Eight pages
A life events website needs eight pages. Two of them, services and prices, and the ceremonies or memorials page, expand into several as the business grows. Here is each one, what belongs on it, and how to build in stages.
1. Home
Above the fold on a phone: the firm's name, what you do, where you are, and a call button with the hours beside it, saying "Answered 24 hours" where that is true. Immediately under it, a link to what to do when someone dies, because that is what most first-time visitors need.
Then, quietly: a line or two about the firm, a link to the price list, the services in a short list, one real photograph of the premises or the team, and the call button again. No slider, no video that plays itself, no popup, no chat window that opens on its own.
2. When someone dies
The step-by-step page, and usually the most-read page on the site. What to do first, split by where the death happened; registering the death, with a link to the official body rather than restated rules; when to contact you and that there is no obligation; what happens after that; the decisions that lie ahead and their timings; a paragraph on cost linking to the price list; and, where it is true, the line that nothing needs doing tonight.
Short sentences. The number in a button at the top, in the middle and at the end.
3. Our services and prices
The regulated page. The required price list reproduced exactly in your regulator's format and order, the additional options list, and any disclosure of business or financial interests where one is required.
Around it: what a simple or direct funeral includes, what third party costs are and why they vary, what is not included, and what help with costs exists. Built as records so the office can change a figure in seconds, with an effective date on every price, and as a web page rather than a PDF.
Where the business offers several service types, each gets its own page linking back to the price list.
4. Planning ahead
For the visitor who is not bereaved. Pre-paid plans explained honestly, with the regulatory position stated where plans are regulated, what is and is not covered, and what happens if circumstances change. A consultation booking, not a form.
On a will writing practice site this page becomes several: wills, powers of attorney, trusts and probate, each written in the client's words, each with a fixed fee and a booking button.
5. Our team and premises
Real photographs of the people the family will meet, with names and roles, and photographs of the rooms they will sit in, the chapel of rest and the parking. Longevity and locality stated plainly. Qualifications, memberships and, for a will writer, regulatory status and professional indemnity insurance, which clients do check.
6. Celebrants and ceremonies
Where you offer it: what a celebrant does, the difference between religious, civil and humanist ceremonies where that distinction applies locally, how the ceremony is created with the family, and who your celebrants are.
For a celebrant practice this is the whole site rather than one page, with an about page carrying a short video, a step-by-step page on how a ceremony is created, the fee with inclusions, sample words used with permission, and a separate fast route for funeral directors checking availability.
7. Memorials
Memorial types and materials with guide prices and a note on what moves the final figure; the permits and cemetery or churchyard rules that surprise families; how long the work takes; and a gallery of real work.
For a memorial mason this expands into pages for memorial types, additional inscriptions and renovation, each searched separately, plus a consultation booking for the showroom or a home visit.
8. Contact and legal
Tappable number with hours, what happens out of hours, a five-field message form with a line about how the information is handled, a real email address, the address with a map, parking and step-free access. Then the legal pages linked from the footer: privacy notice, cookie information, terms, complaints procedure, company details as your jurisdiction requires, and an accessibility statement.
Optional
- Tributes or notices, where you host them, with the family's permission and moderation.
- Repatriation, or funerals for a particular faith community, where you serve one.
- Frequently asked questions, written from what families actually ask on the phone.
- Words from families, sparingly, with permission, never as a wall.
Leave off
Mission and values pages. A news section that stopped in 2019. Stock photographs of sunsets, candles or cupped hands. Anything published only as a PDF. Countdown offers, chat widgets that greet people, and any language that reads like retail.
Building in stages
Stage one, launch: Home, When someone dies, Our services and prices, Our team and premises, Contact and legal. That is a complete, compliant, reachable site.
Stage two, first quarter: Planning ahead with consultation booking, Celebrants and ceremonies, Memorials, and the frequently asked questions written from the phone log.
Stage three, ongoing: service pages as the offering grows, tributes if you decide to host them, and the price list reviewed twice a year against the regulator's current template.
Calm design, the price format, contact on every page, speed on a poor connection and accessibility are in from stage one.
Where this sits
These eight are the page list for every funeral and life events website we build, with the funeral director version running longest because compliant pricing, step-by-step guidance and pre-need pages take it past eight. Families do not explore these sites. They arrive needing one thing, and every page is built so they find it.