Best lead generation for tradesmen in the UK: Checkatrade, MyBuilder, Bark, TrustATrader and the rest compared with doing it yourself

How we judged them

We looked at four things, all from public sources: what the company sells (a directory listing, a lead marketplace, managed ads), what it publishes about price and commitment, what its Trustpilot page says including the one-star share, and who it is plainly built for. Where a figure is not public we say "not published" rather than guess. Companies House facts are from the register; everything else is in the sources list and the individual reviews.

We have not bought a listing from any of them. The point of the comparison is to help you decide which kind of lead you are paying for before you sign.

The four ways they charge

Nearly everything sold to tradespeople as lead generation charges in one of four ways:

• Subscription with matched leads: a fixed monthly fee on a contract, and the platform sends you jobs. Checkatrade's Growth plan and Yell's packages work this way.
• Pay per lead: free or cheap to list, then a fee each time you contact a customer or are shortlisted, win or lose. MyBuilder and Bark work this way.
• Flat fee, no lead charges: a yearly or monthly membership and every enquiry after that is free. TrustATrader, Which? Trusted Traders and Tradesmen Online work this way.
• Managed ads: an agency fee plus your own ad budget, with enquiries exclusive to you. Digitool works this way, as do the Meta ads agencies in the other roundup.

The fourth kind, which none of them sell, is the enquiry that costs nothing per lead because the homeowner found you on Google. That is what Growth Bull is for.

The comparison at a glance

Checkatrade

Best for: being listed where most UK homeowners already search, if you can commit to 12 months.

Checkatrade is a trading name of Vetted Limited, founded in Selsey in 1998 and now part of a Brookfield-owned group through HomeServe. It sells a Free profile, an Approved plan at £30 a month and a Growth plan from £59 a month with matched leads, all paid plans on 12-month terms, with the Growth price rising by trade, postcode and lead volume. In September 2026 it bought the Rated People brand.

What it does well: the audience, the vetting badge and the deepest review record of any directory. What it does not: the 12-month contract, the gap between "from £59" and the real quote, and the member complaints about lead delivery that Trustpilot's summary flags. Full Checkatrade review.

MyBuilder

Best for: trying a job board with no subscription and no contract.

MyBuilder is owned by Angi, the US home services group, and is free to join. You pay a shortlist fee when a homeowner picks you from the trades who responded to their job, shown before you respond and rising with the job value; MyBuilder does not publish a price list. Its homepage states 292,882 tradespeople and 2,864,021 reviews.

What it does well: the lowest-risk entry of any directory. What it does not: the fee is paid win or lose, and Trustpilot's summary notes tradespeople's frustration with leads that never convert. Track cost per won job. Full MyBuilder review.

Bark

Best for: fast responders in high-volume service categories.

Bark is a general services marketplace, founded in 2014 and owned by EMK Capital since 2022, where professionals buy credits at £1.80 each to contact customers who posted a request. Credits per lead vary by service and job size, credits bought since November 2025 expire after three months, and Bark returns your credits if the first pack wins no business.

What it does well: the largest reach of all, and no subscription. What it does not: you pay to open the conversation whether or not the customer replies, and the credit expiry pushes you to spend. It is the most reviewed platform here and the lowest scored of the big ones, at 3.8. Full Bark review.

TrustATrader

Best for: a flat yearly fee with no per-lead charges, if a place is free in your area.

TrustATrader, founded in Stevenage in 2005, charges an annual membership it does not publish, never charges per lead, vets traders with five references and two years' experience, and caps the number of traders per trade in each area, with waiting lists. It advertises on ITV channels and radio on its members' behalf.

What it does well: the fairest pricing model of the directories, and the best Trustpilot ratio among them at 4.6 with 3 percent one-star. What it does not: the unpublished price, the annual commitment and the waiting lists. Full TrustATrader review.

Which? Trusted Traders

Best for: an endorsement badge for higher-value work sold to cautious homeowners.

Which? Trusted Traders is the consumer group's scheme. A £248 assessment, including a trading standards visit and a 90-minute interview, leads to the right to use the Which? logo and a listing, for £69 a month with up to three staff, £89 with four to nine and £124 with ten to fourteen. The prices are on the join page.

What it does well: published prices, a real assessment and a brand older homeowners trust. What it does not: it promises no volume of leads, and it is less useful for small, fast jobs where customers pick from Google. Full Which? Trusted Traders review.

Yell Business

Best for: one managed supplier for website, listings and ads, with a lead guarantee.

Yell, the former Yellow Pages, sells managed packages: Amplify from £299 a month around a website and organic visibility, and Accelerate from £699 a month with managed ads and a guarantee that refunds credits if an agreed lead target is missed. Contract terms are not on the product pages.

What it does well: everything built and run by one supplier, with published starting prices. What it does not: the Trustpilot record is split, 4.2 from 17,036 reviews with 23 percent one-star, and the complaints are about what the campaigns delivered. Full Yell Business review.

Digitool

Best for: exclusive Google Ads enquiries from a service with a published price and a short term.

Digitool, trading name of Daisy Leaf Ltd in Mansfield, runs Google Ads for trades and home services firms for £245 a month plus VAT, on top of a recommended £500 a month of ad spend, with a three-month minimum and a money-back guarantee on the fee if you win no job in 30 days.

What it does well: transparency, a CRM with call tracking, and 25 Trustpilot reviews at 4.7. What it does not: the enquiries stop when the ads stop, and about £750 a month is a serious outlay for a low-value trade. Full Digitool review.

Tradesmen Online

Best for: a small directory experiment, only with the price in writing.

Tradesmen Online is a Stoke-on-Trent directory, incorporated in 2019, where homeowners call traders directly and there are no lead fees. It sells six-month subscriptions at prices it does not publish.

What it does well: the no-lead-fee model is fair in principle. What it does not: the Trustpilot record is the most divided here, 3.5 from 175 reviews with 35 percent one-star, and the one-star reviews say they paid and got nothing. Full Tradesmen Online review.

Rated People

Best for: nothing for tradespeople any more.

Rated People Limited entered liquidation in September 2026, closed every trade membership on 16 September and sold its brand and website to Checkatrade Group. The site still takes jobs from homeowners and routes them to Checkatrade members. If you were a member, the lead flow now comes through a Checkatrade contract, and the reviews you collected on Rated People stopped working for you. Full Rated People review.

Growth Bull: the do-it-yourself option

Best for: growing the free enquiries from Google, automatically, before or alongside any of the above.

Every platform above keeps its reviews on its own site. Growth Bull puts them on yours. Review Builder connects to Xero, QuickBooks, Sage, FreeAgent, HubSpot or Pipedrive and sends one text and one email asking for a Google review after every paid invoice. More Google reviews lift you into the map pack (the box of three businesses with a map at the top of Google), where a homeowner rings you with no shortlist fee, no credit and no contract. It costs £69 a month, there is a 7-day free trial, and there is no contract.

Complete Growth at £129 a month adds Rank Map, which scans a grid of points around your town and names who holds number one for your trade, so you can watch the map pack change as reviews come in; Keyword Tracker, which follows your search positions; and AI Visibility, which asks ChatGPT, Claude and Google's AI who they recommend in your town and shows whether you are named.

What it does not do: send you leads, vet you, build a website or run ads. It is the narrowest thing on this list, by design. For a wider look at review tools, see the best review automation tools for UK businesses.

How to choose

If your Google listing has a handful of reviews and the phone is quiet, start with the software. It is £69 a month, it runs from invoices you already send, and within a couple of months you will know whether more reviews and a better map position bring enquiries. Nothing else on this list is cheaper to test, and the reviews are yours whatever you do next.

If you want enquiries this month and can answer the phone, pick a lead source by the way it charges. No contract and small jobs: MyBuilder or Bark, with a tally of cost per won job. Volume and a year's commitment: Checkatrade. A flat fee and a badge: TrustATrader if a place is free, Which? Trusted Traders for higher-value work. Exclusive paid search with a published price: Digitool. Everything managed: Yell, after reading the one-star reviews.

Whichever you choose, the reviews are the common thread, because a homeowner who finds you on any of these platforms reads your Google reviews next. Try Growth Bull free for seven days at growthbull.io/signup, or book a call with Tom and we will tell you honestly whether you need a directory at all.