The Q4 2025 benchmarking report for UK find a trade sites has just been published. Learn how the top 12 UK find a trade sites perform across the digital space.
The latest Q4 2025 benchmarking report for UK find a trade sites has just been published. It covers the largest 12 UK find a trade sites, including Rated People, Checkatrade, TrustATrader, Bark.com, Book a Builder UK, Houzz, Local Quotes, Which? Trusted Traders, MyBuilder, MyJobQuote, Top Tradespeople, and HomePro.
The research gives an inside track on who is winning the biggest share of voice online, and quantifies the gaps, risks and missed opportunities for other find a trade websites to win brand exposure, drive traffic online, and increase listing volumes. The report highlights quick wins that will improve enquiries from your online strategy and identifies the barriers that may be reducing your site’s ability to optimise digital performance.
To see a preview and contents page of the Q3 report, click here. To get a copy of the full report and the key takeaways, please complete the enquiry form or schedule a call.
For a glance into just 6 of the metrics we evaluated these top 12 find a trade websites on, check out our quick-look table below;
Continue reading for further detail on this quarter's best and poorest-performing UK find a trade sites or request a copy of the report for the full review.
The 70+ pages of research benchmarks each brand based on 50+ metrics and indicators of successful digital strategy, including organic visibility, domain authority, paid media ads, conversion performance, technical performance, site speed, universal search, content, social ads, accessibility, and mobile performance.
Some of the leading players in the space are high spenders on paid media channels such as Google, Bing & Facebook - but have a poor or sub-optimal conversion improvement strategy. Without an optimised, sophisticated conversion strategy that maximises the conversion rate, the return on investment is unsustainable or will under-perform. Scaling spend on paid media is not achievable unless the conversion rate delivers optimal performance in the sector. Some in the space have paid media spend levels from 30k+ per month but dedicate minimal resources and budgets to conversion testing. Given the cost per clicks on ad networks will continue to rise, we recommend spending at least 10% of your paid media budget on ongoing conversion optimisation testing schedules to ensure your paid media ROI maintains long term viability, competitive advantage, and sustainability.
Pay-Per-Click marketing is constantly evolving, with more and more advertisers being forced to hand over a lot of control to Google's algorithms as the push for automation grows ever stronger. There are still key elements of control that we have though, the main one of these being budget which is ultimately something the algorithms can't take from you. That's why being smart with your budget and ad coverage is essential to achieving strong results and bettering what your competitors have to offer.
For Q4 2025, the average monthly budget wastage across these UK find-a-trade sites was £33,861, with some of the top players in the market spending a considerable amount on areas and audiences unlikely to deliver a return. We can see this in more detail when looking at the average monthly cost per cost-per-click (CPC) amongst advertisers, with the average of this metric being £49 . This highlights how competitive the market is and how important it is to control your budgets effectively.
There are varying monthly ad budgets across the competitors in the report. While this gap highlights the competitive advantage that larger budgets can provide, it's not just about spending more; it’s about spending smarter. By focusing on driving efficiency in campaign management, targeting, and budget allocation, businesses with smaller budgets can still effectively compete with larger players. Investing in data-driven strategies and refining ad performance can help close the gap and maximise the return on every pound spent, enabling growth even in a competitive landscape. Relative to their spend, Book a Builder UK reported the lowest monthly cost-per-click (CPC) at £0, and MyJobQuote has the highest at £367.
The report highlights the importance of budget efficiency by comparing monthly ad spend with estimated CPC in relation to your competitors, see who has the highest and lowest CPC. To maximise the effectiveness of your budget, it’s essential to focus on driving CPC down while maintaining or improving campaign performance. In this report, Houzz has the lowest estimate monthly ad spend at £1310, and Which? Trusted Traders has the highest at £1,330,000.
By optimising targeting, refining ad copy, and leveraging data to identify high-converting opportunities, you can ensure every click delivers maximum value. This approach not only stretches your budget further but also boosts your return on ad spend (ROAS), enabling you to achieve stronger results without simply increasing expenditure.
Savvy digital marketers know that having a technically sound website is an essential component of a successful fully integrated digital strategy - plus a site capable of maximising conversion performance. Find a trade websites will want to ensure that old, or expired listings do not impact their technical website compliance.
In our previous audit, Top Tradespeople reported the most 404 errors (154). This quarter, Top Tradespeople has reduced their 404 errors to 6, no longer putting them at the bottom of the leaderboard. Currently, Rated People is the one to watch, with a total of 119 404 errors. When users encounter broken pages, it can reduce trust in the brand and increase bounce rates, and a high volume of 404 errors signals to visitors that a site isn’t properly maintained.
When 62% of consumers are less likely to convert if they have a negative mobile site experience, ensuring that your site is quick and easy to load makes a significant improvement on your overall conversion rates. Find a trade sites will want to ensure they are quick to use, so users needing to find a tradesperson quickly will find them easy to access and navigate.
In our previous report, MyBuilder flagged the slowest mobile site speed (29). This quarter, MyBuilder has increased their mobile site speed to 41, moving them up the leaderboard. Currently, Bark.com is the one to watch, with a mobile site speed of 28. Search engines, like Google, use mobile speed as a ranking factor. If a site loads slowly, it may appear lower in search results, reducing organic visibility. Faster sites not only perform better in rankings but also attract and retain more users.
Domain authority is an essential metric for measuring the effectiveness of SEO performance, and helps create a reliable overall gauge of how effective your site is at achieving organic traffic, i.e. ‘free’ traffic that isn’t gained through sponsored ads. For find a trader sites, they'll want to consider working with a digital PR specialist to identify backlink reclamation opportunities, along with ideate new ways of building backlinks and referral traffic.
A ‘good’ DA really comes down to how your competitors are performing, however it is generally considered average between 40 and 50, good between 50 and 60, and excellent above 60. In our last report, Top Tradespeople received the lowest DA score (23). This quarter, Top Tradespeople has decreased their DA score to 19, continuing to make them the brand to watch. Search engines use signals like backlinks and content quality to evaluate domain authority. Building relevant, trustworthy links from reputable sources helps improve these signals over time. The stronger the authority, the easier it is for new pages to rank well.
A strong organic performance is strategically important as it ensures your site ranks above competitors for key, transactional keywords. When 93% of your customers won’t go past the first page of Google, your absence or lack of targeting for essential keywords will cost you conversions. Find a trade websites will want to keep tabs on the most searched-for trades, to identify whether the cost-of-living crisis is having an impact on the types of trades people are searching for.
Seven brands reported a drop in organic traffic on desktop, with Top Tradespeople receiving the biggest loss (-91%). On mobile, 8 brands reported a drop in organic traffic, Top Tradespeople receiving the biggest loss on this device, too (-87%). Mobile traffic continues to grow, with many users browsing primarily on their phones. Optimising for mobile means faster load times, clear layouts, and easy navigation on smaller screens. This helps retain users who might otherwise leave due to poor usability.
Google Universal Search Results is an evolving opportunity to make your pages visible on a SERP (Search Engine Results Page). Universal results often appear before traditional listings and are eye-catching for users. Universal search results refer to rankings on a SERP that are not the traditional ‘blue line’ Google link, and a brand can appear for universal search results without being strong in standard rankings. 'Reviews' will be a key Universal Search result for find a trade websites, as they'll want to build trust with users searching for reliable tradespeople.
Checkatrade remains the brand to beat for the most Universal Search appearances (57,035) — a decrease from 106,683 in our previous audit. The majority of Go Outdoors’ appearances came from ‘people also ask’ (39,600).
Longtail keywords are often considered high intent and potentially more likely to convert as a searcher is being more specific. Optimising for longtail keywords also puts your content strategy in a strong position to rank for brand new search terms as they enter Google’s index. Find a trade sites can optimise towards specific trades, locations, and availabilities, to capture traffic from users with a high conversion intent.
Checkatrade continues to secure the most longtail keyword appearances for position 3 (27,987) — an increase from 25,496 previously. Checkatrade also secured the most appearances for positions 4–10 (32,175) — an increase from 30,135 previously. Longtail keywords help websites compete more effectively in search results. Unlike broad terms, they face less competition, making it easier to rank higher. This allows smaller or newer websites to gain visibility against larger competitors.
With the number of Facebook users in the United Kingdom (UK) hitting over 44 million users in 2023, it is not surprising that companies have jumped at the opportunity to advertise on the social media platform. Facebook’s UK digital advertising revenue has been estimated to have breached 2.6b GB pounds in 2019.
We’ve included screenshots of Bark.com’s sponsored Facebook posts. This UK find-a-trade site should avoid using the same video and text across each post, as this doesn’t allow them to fairly test which type of content receives the most engagement.
When it comes to social media and on-site content strategies, it is important to release content that has a longer shelf life. An article is considered 'Evergreen' if it has maintained its relevancy to an audience for longer. It's great for your brand engagement, but great for Google too, who will recognise content which achieves traffic over a long period of time. Find a trade sites can create shareable content such as guides to finding the right tradesperson, common household maintenance tasks that will need carrying out, or even how to do simple fixes at home (building brand awareness and trust).
Houzz secured the most Facebook Likes (2.8m) and the most Instagram followers (660,000). Twitter was the most popular social media platforms of all brands. Bark.com received the highest total engagement rate (9,737) and the highest average engagement (66).
20% of people in the UK have a disability – 2 million of which are people living with sight loss. In addition, 1 in 12 men and 1 in 200 women have some degree of colour vision deficiency. When websites are not designed to meet these needs, brands lose customer interest as they turn elsewhere. Everyone will need to welcome tradespeople into their homes at some point or another, so find a trade sites must ensure that those who are vulnerable, such as blind or partially sighted users, can place trust within their choice of tradesperson from the very first point of contact.
In our previous audit, Bark.com received the most accessibility alerts (150). This quarter, Bark.com has reduced their accessibility alerts to 106, demonstrating they’re monitoring their site for these alerts. Currently, the brand reporting the most accessibility alerts is Trusted Traders, with a total of 109. Ignoring these alerts can exclude visitors with disabilities, damaging both user experience and brand reputation. A truly inclusive website ensures everyone can navigate and engage without barriers.
To get a copy of the full report, please complete the enquiry form. If you want to talk to us about accelerating your digital performance, please call us on 01543 410014 or schedule a call with Rory Tarplee.