Site structure: home, services, about, proof and contact

What you will be able to do

• Plan a site map built on five core pages, each with one clear job
• Decide which services and audiences need their own pages
• Write an About page and portfolio entries using reusable templates

A small event business does not need a large website. It needs a clear one. Most visitors want to answer three questions: can you do my event, are you any good, and how do I book you. A site built around five core pages, each with one job, answers those questions faster than a sprawling site with a blog, a gallery, a press page and a menu nobody can navigate on a phone.

Read the transcript

Site structure: home, services, about, proof and contact.

A small event business does not need a large website.

It needs a clear one.

The five core pages.

Every service website in the event industry can be built on the same five pages.

Add more only when a page has a clear job the core pages cannot do.

Navigation that works on a phone.

Keep the main menu to five or six items: Services (or your two or three service names), About, Work or Portfolio, Reviews if they deserve their own page, and Contact.

Put your main action, such as "Check your date", in a button at the top right that stays visible as people scroll.

When a service deserves its own page.

Give a service its own page when two things are true: clients think of it as a separate purchase, and they would search for it by name.

A planner who offers full planning, partial planning and day-of coordination might keep them on one weddings page, because couples compare them side by side.

Worked example: Lantern and Lane's site map.

Marco mapped the old site and found nineteen pages, including three galleries, a blog with four posts from three years ago, and a "Packages" page that was a downloadable PDF.

Inquiries came in through two different forms that went to two different inboxes.

An About page template.

An About page is still about the client.

A headline about the client's experience: "You will always know who to call."

That is the lesson. The worksheet and the quiz are just below this video.

The five core pages

Every service website in the event industry can be built on the same five pages. Add more only when a page has a clear job the core pages cannot do.

Navigation that works on a phone

Keep the main menu to five or six items: Services (or your two or three service names), About, Work or Portfolio, Reviews if they deserve their own page, and Contact. Put your main action, such as “Check your date”, in a button at the top right that stays visible as people scroll.

Use plain labels. “Weddings” beats “Love stories”. “Corporate events” beats “Experiences”. Visitors scan for words they already have in mind, and clever labels make them hunt.

The footer is the second menu. Visitors who reach the bottom of a page and have not found what they need look there. Include your business name, service area, phone, email, links to every core page, your privacy policy and terms, and your social profiles.

When a service deserves its own page

Give a service its own page when two things are true: clients think of it as a separate purchase, and they would search for it by name. A planner who offers full planning, partial planning and day-of coordination might keep them on one weddings page, because couples compare them side by side. The same planner’s corporate holiday parties need their own page, because the buyer, the language and the proof are completely different.

Apply the same test to every vendor type. A caterer might have pages for weddings, corporate lunches and food truck bookings. A magician might have pages for corporate events, private parties and trade shows. A rental company might organize by event type, by product family, or both. Pages for specific cities or regions are covered in the module on search.

Worked example: Lantern & Lane’s site map

Marco mapped the old site and found nineteen pages, including three galleries, a blog with four posts from three years ago, and a “Packages” page that was a downloadable PDF. Inquiries came in through two different forms that went to two different inboxes.

The new structure has eleven pages:

• Home
• Two-Tradition Weddings (the signature service)
• Wedding Planning (Day-of, Partial and Full, compared side by side)
• Corporate and Social Events
• Our Work: four portfolio entries for two-tradition weddings, three for other weddings and two for corporate events, each on its own page
• About Priya and Marco
• Reviews
• Check Your Date (the contact page, with one form)
• Privacy Policy and Terms (in the footer only)

They also counted clicks. On the old site, a visitor on the Full Planning description needed four clicks to reach a form. On the new site, every service page and portfolio entry ends with the same “Check your date” button, so the form is never more than one click away. If a visitor has to go looking for the next step, many will not.

Merging the two forms had a second benefit. Every inquiry now lands in one inbox with the page it came from attached. After three months Marco could see which pages produced inquiries: of 21 inquiries, 12 came from the Two-Tradition Weddings page and its portfolio entries, six from Wedding Planning and three from Corporate. That told them where to add photos and reviews first.

An About page template

An About page is still about the client. Use this outline.

1. A headline about the client’s experience: “You will always know who to call.”
2. A photo of the real people, ideally at work at an event.
3. Why you do this work, in three or four sentences, tied to what the client gets.
4. What working with you is like: how quickly you reply, how planning meetings run, who will be on site.
5. Relevant credentials and experience, stated specifically.
6. A button to the contact page.

A portfolio entry template

Labelled portfolio entries sell far better than galleries, because they prove you have solved problems like the visitor’s. For each entry, include:

• Event type, guest count, season and area, such as “Two-day Sikh and Italian wedding, 280 guests, Brampton, August”
• The challenge, in one or two sentences
• What you did, in three or four bullet points
• A short review from the client, with permission
• Eight to fifteen of the best photos, not all of them
• Photo credit and the vendors you worked with
• A button: “Planning something similar? Check your date”

Contact page checklist

• A short form, covered in detail later in this module
• A tappable phone number and email address
• When you reply, such as “within one business day”
• Your service area, in place names
• What happens after they send the form
• A link to your price sheet or packages, so visitors can self-qualify

In Canada and Ontario

Your address on the page. Many event businesses run from a home office or a storage unit and travel to clients. Google’s rules for Business Profiles say that service-area businesses, which serve customers at the customers’ locations, should hide their address and set a service area instead. P.O. boxes and remote mailboxes are not acceptable addresses for a profile. Your website can follow the same logic: show your service area and a contact method, and keep a home address off the page. Commercial emails are a different matter. Under CASL, every commercial electronic message must include a current mailing address, and the CRTC says a P.O. Box can qualify. Many home-based vendors rent one for that purpose and use it in email footers, not on Google.

Your business name. Use your registered business name consistently in the header, footer and contact page. Registering a business name in Ontario does not give you a trademark. The Canadian Intellectual Property Office says a trade name can be registered under the Trademarks Act only if it is also used as a trademark, and trade names are recorded separately under provincial law. If you are investing in a site and a brand around a name, the module on brand covers trademarks.

Client logos and “as seen at” sections. A row of corporate logos or venue names suggests those organizations chose you. That general impression is a representation under the Competition Act, which makes it reviewable to make a representation to the public that is false or misleading in a material respect. Only show logos of clients you actually worked for, ask permission, and avoid wording that implies an endorsement you do not have.

Portfolio photos. For photos taken on or after November 7, 2012, the photographer owns copyright by default, even when someone else paid for the shoot, unless a signed written agreement says otherwise. Ask every photographer for written permission to use their images on your site, and credit them. Photos of identifiable guests are also personal information, a principle the Office of the Privacy Commissioner has supported, so build consent into your client agreement and remove an image promptly if someone asks.

Consistent navigation and accessibility. Ontario businesses and non-profits with 50 or more employees must make their public websites meet WCAG 2.0 Level AA, as explained on Ontario’s page on how to make websites accessible. Most event businesses are smaller, but the standard is a sound guide for everyone, and corporate clients increasingly ask. A simple structure, plain labels and navigation that appears in the same place on every page help all visitors, including those using screen readers. A later lesson covers accessibility in detail.

GTA practice notes

Corporate buyers need a capability page. Procurement teams and executive assistants in Toronto often need to send a vendor’s details to someone else for approval. A page or downloadable sheet with your services, typical event sizes, service area, insurance coverage and how to arrange a certificate of insurance saves them an email and puts you ahead of vendors who make them ask.

Portfolio by community and venue type. Couples planning multi-day cultural weddings want proof that you understand the sequence of events, not only that you take good photos or serve good food. Label portfolio entries by tradition, guest count and type of venue, such as a banquet hall, a hotel ballroom, a golf club or a backyard tent, so visitors can find a match quickly.

Keep it current. A portfolio whose newest entry is three years old raises a question about whether you are still busy. Add one or two entries after each season, before the winter wedding shows and the late-summer corporate booking period.

Worksheet

Download the worksheet and complete it for your own business, using Lantern & Lane as the model where it helps. Keep it with your marketing plan. It takes about 10 minutes.

Download the worksheet (PDF)