I visited the website of a family law attorney yesterday in search of his phone number. I needed to place a quick call to this guy about some help I needed. I had a crappy Internet connection, and I was in a hurry. I found the site easily by searching on his name and city. So far, so good.

I scrolled down to the bottom of the site looking for the number. Nothing. I got agitated.

Then I scrolled back up to the top. There was a “Contact” button. I clicked, waited for the page to load, and found the number. I was calmer now.

The whole two-minute episode got me thinking. What’s the most important thing on the site? I suppose one could argue that it’s the headline, the copy, the information provided, and on and on. Or one could argue that the phone number is the critical piece of information.

After all, nearly every client who hires you comes in via the phone. If prospective clients like what they see on the site, they give you a call, schedule an appointment, and come in for a consult. Most people will call to make an appointment even if you’ve integrated a slick meeting scheduler into your site. They like to call. It’s comforting to talk to a person. They’re going to need your phone number, or they’re not likely to hire you.

What to do?

Put your phone number on the bottom of every single page of your site. Feel free to put it on the top and on the sides as well if it makes you happy. Just put it in a bunch of places. Make finding your number easy. Make it as frictionless as possible. Make it simple for an idiot like me to find it with the least amount of effort.

The last thing you want is for a prospective client to become frustrated and call someone else with a great, big phone number on their site.