How many pages does a website need

Why the number is the wrong question

Page count is an output rather than an input. A business that covers its subject properly ends up with however many pages that took, and a business aiming at a number ends up padding or stopping early.

Both failures are visible. Our page on thin content covers what padding produces, and a site that stopped at ten pages because ten sounded right leaves obvious questions unanswered.

So ask what is unanswered rather than how many pages exist. That question has a real answer and it changes as the business does.

The pages nearly every site needs

What you do, who for, and where. How to get in touch and what happens next. Proof that the work is real. Those three cover the minimum for a business that gets work by referral.

Then a page for each distinct service, because somebody searching for one service should land on a page about that service rather than on a list.

And the practical ones: terms, privacy, and anything your trade requires. Our page on the compliance checklist covers what those usually are.

Add a page for the area you work in if coverage is a real question for your trade. For anybody who travels to customers, that single page answers the first thing almost every visitor wants to know.

When to add a page

When a real question keeps arriving that no existing page answers properly. That is the only trigger worth acting on, and it produces pages that earn their place from the day they publish.

Not on a schedule. A page a week because somebody said to publish weekly produces filler, and filler dilutes the pages that were working.

Our page on FAQ content covers finding the real questions. The ones you are tired of answering on the phone are the best candidates you have.

Signs you have too few

The list below is what a site that is too small looks like from the outside. Each item is a question a visitor had and left without an answer to.

• Somebody has to call to find out what you charge
• A service you offer has no page of its own
• Nothing says which areas you cover
• There is no proof of work anywhere
• Common objections are addressed nowhere
• Nothing explains what happens after contact
• You answer the same question by phone every week

Signs you have too many

Several pages answering the same question in different words. That is the doorway pattern our page on doorway pages describes, and it makes a site worse rather than larger.

Pages nobody reads and nobody maintains. A page that has not been updated in four years and gets no visits is costing you credibility rather than earning anything.

And pages you cannot fill with anything specific. If the honest version is three paragraphs of generalities, that subject belongs as a section inside another page.

Growing past twenty

Some businesses genuinely need a hundred pages, usually because they serve many locations or many distinct services, and each one has something real to say.

The requirement at that size is structure. Our page on site structure covers hubs and sections, without which a large site becomes a pile rather than a library.

It is also where consistency becomes a problem people cannot solve by hand, and where a tool that applies the same rules everywhere starts to earn its keep.

Watch the maintenance cost as you grow. Every page is something that can go out of date, and a site of a hundred pages needs a review routine rather than somebody remembering to check.

Quality against quantity, honestly

Ten pages that answer real questions specifically will outperform fifty that answer them generally. That has been true for every site we have measured and it is not close.

The exception is coverage. If a question exists and you have no page for it, no search engine or answer engine can send anybody to you for it, which is the honest argument for more.

So the rule is: add a page when you have something specific to say about a question somebody asks. Never add one to reach a number.