A plumber’s week in Celbridge starts with Monday morning messages from the weekend: a boiler in one of the estates off the Maynooth road, a leak in a house above Main Street, a bathroom quote out at Hazelhatch. Most of those jobs came from the same two places, a recommendation in a local Facebook group and a search on Google at nine the night before, and the second is growing faster than the first.
That is the practical reason for website design in Celbridge: the town is full of households who arrived in the last twenty years, who do not have a plumber yet, and who choose one on their phones. We are Dublin based, so the first chat with a Celbridge business is a phone or video call; after that it works the same as for anyone we meet in person, with changes by WhatsApp and a report each month.
The shape of the town
Celbridge is one Main Street running down the hill from the gates of Castletown House to the bridge over the Liffey, with the old Mill beside the water and estates spreading out in every direction behind. It is one of the biggest towns in Kildare, and most of its working population leaves it every morning: to Hazelhatch station for the train to Heuston, to the M4, to Intel, to the buses into the city. During the day the Main Street trade is parents, retired people and the people who work in the town itself. In the evening it is everyone.
Who searches, and when
Young families dominate. The searches that matter in Celbridge are “creche Celbridge”, “childminder near me”, “electrician Celbridge”, “kids party entertainer Kildare”, “dentist Celbridge”, “Chinese takeaway Celbridge”, and they peak after the children are in bed. Recommendations still travel through the parents’ WhatsApp groups and the Facebook groups for the town, but a name passed on there is looked up on Google before anyone rings it. If the lookup finds nothing, or finds a Facebook page last updated years ago, the recommendation dies.
What the page has to say
For a trade, the page needs the service area written out, because Celbridge sits against the Dublin border: Leixlip, Lucan, Maynooth, Straffan, Newcastle, Hazelhatch and Ardclough are all a short drive and all search for themselves by name. It needs the W23 Eircode and the words “Co. Kildare”, photos of real work with a line about each job, the hours you actually answer the phone, and a call button that works from a phone. A trade that says “Celbridge and surrounding areas” is leaving Lucan to someone who names it.
For a shop or a clinic on Main Street, it needs parking advice, because the street is narrow and busy and a customer from Leixlip wants to know where to leave the car, and correct hours on Google, because the person checking is already driving.
Creches, party entertainers and the WhatsApp businesses
Celbridge has a lot of businesses that run on a WhatsApp number and a Facebook page: childminders, after-school clubs, face painters and bouncy castle hire, cake makers, home-based beauty rooms, mobile dog groomers. Their regulars are happy. Their problem is the family that moved in last month and searched. We have written about getting a business onto Google Maps and about what a small business site actually needs to include; for most of these businesses the answer is one page, done properly, not a brochure.
Two plans
Essentials is €499 to set up and €50 a month. Complete is €1,499 and €100 a month and adds bookings, payments, review requests, chat and the monthly Google work. Details are on the pricing page, and the plumbers page shows what a trade’s site includes.