs and the front-garden drainage rule. If the site answers both, the enquiry arrives already knowing, and you are the firm that told them.
Photographs
From the pavement, and from above
A driveway photographs better than almost any job in the trade and most firms waste it. The same spot on the pavement before and after; the edge detail; the drainage channel at the threshold; and, where a drone was on site, the whole drive from above. Captioned with the town, the surface and the month, those photographs carry the project page, the surface page and the Google profile at once.
Schemes and registers worth showing
- Marshalls Register. The accredited installer scheme for one of the two big paving makers. If you are on it, the badge goes on the site and the listing is matched to the profile.
- Brett Approved Installer. The equivalent for the other. Same treatment.
- Checkatrade and the others. Useful as citations and as a source of reviews; the site is where the reviews are quoted with their dates, so the buyer does not have to leave.
- Your own guarantee. Written on the page in plain words, with what it covers and for how long, because the cheap quote does not have one.
After the site
The map pack for “driveways” with your town is won in winter
The site is built once. The map position for the spring is built between October and February: the profile with the surfaces listed and from-prices on them, a project a month, reviews asked for at every handover while the customer is still standing on the new drive. That is the local SEO work, and every package on the pricing page includes its first month free.
The cluster
Other trades we build for
Same builder site, different front door. The full site is described on website design for builders, and what we have built so far is on projects.
Questions builders ask us
Does a driveway company need a website if the map pack does the work?
The map pack sends the click; the site closes it. A driveway buyer taps three firms from the map, looks at the photos, checks the price logic, and rings one. A profile that links to nothing, or to a one-page site with a stock photo, loses to the one whose site shows twenty finished drives with the towns on them. The two work together, and the site is what the profile links to.
Should we publish a price per square metre?
A from-figure per surface, with what moves it, is the single most useful line on a driveway site. It filters the buyer with a third of the budget and keeps the one who wants it done properly. If you would rather not, the page explains what the price includes: excavation and removal, the sub-base depth, edging, drainage, the surface, sealing. That turns the comparison from price into what you get for it.
What is the front-garden planning rule the site should answer?
In England, a new or replacement driveway of more than five square metres that is not permeable and drains to the road needs planning permission. Permeable paving, or a surface that drains to a lawn or a soakaway within the property, does not. A dropped kerb needs the council's approval separately. Two sentences on the page save a phone call and mark you as the firm that knows.
Do drone photos help?
They are the best photograph a driveway firm has. The whole drive, the edging, the pattern, the drainage channel, in one frame, before and after from the same height. Captioned with the town and the surface, they carry the project page and the Google profile both.
We do driveways and patios and landscaping. One site?
One site with a page per surface and a page for patios, and a landscaping page if you do it. Each search is its own search; each page shows its own photographs; the projects show the whole garden when you did the whole garden.
The season is short. Is the monthly work worth it for us?
The searches peak in spring and summer but the ranking is built in winter, when the profile, the pages and the reviews are laid down for March. A firm that starts the work in October is in the map for the season; a firm that starts in April is paying for the lesson. The first month is free with every package, and the retainer is monthly after three.
Be the firm the map sends this spring
Send your site, or say you have none, and your town. You get a review of what a homeowner comparing three driveway quotes sees, and a quote for the site that wins the comparison.