Turning visits into calls

Put the number where the thumb already is

Your phone number belongs in the header of every page, not just the contact page. On a phone it should be a real phone link, so one tap starts the call. A number set inside an image cannot be tapped and cannot be copied.

If you use a call tracking number, read Google's own rules first. The Google Business Profile guidelines say a phone number "must be under the direct control of the business" and must connect to your individual business location. That page carries no update date. Keep your real number listed as well.

Speed decides who is still there to call

Google's guidance on web.dev, last updated September 4, 2025, says a page should reach its Largest Contentful Paint in 2.5 seconds or less for at least 75 out of every 100 visits. That is a number you can check today, for free, in PageSpeed Insights.

Think with Google, in a piece by Daniel An dated February 20, 2018, reported that as load time goes from one second to ten seconds, the chance of a mobile visitor bouncing rises 123 percent. That figure came from a review of 11 million mobile ad landing pages.

Here is the honest limit. That study counted people leaving ad landing pages, not people calling a plumber. No published work ties your load time to your call count, so treat speed as worth fixing on its own and not as a promise. The site you are reading scores 100 on Google's PageSpeed test, desktop and mobile.

Give people a second way, then answer it

Plenty of good jobs come from people who cannot call right then. They are at work, on a site with no signal, or it is nine at night with a kid asleep. A short form or a text number catches those.

Keep the form short, and check that it actually reaches you. Form mail often drops into a junk folder, and nobody notices for weeks.

One refusal, plainly. If calls already go to voicemail and messages sit until the weekend, a new website will not fix that. Sort out the answering first. A faster site only brings more people to a phone nobody picks up.

What to do this week

Work through it in order and stop at the first thing that is broken.

• Open your own site on your phone and time how long it takes to reach a number you can tap.
• Run your busiest page through PageSpeed Insights and write down the Largest Contentful Paint.
• Send yourself a test message through your own form, then check the junk folder.
• Ask every caller for one month how they found you, and keep the tally on paper.

Fix the worst item, then measure the same four again.