The question behind most calls
Ask whoever answers your telephone what people ask first. It is almost never about price and almost never about you. It is some version of "what do I do now".
Somebody has died at home an hour ago, or in hospital overnight, or in a care home while the family was asleep. The person calling has never done this before, does not know whether there is any urgency, and is not sure whether they are even ringing the right sort of business. Most funeral websites do not answer that question anywhere, which is why the call happens at three in the morning in a state of panic.
A step-by-step page for the first days is the single most useful thing a life events website can carry.
Structure it by where the death happened
This is the fork that matters, because the first action is genuinely different in each case.
At home, expected. Who to contact first, usually the medical practice or the community nursing team, and what happens after that. Whether the family can sit with the person for a while. When to call you.
At home, unexpected. The emergency services first, and what follows, including that the coroner or equivalent may become involved and what that means for timings.
In hospital. The bereavement office, what it does, what documents it issues and when, and that the hospital will hold the person until arrangements are made.
In a care home. What the home will do, who they will contact, and what the family needs to do.
Abroad. A short section with the first two steps and a note to call you, because repatriation is not something to explain in bullet points.
Each fork as a short numbered list. Four to seven steps. Nothing else on the page competing for attention.
Say the thing nobody says
Most people believe there is a rush. Almost always there is not. A sentence stating plainly that there is usually time, that the person will be cared for, and that decisions do not have to be made tonight, is the most valuable sentence on a funeral website. Add it near the top.
If there are genuine time factors in your area or for particular faiths, say what they are and who to call.
Then the practical list
Below the steps, a short section of the things people ask next.
- What to have to hand when you call: the name, where the person is, and a contact number. Say that nothing else is needed yet.
- What a registration of death involves where you are, who does it, and roughly what the timescale is. Link to the official source rather than restating rules that change.
- What a certificate is called locally and who issues it.
- Whether the person had a pre-paid plan or a will, and that either can be looked for later.
- Who to tell, briefly, with a link to whatever official notification service exists in your country.
- What happens when you take the person into your care.
Keep this factual and keep it linked to official sources, because the detail differs by country and gets updated. The website's job is to orient, not to be a legal handbook.
How to write it
Write it the way you would say it across the table. Short sentences. No subordinate clauses. Second person. No reassurance without information attached, because reassurance alone reads as filler to someone in shock.
The best way to draft it is to sit with whoever takes the calls and write down what they actually say, in the order they say it. That is the page. Then take out anything that sounds like a brochure.
Where it lives on the site
- Linked from the top navigation with plain words: "When someone dies". Not "Bereavement support".
- Linked from the first screen of the home page, above anything about the firm.
- The telephone number at the top of the page and again at the bottom, tappable, with the out-of-hours arrangement in words.
- Its own address, short and memorable, so staff can say it on the phone and it can go on printed cards for hospitals and care homes.
- Readable at arm's length: large type, high contrast, no images behind text.
What it does for the practice
It answers the questions that currently arrive as calls, so the calls that do come are shorter and calmer. It gives hospital and care home staff something to hand over. It is one of the few pages on a funeral website that people search for directly, which brings families who had not yet chosen a firm. And it demonstrates, without saying so, the way your firm treats people.
Keep it current
Registration processes, certificate names and notification services change. Review the page once a year and whenever a local process changes, and check that every external link still works.
Where this sits
A first-days page written from the calls your office actually takes is part of every build described on our life events websites page, and it is the page we start with for funeral directors. It is also the page most likely to be already on your site in a form nobody would read at two in the morning.