A carpenter’s customer has already measured the alcove. They have a photo of a wardrobe they saw somewhere and a rough idea of what they want to spend. When they look at websites for carpenters in Dublin, they are checking three things: can this person make what we have in our head, do they take jobs our size, and how long will we wait. The site that answers with close-up photos, a plain list of the work you take, and a line about your lead time gets the message with the photo attached. The others get nothing.
Which carpenter are you?
“Carpenter” covers a fitted-furniture maker with a workshop in Ballymount, a second-fix carpenter hanging doors and fitting skirting on sites, an attic conversion specialist, and a one-man outfit building decking in the summer and wardrobes in the winter. The customer searching does not know which one you are, and your page has to tell them in the first line.
So the first thing we want is a sentence that says what you make. “Fitted wardrobes, alcove units and home offices, made in my workshop and fitted in your house.” Or “second-fix carpentry for builders and homeowners across west Dublin.” Everything else on the site follows from it.
Close-ups, not room shots
Most carpenters photograph the finished room from the doorway. The customer cannot see the thing they care about, which is the quality of the work. Get in close: the mitre on the architrave, the shadow gap, the drawer runner, the scribe against a crooked wall in a 1930s house. Then one wider shot so they see it in context.
Group the photos by type of work, not by date. A page for wardrobes, a page for alcove units, a page for stairs and doors, a page for decking if you do it. Under each photo, the area and one line about the job: “Alcove units either side of a chimney breast in Drumcondra, painted in the workshop.” Those lines are what people type into Google. If your Instagram already has the pictures, that is a start, and we have written about why a site still matters alongside Instagram.
The small-jobs question
Every carpenter we have spoken to has a version of the same complaint: the phone goes while the router is running, and it is someone wanting a door eased. If you take those jobs, say so, give a minimum charge, and you will get a steady run of them. If you do not, say that too, kindly, and point them towards a handyman. Either way you stop having the conversation in a dust mask.
Lead times, deposits and the honest page
Good carpenters are booked for months, and some are embarrassed to say so. Put it on the page. “Currently taking bookings for fitting from March” is not a deterrent, it is a credential. You change the month yourself as the diary moves, from your phone, or text us and we change it.
If you take a deposit on fitted furniture before you order materials, say what it is and when the balance is due. People are fine with deposits when the terms are clear in advance and strange about them when they first hear of it at the door.
Getting the enquiry right the first time
The enquiry form on a carpentry site asks for what you need to price: the room, rough measurements, a photo of the space, what they have in mind, and their area. It arrives in your email and on WhatsApp. You can give a ballpark from the van and only drive out to the ones that are real. Builders and kitchen fitters who pass you work can use the same form, which keeps everything in one place.
What we need
Twenty close-up photos of your best work, sorted by type. The sentence that says what you make. The jobs you turn away. Your lead time and your deposit terms. Your area. Ten minutes on the phone or at the workshop.
The plan for a carpenter
Essentials is the fit for nearly every carpenter: €499 to set up, €50 a month, no contract, cancel with 30 days’ notice. A workshop that wants to take deposits by card, run a chat box, or have its Google profile posted to monthly can look at Complete on the pricing page.