Ten Bristol trade sites, scored for speed and structure
We scored ten Bristol trade sites out of 100 across four categories. The average was 41. Nobody failed on design, and almost everybody failed on the same four things.
Key takeaways
- Average mobile load time was 4.3 seconds; the best was 1.2.
- Seven of ten had a single Services page instead of a page per job.
- Nine of ten had no LocalBusiness schema at all.
- Six of ten hid the phone number below the fold on a 375px screen.
How we scored
Twenty-five points each for speed, mobile usability, page structure and structured data. Sites were picked from the first two pages of results for trade searches across Bristol postcodes and are anonymised here, because the point is the pattern rather than naming anyone. SEO Bristol runs the same four checks on every site we audit.
| Category | Average score | Best | Worst |
|---|---|---|---|
| Speed | 9 / 25 | 24 | 2 |
| Mobile usability | 14 / 25 | 25 | 6 |
| Page structure | 11 / 25 | 22 | 4 |
| Structured data | 7 / 25 | 25 | 0 |
The four recurring failures
- One Services page. Seven sites listed every job on a single page. That page cannot rank for any of them individually, and it is usually the most valuable fix available.
- No schema. Nine sites had no LocalBusiness markup. It takes twenty minutes and it is how Google confirms your hours, area and rating.
- Buried phone numbers. Six sites required a scroll or a menu tap before a customer could ring. On an emergency search that is the whole game.
- Unoptimised images. Five sites shipped photographs over 2MB. This is the single easiest second to win back.
What the best one did
The highest scorer, at 78, was not the best looking site in the group. It had a page for each job with a price on it, a phone number in the header as text, compressed photographs of real work, and correct schema. It was also the only site in the ten that appeared in an AI Overview during our testing, which is probably not a coincidence.
Questions people ask
Will you tell me which site was mine?
If you ask us directly, yes, with the full scoring sheet.
Is 78 good?
It is very good for a trade site in Bristol. A well-built static site should reach the low nineties.
Which fix should I do first?
Split the Services page. It is the most work and by some distance the biggest return.
Want yours scored? Our Bristol SEO agency will run the same audit on your site, free, before you commit to anything.
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