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County Louth

Web design in Louth, with the homework done.

Websites for Louth businesses. In October 2026 we checked the websites of the 20 businesses Google shows first in Dundalk, across five trades. This page shows what those sites have, what they miss, and what to fix first on your own.

The round tower and high cross at Monasterboice behind a row of shopfronts, and a laptop open on a new websiteThe round tower and high cross at Monasterboice behind a row of shopfronts, and a laptop open on a new website
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14 of the 20 businesses Google shows first in Dundalk have a website of their own, against 11 of the 48 further down the same Maps lists. We could read all 14: 13 put a call button or a form on the home page, and seven show a price.

The headline numbers for Dundalk, October 2026

  • 14 of 20 businesses Google shows first have a website of their own
  • 1 of 14 sites with a speed score reach 90 or more on a phone
  • 7 of 14 sites we could read show a price
  • 4 of 8 cafe, hairdresser and clinic sites we could read take bookings online
Where we looked

We checked the 20 businesses Google shows first in Dundalk.

Checked · Study by , founder · How we checked

I set the rules for this study: one town per county, the same five searches in each, the businesses Google shows first, and no business named.

  1. We searched Google for five trades

    Plumbers, electricians, cafes, hairdressers and physio and physical therapy clinics, on 14 October 2026, on a phone, logged out, from Dundalk town centre.

  2. We took the first four from each Maps list

    After removing chains, wrong trades, duplicate listings and anything outside the county. That gives 20.

  3. We checked each of the 20

    Their websites, their Google profiles, their Google ads and whether ChatGPT names them. We name none of them here.

Searches a month from County Louth

Searches a month from County Louth

  • Cafes and coffeeabout 8,410
  • Hairdressersabout 1,290
  • Plumbersabout 680
  • Physio and physical therapy clinicsabout 660
  • Electriciansabout 310
The searches in each total

Cafes and coffee about 8,410 a month

  • "coffee near me" 4,400
  • "cafe near me" 1,600
  • "coffee shop near me" 1,300
  • "cafe" 880
  • "cafe dundalk" 210
  • "cafe louth" 20

Hairdressers about 1,290 a month

  • "hairdresser dundalk" 720
  • "hair salon near me" 210
  • "hairdresser" 210
  • "hairdresser near me" 140
  • "hairdresser louth" 10

Plumbers about 680 a month

  • "plumber dundalk" 390
  • "plumber" 140
  • "plumber near me" 110
  • "emergency plumber" 20
  • "plumber louth" 20

Physio and physical therapy clinics about 660 a month

  • "physio" 260
  • "physio dundalk" 260
  • "physio near me" 140

Electricians about 310 a month

  • "electrician" 140
  • "electrician near me" 90
  • "electrician dundalk" 70
  • "electrician louth" 10

Google's own monthly estimates for searches made from County Louth: a 12-month average, rounded by Google, with singular and plural counted once.

Who has a website

14 of the 20 in Dundalk have a website of their own.

Of the other six, two rely on Facebook alone, three have no website we could find and one has a website that no longer works.

In Dundalk a website is far more common at the top of each list than below it.

Every physio and physical therapy clinic at the top in Dundalk has a website of its own. Plumbers and electricians have three of four each, cafes and hairdressers two of four.

Dundalk's 14 of 20 matches Limerick and is above the 308 of 505 across the 26 study towns. 11 of the 14 run on WordPress, level with Cork for the most of any study town, and their median load time on a phone, 14.6 seconds, is the second slowest of the 26.

Every month, about 8,410 searches for cafes and coffee come from County Louth, with about 1,290 for hairdressers and about 680 for plumbers. Of the 14 Dundalk sites, seven name the area they cover.

The shops are sorted by status, not by trade or by place on the map.

The 20 businesses Google shows first

  • Own website 14 of 20
  • Facebook or Instagram only 2 of 20
  • No website found 3 of 20
  • Website no longer works 1 of 20
The rest of the same Maps lists, 48 businesses
  • Own website 11
  • Facebook or Instagram only 4
  • No website found 30
  • Not working, or could not tell 3
A phone showing a shop's website with a green call button, beside a booking calendar

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What the websites do

One of the 14 Dundalk sites scored 90 or more for speed on a phone.

In October 2026, Google's PageSpeed test, run as a phone, gave the 14 sites with a speed score in Dundalk, County Louth, a median of 59 out of 100. Five scored under 50.

Speed on a phone

05090100

59 median score out of 100

  • Under 50 5
  • 50 to 89 8
  • 90 or more 1

Why speed matters

In October 2026, the biggest image or block of text on the 14 sites with a speed score in Dundalk, County Louth, took a median of 14.6 seconds to appear on a phone. That is the second slowest of the 26 towns we checked. Google's own mark for a good page is 2.5 seconds or less.

Google counts 90 or more as a good score, and one of the 14 got there. A Dundalk site that does would outscore 13 of them.

Run Google's Lighthouse test on your own site
Page checks and platforms, in numbers

What the 14 sites we could read do

  • 8 of 14 read say what they do and where, in the page title or main heading
  • 13 of 14 read put a tap-to-call link or a form on the home page
  • 7 of 14 read show a price
  • 7 of 14 read name the area they cover
  • 12 of 14 read load securely (https)
  • 4 of 8 cafe, hairdresser and clinic sites we could read take bookings online

What the 14 websites are built on

  • WordPress 11
  • Wix 1
  • Squarespace 1
  • Could not tell 1
What "read" and "scored" mean

"Read" means the 14 sites we could read page by page. "Scored" means the sites with a speed score: Google's speed test reached all 14, three runs each, median taken.

A list of search results with a cursor on the top result, which is lit green

Slow on a phone, or hard to find on Google?

Send the address and you'll get a straight read on its speed and on how it shows up on Google.

Get a free website check

A real person will get back to you.

Steps you can take

Four fixes for a Dundalk website, each tied to a gap we measured.

  1. Make it quick on a phone

    5 of 14 sites with a speed score scored under 50 on a phone

    Start with the images and the add-ons. One Dundalk site of the 14 reached 90, so it can be done here.

  2. Put your prices, your area and a call button on the home page

    7 of 14 sites we could read show no price

    Seven of the 14 Dundalk sites we could read show a price and seven name their area. Put both on your home page, beside one tap to call.

  3. Get a website of your own

    6 of 20 businesses Google shows first have no working website of their own

    Three of the 20 at the top in Dundalk have no website we could find, two rely on Facebook or Instagram alone and one has a site that no longer works. One page of your own is the start.

  4. Get the setup underneath right

    15 of 48 businesses further down the Maps lists have not claimed their Google profile

    All 20 at the top in Dundalk list their hours on Google. Claim your profile, add yours, link your website and make sure it loads securely.

Questions

What owners ask about a website.

Do businesses in Louth have websites?

More than in 17 of the other 25 towns we checked. In October 2026, 14 of the 20 businesses Google showed first in Dundalk, County Louth, had a website of their own, across plumbers, electricians, cafes, hairdressers and physio and physical therapy clinics. Across all 26 towns in our county study it was 308 of 505.

Do I need a website if I have a Facebook page?

Yes, if you want customers to see what you charge and where you work. In October 2026, 14 of the 20 businesses Google shows first in Dundalk, County Louth, have a website of their own, and two rely on Facebook or Instagram alone. A social page is a fair start. Your own website is where you set out, your way:

  • your prices
  • the area you cover
  • a way to call or book.
What should a small business website have?

Start with five things. We could read all 14 Dundalk sites; the counts:

  • What you do and where, in the page title or main heading: 8 of the 14 Dundalk sites we could read in October 2026.
  • A tap-to-call link or a form on the home page: 13 of the 14.
  • A guide price where you can give one: 7 of the 14.
  • The area you cover: 7 of the 14.
  • Speed on a phone: of the 14 sites with a speed score, one reached 90 out of 100.

Google's "People also ask" box on our Dundalk searches asked "How much should a plumber charge for a call out?" A guide price on your site answers it.

How much does a website cost?

It depends on the number of pages and what the site has to do. Our website packages and their prices are on the website development page, and bigger builds are quoted.

What does a website do that a Google listing doesn't?

It gives you a place of your own in the ordinary results under the map, and a page you control from top to bottom. Across our five Dundalk searches in October 2026, 16 of the 50 places in the first ten ordinary results went to local businesses' own websites. Directories and listings took 13 of those 50, most often Golden Pages with five and Yelp with four. Without a website of its own, a business shows up there only on someone else's page, such as a directory or a social page.

Do you only work with businesses in Dundalk?

No. We work with businesses across Ireland. The study looked at Dundalk because our method takes the biggest town in each county, and in County Louth we took Dundalk over Drogheda, because part of Drogheda lies in County Meath.

Michael Collins, founder of Wagyu Digital
MethodHow we checked
  • Checked October 2026. The searches ran on 14 October 2026 at about 3pm Irish time; ChatGPT was asked on 14 October 2026.
  • The 20 businesses are the first four local businesses in the Google Maps list for each of five trade searches. The searches ran on a phone, logged out, from Dundalk town centre. Chains, wrong trades, duplicate listings and businesses outside the county were removed first. "The rest of the list" is everyone else in the same cleaned lists: 48 businesses.
  • A website counts only if it is the business's own. A Facebook or Instagram page alone does not.
  • A website linked from the Google profile counts as live even when its host shows our checks a bot check or refuses our requests. We cannot read those sites, so they are left out of every page check: "of 14 read" means the 14 sites we could read. Google's PageSpeed test can still reach them, so the speed figures ("of 14 scored") cover every site it scored.
  • Speed is Google's PageSpeed test, run as a phone, three runs per site, median taken. The load time is the same test's Largest Contentful Paint: when the biggest image or block of text appears.
  • Google ads come from Google's Ads Transparency Center, looked up by the business's own web address, plus one look at each search. So the ads figure counts only businesses with a web address of their own, including sites that no longer work. Facebook ads were not checked.
  • ChatGPT was asked "Who is a good [trade] in [town]?" three times for each trade, from Ireland, with web search on. A business counts as named if any of the answers names it.
  • "The first ten results for their own search" means the first ten ordinary results, under the map and the ads, for the business's trade-and-town search, such as "plumber dundalk".
  • Distances run from the Dundalk town centre point to each business's map pin.
  • Figures "across the 26 towns" add up the 505 businesses Google showed first in all 26 study towns, one town per county. Every town was searched the same way on the same day, 14 October 2026.
  • Anything else we could not check is left out of that count, and the count says so.
  • A median is the middle value. With an even number of businesses it is the average of the two middle values.
  • Searches a month are Google's own estimates (Google Ads search volume, read on 16 October 2026) for searches made by people in County Louth: a 12-month average, rounded by Google. Each trade's total adds up the same set of searches in every county: the trade on its own, the trade with "near me", and the trade with "dundalk" or "louth" after it. Four more searches count too: "emergency plumber", "coffee near me", "coffee shop near me" and "hair salon near me".
  • Singular and plural are one search in Google's data, so neither is counted twice. A search Google gives no figure for is left out, not counted as zero. One person can search more than once, and not every search for a trade comes from someone hiring, so these figures count searches, not people.
  • No business from the study is named on these pages.

Sources: Google's guide to Largest Contentful Paint (good is 2.5 seconds or less); About PageSpeed Insights (90 or above is good); Google Ads Transparency Center.