Smithfield has three customers and they rarely overlap. The first lives in one of the apartment blocks around the square or works in the offices behind them, and wants a gym, a barber, a good coffee and somewhere to eat on a Tuesday. The second is here for the law: solicitors, barristers, clients and witnesses moving between the Four Courts on Inns Quay, the Bridewell on Chancery Street and the offices on Church Street and the quays. The third is a visitor with a tour booked at the Jameson distillery on Bow Street or a ticket for the Lighthouse cinema, with an hour to fill. Website design in Smithfield means deciding which of those you are for and writing the page for them. We are based in Dublin and we meet Smithfield owners at their premises or on the square.
Searches made within sight of the Four Courts
The legal trade searches by service and place: “family law solicitor Dublin 7”, “commissioner for oaths near Four Courts”, “notary Smithfield”. Those searches are made by people under pressure who want a phone number and a sense that the practice is real. A practice page with the people named, the areas of law listed one per page and the office hours stated plainly beats a one-page brochure every time.
The residents search the way renters everywhere do, by trade and area, “gym Smithfield”, “barber near Smithfield Luas”, and they read reviews before they commit. The visitors search in English and in other languages, often from a hotel the night before, for “breakfast near Smithfield” or “pub near Jameson”. They trust the map pin, the photos and the hours more than anything written.
What the page has to carry
Because Smithfield is a square and not a street, directions matter more than usual. Say which side of the square you are on, name the Luas stop, and give the D07 routing key with your Eircode so the map pin lands on your door rather than in the middle of the cobbles. Say whether there is parking (there mostly is not) and that the red line runs along the bottom of the square.
For the lunch trade, the hours and the menu have to be text that changes the morning the special changes, not a PDF from last year. For the legal and accounting offices, the site should carry the registered business details, the people, and an email address on your own domain rather than a free one. We have written a plain guide on getting business email on your own domain, and it is included in Complete.
Gyms, studios and pop-ups with a social account and nothing else
The square and the streets around it have pop-ups, food trucks and classes that run on Instagram and a WhatsApp broadcast list: personal trainers working out of the apartment gyms, a hairdresser renting a chair, a weekend coffee cart, a supper club. The account shows the work. It does not show up when a new resident searches “personal trainer Dublin 7”, and it cannot take a deposit. A one-page site under your own .ie name does both. The guide on what a small business website should include is a good checklist for that page.
Cost
Set up for Essentials is €499, then €50 a month, with the domain in your name, hosting, the Google listing and WhatsApp changes. Complete adds bookings, payments, business email, reviews and chat for €1,499 and €100 a month. The pricing page has the full list. For the legal trade in particular, see the solicitors page.