An orthodontic website has one job that a general business site does not: it has to turn a parent comparing three practices into a booked consultation, usually on a phone, usually in the evening, often before anyone has spoken to your front desk. That makes the design brief unusually concrete. Load speed, a booking path that works on a small screen, honest treatment pages, and photography of your actual practice do more for case starts than any visual trend. This page sets out what to specify, what is regulated when you advertise treatment, and how to check a designer's previous work rather than trusting a portfolio thumbnail.
What the site has to do before it has to look good
Start with the booking path and work backwards. A parent lands on a treatment page from a search, wants to know roughly what is involved and how to start, and either books or leaves. Every element between those two points should be defended: a form that asks for a phone number and little else, a click to call that works, appointment times that reflect reality, and a confirmation the practice actually acts on. Google publishes Core Web Vitals as its measurement of that experience, covering loading, interaction responsiveness and layout stability, and a design that fails them on a mid range phone will lose enquiries no matter how it renders on the designer's monitor. Ask for the vitals report on the designer's last three builds, on mobile, not desktop.
Accessibility is a design requirement, not an add on
A practice website is part of how a healthcare business serves the public, and the Department of Justice publishes guidance on web accessibility for state and local government and for businesses open to the public. The practical implications are ordinary design decisions made properly: text that meets contrast requirements, forms with labels a screen reader can announce, video captions, and a site that can be operated with a keyboard alone. Ask whether accessibility is in the scope of work or the exclusions list, because retrofitting it after launch costs more than building it in. An overlay widget bolted onto a finished site is not the same thing as a site that was built to be usable, and it is worth asking a designer to say which one they are offering.
The claims on your treatment pages are advertising
Copy describing outcomes, timelines and comfort is advertising, and it carries the same evidence burden as any other advertisement. The FTC advertising guidance for small business is blunt about the standard: claims must be truthful, not misleading, and supported by evidence before they are made, and that applies to the pictures as much as the sentences. Before and after photography should be your own patients, with consent, not stock or supplier images, and treatment time ranges should reflect your own case mix. Patient testimonials carry their own rules around typical results and disclosed connections. Give the designer approved copy and approved photography rather than letting placeholder marketing language survive into launch, which is where most problems on dental sites originate.
How to check a designer before you commit
Ask for three live sites they built for practices, then look at them the way a parent would: open each on a phone, time the load, complete a booking form, and see what happens. Ask who wrote the content, because a designer who subcontracts copy to a general writer will produce treatment pages that read like every other practice in your city. Ask what platform the site will be built on and confirm you own the domain, the hosting account and the content. Then ask what happens after launch, since design and search visibility are usually bought together as a combined web design and SEO service, and a beautiful site nobody finds is a slow way to spend a marketing budget. Get the post launch arrangement in writing before the build starts.
Questions people ask about orthodontist web design
Should an orthodontic practice use a template or a custom build?
A well configured template with your own photography and your own treatment copy beats a custom build with generic content, and it costs far less. Custom work earns its price when you need an unusual booking flow, integration with a practice management system, or a multi location structure that a template cannot express cleanly.
How many pages does a practice site really need?
One strong page per treatment you want cases for, one per location, a team page, a fees or financing page and a contact page will outperform a forty page site of thin content. Google's guidance on helpful content is that pages should be written for people who need the information, so add a page only when there is something specific to say on it.
Who should own the website when the relationship ends?
You should. Register the domain in the practice name, hold the hosting and analytics accounts yourself, and make sure the contract says the finished site and its content transfer to you. Ask specifically whether the design is portable or locked to the vendor's proprietary platform, since that answer decides how expensive it is to leave.
Can we publish before and after photos of patients?
Only with documented patient consent, and the images should be your own clinical results. Treat the surrounding copy as an advertising claim: the FTC expects claims and the impressions they create to be truthful and supported. Avoid presenting an unusually good outcome in a way that suggests it is typical.