What should a B&B website have? A checklist from 21 Irish sites

What guests look for first

Someone looking at your site is usually comparing you with two or three other places, often on a phone. In the first few seconds they want to know four things: what the rooms look like, what a night costs, where you are, and how to book. Everything else comes after.

What we found on 21 Irish sites

In October 2026 we looked at the websites of 21 B&Bs, guesthouses, holiday homes and one glamping site in Kerry, Clare, Galway, Mayo, Cork and Donegal. We read each home page and one inner page, and measured how long the main content took to appear on a phone. We picked a mix of tired and modern sites rather than only the top search results.

What we checked	What we found
Rooms or units described	21 of 21, often briefly
Local area guide	Almost all, often the best-written page
Prices shown	2 or 3 sites only
Real online booking	About 6 of 21
English only	20 of 21
Main content under 2.5 seconds on a phone	1 of the 20 we could measure
Recent guest reviews	About half had reviews, many from 2018 to 2020

The good news: the hard part is usually already there. The photos are good, the owners write well about their area, and the rooms are described. What is missing is mostly practical.

The gaps we saw most

No prices. Most sites asked guests to email for rates. Many guests will not. A “from €95 per night” line, with the season it applies to, answers the first question and keeps them on your site.

No way to book. About two thirds of the sites relied on an enquiry form, a phone number or a link to Booking.com. A “Book now” button that leads to a contact page is the most common version. If you already use a booking system, its widget can go on every page. Our guide to booking engines for small B&Bs compares the options.

English only. Only one of 21 sites offered another language, and it did so through its booking software. Many visitors to the west come from mainland Europe, and a translated site, checked by someone who speaks the language, is one of the cheapest ways to stand out.

Slow on phones. Only one of the 20 sites we could measure showed its main content in under 2.5 seconds, which is Google’s threshold for a good experience. Large photos, sliders and old themes were the usual causes. See how to check your site’s speed in two minutes.

Old notices. Covid pages still in the menu, “2019 rates”, links to Google+, a message asking visitors to install Flash, template text such as “Double click an image to replace it”. Each one tells a guest the site, and maybe the house, is not looked after.

Zoom turned off. Several themes stop visitors from pinching to zoom on a phone. That makes small text hard to read, especially for older guests.

What you can fix this week

You don’t need a new website to fix the worst of it:

1. Add a “from” price to your home page and each room page.
2. Make your “Book” button lead to a real booking page, not a contact form.
3. Delete old notices and pages, and check every link in your menu.
4. Add your check-in times and cancellation terms.
5. Link to your latest Google reviews.

If your site is built on WordPress, also check that it is up to date: several sites we saw ran versions several years old.

When a rebuild makes sense

A rebuild is worth it when the fixes above are hard to make yourself, when the site is slow even after you remove large images, or when you want it in more languages. Before you pay anyone, check what the Grow Digital Voucher from your Local Enterprise Office can and cannot fund: it replaced the old Trading Online Voucher, and the rules are different.