Move the business onto a domain it owns, with email at that domain and a site free of anyone else's advertising. For a contractor asking for trust and a deposit, the address is part of the pitch.

The site

A renovation contractor with a crew of three: kitchens, bathrooms and basements in older houses, mostly within half an hour of the yard.

The website lives at an address made of the business name, a dot, and the domain of the site-building service it was made with. On the truck, that address runs across the tailgate in small letters.

Every page carries the service's banner along the bottom, inviting visitors to create a free website of their own. On a phone, it sits over the last lines of each page.

The contact address is a free webmail account: the business name followed by two digits, the plain name having been claimed long ago by someone else.

The photographs are real and good, which makes the rest harder to explain.

The inference a visitor makes

Someone choosing a renovation contractor is about to let strangers into their home for weeks and hand over a deposit. Every detail on the site gets weighed as evidence, for or against.

A free address with someone else's advertising on every page reads as a business that has not spent anything on itself. Perhaps a side job, perhaps a new venture that may not last.

Fair or not, the visitor wonders whether a business that has not committed to its own address will be around to honour a warranty.

They rarely phone to find out. They look at the next contractor on the list.

The problems at a glance

The fourth costs the most in the end, because it grows more expensive every month the site stays where it is.

An address owned by someone else

The business name in the address is a guest on the service's domain, and the service decides what happens to it.

If the service changes its free plan, closes inactive accounts or ends the product, the address goes, along with every link to it.

It is also long, hard to say on the phone and easy to mistype. That matters for a business whose address is read off a tailgate at a traffic light.

A banner for somebody else

The banner exists because the site is free. It is how the service pays for itself, and on a free plan it stays.

To a visitor it says two things: this site cost nothing, and you could make one too. Neither helps a contractor quoting a large job.

On a phone, a banner pinned along the bottom edge also hides part of every page, sometimes the phone number itself.

Email anyone could create

A free webmail address is fine for personal use. For a business, it removes a signal people rely on.

Anyone can open an account with a business name and a number in minutes. Cautious customers know that, and hesitate before sending a deposit to one.

An address at the business's own domain cannot be set up by a stranger, and it outlasts any one employee or personal account.

Quotes read differently too. One sent from the business's own domain looks like a document from a company; one from a numbered webmail account looks like a note from a person.

Search history on borrowed ground

Every link to the site, from suppliers, directories and the Google My Business listing, points at the service's address. So does everything search engines have learned about the site.

When the business moves, that history does not follow by default. Forwarding the old address to a new one is often unavailable on a free plan, or sold as an upgrade.

Each directory or supplier page that links to the old address then has to be asked, one at a time, to change it.

The longer the site stays, the more it leaves behind.

On the truck and the cards

The tailgate, the business cards and the lawn signs repeat the borrowed address in public, and each costs money to change.

The cheapest moment to change them is the next repaint or print run. Which makes the decision urgent, even though the lettering is not.

Lawn signs are the exception. They are cheap and short-lived, so they can carry the new address within the month.

A worked example

The contractor decided to move after a homeowner asked, politely, whether the company was registered.

The business registered a .ca domain matching its name, which a Canadian business is entitled to do, and set up email at that domain for the owner and the office.

A new site was built on hosting the business controls, with the existing photographs, the warranty page from the old site and a page for each type of renovation.

The Google My Business listing, the supplier directories and the trade association page were updated to the new address.

The old free site was reduced to one page saying the business had moved, with the new address and phone number, since its plan offered no forwarding.

The truck got the new address at its next repaint. The business cards changed when the box ran out.

The counter-case within the site

Not everything needed changing. The photographs of finished basements were real and well taken, and the warranty page was clearer than many. Both moved across intact.

A business in its first weeks can live with a temporary page for a short while, as long as the domain and email are its own from the start.

And a free address is fine for a test or a hobby that nobody is asked to pay for.

For a contractor asking homeowners for trust and a deposit, the address should belong to the business.

What to change

  1. Register a domain that matches the business name.
  2. Set up email at that domain.
  3. Build the site on hosting the business controls.
  4. Move the real photographs and warranty details across.
  5. Update the Google listing and directory links.
  6. Leave a moved notice on the old address.
  7. Change the truck and cards at the next print.

Step two matters more than it looks, because the email address goes out with every quote and invoice, long after a visitor has left the website.

Reading small details as signals about the whole business is covered in a clinic site with three different logos.

Frequently asked questions

Why does a free subdomain hurt a contractor?

Visitors read it as a business that has not invested in itself, and wonder whether it will be around for the warranty. Most do not ask; they call someone else.

What is wrong with the service's banner?

It tells visitors the site cost nothing and invites them to make their own. On phones it can also cover part of each page, sometimes the phone number.

Is a free webmail address a problem?

For a business, yes. Anyone can create one with your name and a number in minutes, while an address at your own domain cannot be set up by a stranger.

What happens to search history when moving?

Links and search history point at the old address. Forwarding is often unavailable on free plans, so the sooner the move happens, the less is left behind.

Can anything from the free site be kept?

Yes. Real photographs and clearly written pages, such as a warranty explanation, can move across to the new site intact and usually should.

When should the truck lettering change?

At the next repaint or print run. Deciding on the move now means the next print carries the new address rather than another round of the old one.

West Coast Media Solutions Inc. provides web design, web development, hosting, digital marketing, and business consulting to organisations across Canada, drawing on more than twenty-five years in the field.

Business website on someone else's address?

Send us the current address. We will plan the move to your own domain, email included.

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