Checkatrade vs your own website: where should a tradesperson actually invest?

If you're a tradesperson, you've almost certainly paid for leads. Checkatrade, MyBuilder, Bark, Rated People — they promise a steady stream of customers for a monthly fee or a price per lead. And to be fair, they can work, especially when you're starting out and nobody knows your name.

But a lot of tradespeople reach the same frustration: the fees keep climbing, the leads are shared with your competitors, and none of it actually belongs to you. So is it worth it — and where's your money better spent? Let's look at the real numbers.

1. What the directories actually cost

Pricing varies a lot by trade and area, and it's rarely shown up front. But based on what tradespeople widely report, here's the realistic monthly picture:

Over a year, a Checkatrade membership commonly works out to £840–£1,800+, and heavy lead-buying can run well beyond that. A website of your own with us is £180 a year — often less than a single month on the pay-per-lead sites.

2. The catch nobody mentions: your leads are shared

Here's the part that stings. On the pay-per-lead platforms, when a homeowner posts a job, that lead isn't sold to you — it's sold to several of you. You're not paying to win the job. You're paying for the chance to quote for it, against three or four rivals who bought the exact same lead.

That's the treadmill: pay to quote, get undercut, lower your price, pay again. It can keep you busy, but it quietly trains customers to see you as a price on a list rather than the tradesperson they specifically chose.

3. Renting your reputation vs owning it

The deeper issue isn't even the money — it's that you're renting. Everything you build on a directory stays on the directory. Your reviews, your ranking, your presence: the day you stop paying, it all vanishes, and you walk away with nothing to show for years of fees.

4. So… is Checkatrade a waste of money?

No — and we're not going to pretend it is. Directories genuinely help when you're new and have no reputation of your own to point to yet. The badge reassures nervous homeowners, and the leads can fill your diary while you find your feet.

The mistake is treating them as your whole marketing plan, forever. The tradespeople who get off the treadmill do one thing differently: they use the directory as a starting point while they build something they own — a proper website and a Google Business Profile — so that over time, more of their work comes from customers who found them directly and never had to be shared with anyone.

• Directory leads cost you every month, forever. A website is a one-off build plus a small fee, and it compounds.
• Directory enquiries are shared. Website enquiries are exclusively yours.
• A website makes your directory profile work harder too — people who find you on Checkatrade will still Google you before they call.

The bottom line

Paying for leads isn't wrong — but paying for leads and nothing else means you're building someone else's business, not your own. For less than many tradespeople spend on a single month of directory fees, you could have a professional website that brings in exclusive enquiries and belongs to you for good.

That's exactly what we do at WinNorth Digital: custom, mobile-first websites built specifically for trade businesses, from £15 a month. Keep the directory if it's working — but start owning your own patch of the internet too.

Sources

• Reported Checkatrade membership costs (~£70–£150+/month; £840–£1,800+/year with upgrades) — SwiftLead, Homebuyer Leads and other trade-industry breakdowns, 2025–26.
• Pay-per-lead pricing and the shared-lead model (Bark, Rated People and MyBuilder sending each lead to multiple tradespeople) — Local Search North, SwiftLead and MyBuilder's own support documentation.
• Figures are reported industry ranges and vary by trade, region and package; they're illustrative, not a quote from any named platform.