The honest answer is seven days from sign-off, and we hit it when the client gets us three things quickly. When a build runs long it is almost never the code. It is photos, words and a domain login sitting in somebody's inbox.
Here is what the week actually looks like, what makes it slip, and exactly what we need from you on day one so it does not.
What live in 7 days means
It means seven days from the point you say yes, not from the first conversation. Before that we have already built you a demo to look at, so by sign-off the shape of the site, the trade, the town and the general look are settled. That is why the week is realistic rather than a sales line.
Live means four things. The site is on your domain. The forms have been sent for real, end to end. The phone number is tappable on every page. And it has been checked on a phone, not only on a laptop.
The week, day by day
- Day one. We collect. Photos, your services in your own words, the areas you cover, your certificates and insurance details, and access to the domain. This is the day that decides whether the rest of the week runs.
- Days two and three. Build. Pages, service pages, area pages, the enquiry flow set up for your trade, your photos cropped and compressed properly.
- Day four. Copy pass. We write and you read. Anything that does not sound like you gets changed, because customers can tell.
- Day five. You review it on your own phone and send a list. One round of changes is normal. Two is fine.
- Day six. Checks. Mobile speed, every link, every form, the number, the layout at small screen sizes, the legal pages.
- Day seven. Domain and go live. We point the name at the new site, watch the email keep working, and send you a real test enquiry so you can see what lands in your inbox.
What actually slows it down
Photos
This is the big one, every time. You have hundreds of job photos on your phone and finding forty good ones feels like a chore, so it sits. A build can stall for three weeks waiting on a gallery.
The fix is small. Send everything you have in one go and let us pick, rather than curating first. Screenshots of finished jobs from your own social posts are fine. Photos from the van are fine. We would rather have two hundred rough ones than wait a month for forty perfect ones.
Words
We can draft everything, but the pages that sell best are the ones where you told us how you actually describe the job. Five minutes of voice notes on WhatsApp beats a blank document every time. Talk to us the way you would talk to a customer at the door and we will tidy it up.
Domain access
The quiet one. If the domain is held by a previous designer, that takes days, sometimes a fortnight, and it is out of everybody's hands once the request is in. Start it in week one even if you are still deciding, because it costs nothing and it removes the only genuinely unpredictable step.
Approvals from more than one person
If there are two of you and you both have a view, decide between yourselves who gives us the final word. Split opinions cost more days than any technical problem we have ever had.
Send these on day one
The day one list
- Your photos. All of them, straight from the phone, no editing needed.
- The services you want on the site, in the order you would rank them.
- The towns and villages you cover, and any you deliberately do not.
- Your phone number, email and the hours you pick up.
- Insurance, certificates and any trade bodies you belong to.
- Your company number if you are a limited company.
- Domain login, or the name of whoever holds it now.
- Two or three sites you like, and one you cannot stand. The second is more useful.
What we do not do
We do not start the clock and then go quiet. You get told what is happening each day, and if something is waiting on you, you get told that too rather than finding out in week three.
We also do not chase you with the site half built and no way to judge it. You saw a live demo before any of this started. Hemsley Building Services in Wakefield has been live since August 2026, and that build ran the same way: a demo first, then the week.
If you need it faster
It happens, usually because a firm has lost a site or a season is about to start. A smaller site with fewer pages can go live inside a few days if your photos and your domain are ready to hand. The only thing we will not do is skip the checks, because a site that goes live broken costs more time than it saved.
Start with the demo
Send us a message, tell us your trade and your town, and we will build you something to look at. There is no payment, no deposit and no obligation attached to that, and it will tell you more about working with us than any page on this site will.