Give each service its own heading, in your customer’s words
Headings show a page’s shape. The W3C’s accessibility tutorial says they communicate how content is organised, and that browsers and assistive technology use them to move around a page. A reader skimming, a screen reader user jumping between headings and a machine splitting your page into parts all rely on that structure, so a service with its own heading can be found and repeated on its own.
Name each service the way customers ask for it, not the way you talk about it at work. The Welsh Government’s guidance for its web writers warns that the public may not know the official name for something, and suggests checking a tool such as Google Trends. Better evidence is closer to hand: the words people use when they ring or message you. If they ask for a “full groom”, a heading reading “Pamper package” names something none of them will type.
Keep package names after the plain one: “Full groom (our Works package)”. Then give the page one main heading naming your trade and area, “Dog grooming in Cardiff” rather than “Services”, and one second-level heading per service. The tutorial asks for headings nested by rank, so pick a level for meaning, not size.
Five things to say under every service
The sentences under each heading should answer what a customer would ask next, before they have to. Google’s guidance on helpful content suggests asking whether a reader will leave feeling they’ve learned enough to achieve their goal. Here the goal is booking, so the test is whether a stranger could decide from the page alone.
Put all five inside each service, not once in the footer: the mobile service may cover different streets from the salon.
- Who it’s for: “dogs of any size”, “sole traders and small partnerships”
- Where: your premises, theirs or online, and which towns
- Price: a figure, a starting price and what changes it, or how you quote
- How long: the appointment, the turnaround or the notice you need
- What happens next: how to book, what you’ll ask, when you’ll reply
No price list? Then state the basis: hourly, per item, a fixed fee agreed in advance, or a free quote after a visit. A customer can weigh any of those, but not “Prices on request”.
One services page, or a page for each service?
One page suits a few short services bought by the same people, often together. A groomer’s full groom, bath and tidy, puppy groom and nail trims fit on one page, each under its own heading, and a customer can compare them without leaving it.
A page per service suits services that are separate decisions, with enough to say: their own pricing, paperwork and questions. Take an invented bookkeeper in Wrexham offering bookkeeping, VAT returns, payroll and year-end accounts. A sole trader after help with VAT wants that page, with a title and main heading naming the service and the town.
If you split, keep an overview with a short paragraph per service and link to each by its name. Google’s link guidance asks for anchor text that is descriptive, reasonably concise and relevant to the page it points to, and counts “Read more” as weak. Don’t multiply pages that differ only by town: a service page earns its place by saying more than the overview.
Before and after: an invented dog groomer in Cardiff
The business, prices and times here are invented. Before: the main heading reads “Our Services”. Below it, a carousel of photos with package names set into the pictures: “Pamper Pooch”, “The Works”, “Puppy Love”. Then one line, “A full range of grooming for all breeds, prices on request”, and a PDF price list.
As text, that page says only that a business grooms dogs. Ask an assistant who does hand-stripping in Cardiff and nothing on it answers.
After: the h1 reads “Dog grooming in Canton, Cardiff”. The first h2 reads “Full groom (our Works package)”, and under it: “Bath, dry, clip or hand-strip, nails and ears, for dogs of any size, at our Canton salon. From £40 for small breeds; larger dogs and matted coats are priced at drop-off, before we start. Allow two to three hours; we text you when your dog’s ready. Book online or ring the salon.”
“Puppy groom” and “Nail trim” follow in the same way. The photos stay, without words in them, and the PDF becomes a printable copy of prices now on the page. Every fact is now a sentence.
Keep every service out of images, PDFs and carousels
A price list made in a design app and uploaded as a picture looks finished, and isn’t text. The W3C’s accessibility guidelines ask for real text rather than images of text wherever text can achieve the same look, logos excepted. Alt text helps a screen reader, but a price list doesn’t belong in an attribute: write it on the page and style it.
A PDF isn’t invisible: PDF is on Google’s list of file types it can index. But it’s a separate document, and a page saying “download our prices” states no price itself. Put the figures on the page and keep the PDF to print.
Carousels show one service at a time, often as pictures. Accordions are fine when the words are in the page and only folded, not when they’re fetched after a click. Google’s guidance on lazy-loaded content asks for relevant content to load whenever it’s visible on screen rather than in response to scrolling or clicking, because Google Search does not interact with your page.
To check, view the page’s source (Ctrl+U in Chrome, Edge and Firefox on Windows) and search for a service name and a price. If they’re not there, they don’t arrive with the page. The free assessment on this site reads a page the same way, without running scripts, and says whether it found your services in headings or sentences.
Writing the Welsh and English versions so each reads naturally
On a bilingual site, write each services page for its own readers. Service names matter most: a Welsh speaker may type “cadw cyfrifon” or “ffurflen TAW”, and the Welsh page should use the words your Welsh-speaking customers use with you.
Canolfan Bedwyr at Bangor University, home of the Cymraeg Clir approach to clear Welsh, reports a common complaint that Welsh versions of public documents are too hard to read, so Welsh speakers often turn to the English. A page translated word for word does the same to your customers.
Keep the facts identical and the words natural: the same services, order, prices, times and contact details in both, so neither quietly loses one. If you don’t write Welsh, the Welsh Government’s Helo Blod service translates up to 500 words a month for a business free of charge, and offers a free check of Welsh you’ve written yourself.
Translate the meaning, not the word order. “Ffurflenni TAW i unig fasnachwyr” reads as Welsh. “Gwasanaethau Dychwelyd TAW”, a word-for-word “VAT Return Services”, reads as English in disguise.
Frequently asked questions
What should a services page include?
A heading for each service, named as customers name it, and under it who it’s for, where, the price or how you price, how long it takes and how to book, all written as text on the page.
Should each service have its own page?
Only when it has enough to say alone: its own pricing, process and questions, and customers who search for it by name. A few short services bought together sit better on one page, with an overview linking to any that need more.
Should I put my prices on my website?
Yes, if you can, with what changes them: size, distance, materials or time. If every job is quoted, say how you quote and whether quotes are free. Either gives a customer something to weigh before getting in touch.
How do I describe my services so AI understands them?
In plain sentences, on the page, in your customers’ words. An assistant can only repeat what it can read, so state the facts rather than leaving them to photos, a PDF or a contact form, and name services the same way everywhere you’re listed.