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County Waterford

Web design in Waterford, with the homework done.

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

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Reginald's Tower on the Waterford quay beside a row of shopfronts, and a laptop open on a new websiteReginald's Tower on the Waterford quay beside a row of shopfronts, and a laptop open on a new website
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11 of the 20 businesses Google shows first in Waterford have a website of their own, and all 10 with a speed score came in between 50 and 89 on a phone. None reached 90, and the median was 54.5 out of 100, near the bottom of that band.

The headline numbers for Waterford, October 2026

  • 11 of 20 businesses Google shows first have a website of their own
  • 0 of 10 sites with a speed score reach 90 or more on a phone
  • 4 of 11 sites we could read show a price
  • 6 of 7 cafe, hairdresser and clinic sites we could read take bookings online
Where we looked

We checked the 20 businesses Google shows first in Waterford.

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.

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The 26 towns in our county study, one per county. This page is Waterford city, in County Waterford. Tap a county to open its page.

  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 Waterford city 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 Waterford

Searches a month from County Waterford

  • Cafes and coffeeabout 9,570
  • Hairdressersabout 1,360
  • Plumbersabout 560
  • Electriciansabout 280
  • Physio and physical therapy clinicsabout 260
The searches in each total

Cafes and coffee about 9,570 a month

  • "coffee near me" 5,400
  • "cafe near me" 1,600
  • "coffee shop near me" 1,300
  • "cafe" 880
  • "cafe waterford" 390

Hairdressers about 1,360 a month

  • "hairdresser waterford" 880
  • "hair salon near me" 170
  • "hairdresser" 170
  • "hairdresser near me" 140

Plumbers about 560 a month

  • "plumber waterford" 320
  • "plumber near me" 140
  • "plumber" 90
  • "emergency plumber" 10

Electricians about 280 a month

  • "electrician waterford" 140
  • "electrician" 90
  • "electrician near me" 50

Physio and physical therapy clinics about 260 a month

  • "physio" 170
  • "physio near me" 90

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

Who has a website

11 of the 20 in Waterford have a website of their own.

Of the other nine, three rely on Facebook alone, five have no website we could find and for one we could not tell.

Further down the same Maps lists, 23 of the 55 businesses have a website of their own, so a website is more common at the top of each list than below it.

Plumbers and cafes are the gaps at the top in Waterford: one of four each has a website of its own. Electricians, hairdressers and physio and physical therapy clinics have three of four each.

Waterford's 11 of 20 is under the 308 of 505 across the 26 study towns. That leaves a Waterford plumber or cafe room to be the one a customer can look up: three of the four at the top in each have no website of their own.

People in County Waterford make about 9,570 searches a month for cafes and coffee, about 1,360 for hairdressers and about 560 for plumbers. Of the 11 Waterford sites we could read, four show a price.

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

The 20 businesses Google shows first

  • Own website 11 of 20
  • Facebook or Instagram only 3 of 20
  • No website found 5 of 20
  • Could not tell 1 of 20
The rest of the same Maps lists, 55 businesses
  • Own website 23
  • Facebook or Instagram only 10
  • No website found 21
  • Not working, or could not tell 1
A phone showing a shop's website with a green call button, beside a booking calendar

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What the websites do

None of the 10 Waterford sites reached 90 for speed on a phone, and none fell under 50.

In October 2026, Google's PageSpeed test, run as a phone, scored 10 of the 11 sites in Waterford city, with a median of 54.5 out of 100. All 10 came in between 50 and 89.

Speed on a phone

05090100

54.5 median score out of 100

  • Under 50 0
  • 50 to 89 10
  • 90 or more 0

Why speed matters

In October 2026, the biggest image or block of text on the 10 sites with a speed score in Waterford city took a median of 11.2 seconds to appear on a phone. Google's own mark for a good page is 2.5 seconds or less.

Google counts 90 or more as a good score, and none of the 10 got there. A Waterford site that does would outscore every one of them.

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

What the 11 sites we could read do

  • 4 of 11 read say what they do and where, in the page title or main heading
  • 8 of 11 read put a tap-to-call link or a form on the home page
  • 4 of 11 read show a price
  • 3 of 11 read name the area they cover
  • 11 of 11 read load securely (https)
  • 6 of 7 cafe, hairdresser and clinic sites we could read take bookings online

What the 11 websites are built on

  • WordPress 8
  • Squarespace 2
  • Could not tell 1
What "read" and "scored" mean

"Read" means the 11 sites we could read page by page. "Scored" means the sites with a speed score: Google's speed test scored 10 of the 11, three runs each, median taken.

The rest of the study

How the same 20 show up on Google.

Google Maps, the ordinary results, the ads and ChatGPT's answers have their own page, with a step for each.

Read SEO in Waterford
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.

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A real person will get back to you.

Steps you can take

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

  1. Make it quick on a phone

    10 of 10 sites with a speed score stayed under 90 on a phone

    On a phone, the Waterford sites took a median of 11.2 seconds to show their biggest image or text. Start with the images and the add-ons, and check every month.

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

    8 of 11 sites we could read do not name the area they cover

    Name Waterford and the areas you cover on the home page; three of the 11 Waterford sites we could read do, and four show a price.

  3. Get a website of your own

    8 of 20 businesses Google shows first have no website of their own

    Five of the 20 at the top in Waterford have no website we could find and three rely on Facebook or Instagram alone. One page of your own is the start.

  4. Get the setup underneath right

    8 of 55 businesses further down the Maps lists have not claimed their Google profile

    Claim your Google profile, link your website and add your hours, as 19 of the 20 at the top in Waterford do.

Where we can help

Our work

See the work we've done.

Every site here is real client work, live and public. Have a look around before you talk to us.

See all our work
Questions

What owners ask about a website.

Do businesses in Waterford have websites?

Fewer than in 16 of the other 25 towns we checked. In October 2026, 11 of the 20 businesses Google showed first in Waterford city 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, 11 of the 20 businesses Google shows first in Waterford have a website of their own, and three 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. Here is each, for the 11 Waterford sites we could read:

  • What you do and where, in the page title or main heading: 4 of the 11 Waterford sites we could read in October 2026.
  • A tap-to-call link or a form on the home page: 8 of the 11.
  • A guide price where you can give one: 4 of the 11.
  • The area you cover: 3 of the 11.
  • Speed on a phone: of the 10 sites with a speed score, none reached 90 out of 100.

On our Waterford searches, Google's "People also ask" box asked "What is the average call-out charge for a plumber?" 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.

Website packages and prices How much does a website cost in Ireland?

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 Waterford searches in October 2026, 10 of the 50 places in the first ten ordinary results went to local businesses' own websites. Directories and listings took 20 of those 50, most often Yelp with three. 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 Waterford city?

No. We work with businesses across Ireland. The study looked at Waterford city because our method takes the biggest town in each county, and in County Waterford that is the city.

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 Waterford city 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: 55 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 11 read" means the 11 sites we could read. Google's PageSpeed test can still reach them, so the speed figures ("of 10 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 waterford".
  • Distances run from the Waterford city 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 Waterford: 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 "waterford" 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.