Dentist Website Development: 10 Questions to Ask Before You Hire a Developer

An agency pitch for a dental practice website tends to be about design: modern, clean, patient-friendly. Design is the easy part to judge, because you can see it. The things that go wrong later are the ones you cannot see in a presentation: how fast the site is on a phone, whether it follows the rules for dental advertising, who owns it, and what it costs once the first invoice is paid. These ten questions are for the meeting before you sign.

In plain wordsA website is like the fit-out of a treatment room: how it looks decides the first minute. The wiring, the keys and the paperwork decide what happens when something breaks.

1. Will I see a working copy before it goes live, and how often? A good answer is a private test copy (a staging site) you can click through, with a regular demo during the work rather than one reveal at the end.

2. Is the price fixed before work starts? You want a written price for a written scope. Ask what is included (pages, languages, forms, booking) and what counts as extra.

3. What happens to my old site’s pages in Google? If you are replacing an existing site, you should hear about a list of the old addresses with a redirect from each to its new page. The fuller answer is in our guide to redesigning a clinic website without losing rankings.

4. How fast will the site be on a phone? Ask which numbers they target. Google’s “good” thresholds for Core Web Vitals, measured on real visits, are: main content appears in 2.5 seconds or less (LCP), the page reacts to a tap in 200 milliseconds or less (INP), and the layout does not jump by more than 0.1 (CLS). Then ask how they will check it after launch, not only on the test copy.

5. Does the site follow the rules for dental websites in my country? In the UK, the General Dental Council’s advertising guidance says that for named professionals a website should show their qualifications, the country where they qualified and their GDC number. It should also show the practice name and address, contact details including an email address and a phone number, the GDC’s contact or a link to it, and your complaints procedure, naming who patients can turn to. It should also carry the date the site was last updated. Patient privacy rules matter too: ask which ones apply to you, and check them with a lawyer, not only with the agency.

6. Can patients book from their phone? Ask what the booking path is: a form, a phone number that works with one tap, or a connection to the system you already use. Ask who receives the requests and what happens if the email does not arrive.

7. Who owns the site, the code and the accounts? The domain, the hosting account, the code and the content should be registered to you. Ask for the logins and for written instructions for editing the pages, so that you are not tied to one agency forever.

8. Is the site translated properly, if I need more than one language? Each language needs its own address and real translations of the pages that matter: doctors, services, contact. See our guide to a multilingual clinic website.

9. What will I be able to change myself? Opening hours, a new doctor, a price, a news item: ask whether you can do these without calling anyone, and how long it takes to learn.

10. What does the agency do after launch? Updates, backups, security, who to call when the site is down. Ask what is included and what is billed separately, and who answers.

We built a dental surgery clinic’s site in three languages. It was done on a copy, with the content moved from the old site, the addresses kept where possible and redirects for the rest. The clinic gets the code and the instructions.

It depends on the number of pages, languages and what the site must do, so there is no honest single number. Ask each agency for a fixed price for a written scope, and compare what is included.

Yes. A site can look fine on your laptop and be slow on a patient’s phone. Google’s thresholds are measured on real visits, which is why they are worth asking about.

In the UK, the General Dental Council’s guidance says a named professional’s qualifications, country of qualification and GDC number should appear. Check the current guidance on the GDC website, since rules can change.

Whoever writes it, the facts (treatments, qualifications, prices) must be yours and must be true. Do not accept invented reviews or results.

• Speed. Measure LCP, INP and CLS on real mobile visits (field data) as well as in lab tests. Check images, fonts, third-party scripts (chat, booking, tracking) and the theme’s own weight.
• Compliance page. A footer block or page with practice name and address, contact details, GDC contact, complaints procedure, and the last-updated date; named professionals with qualifications, country and GDC number.
• Booking. Form submissions stored as well as emailed, a clear confirmation, a test on mobile, and a check that the email actually arrives.
• Redirects and indexing. Redirect map from the old site, no noindex left from development, a sitemap, canonical links.
• Ownership. Accounts in the client’s name, code in a repository the client can access, documented deployment and backups.
• Privacy. A privacy policy, consent for cookies and tracking where it is required, and no personal data in analytics.

We build clinic websites on WordPress with doctor and service pages, online booking and several languages. The work happens on a private copy, with a weekly demo, and the code, access and instructions are handed to the clinic. Tell us about your practice: within two working days we send a structure review, an indicative timeline and a price, with no obligation. The price is fixed before work starts. See our clinic website page.