Independent web developer in the Geneva basin. I build and optimise the websites of the shops, tradespeople, practices and services of Saint-Julien and the French Genevois — a double market, French and Swiss, that has to be worked differently.
Saint-Julien-en-Genevois is the southern gateway to Geneva. The town and its neighbours — Archamps, Neydens, Beaumont, Viry, Valleiry, Collonges-sous-Salève — live to the rhythm of the border: a largely cross-border working population, sustained demographic growth, and a daily flow crossing customs in both directions.
For a local business that creates a particular situation. Your customers live in France but earn their living in Switzerland, compare prices on both sides, and search from a phone while queuing. And your competitors are not only the businesses of Saint-Julien: they are also those of Geneva, right next door.
It is a market where a well-built site pays off quickly, for a simple reason: few local businesses have worked that out. The town is growing faster than its online offering. In a number of trades, the first page of Google is occupied only by directories and two or three ageing sites.
Who for
The local economy is dominated by services and neighbourhood retail. Three families come up regularly.
Doctors, dentists, physiotherapists, osteopaths, lawyers, accountants. A large clientele that moves house often and picks a practitioner on Google in a few minutes. A complete listing, one page per speciality, online appointment booking: the trio that fills a diary.
Hairdressers, garages, driving schools, gyms, home services. Here everything turns on three pieces of information: where, when, how much. A site that gives them immediately on a phone beats a prettier site that hides them in a menu.
Property growth across the Genevois feeds constant demand for renovation, fitting-out and upkeep. The site is there to show real jobs and to cover, page by page, the towns you genuinely serve.
Local search around Saint-Julien has one particularity: the relevant area is not the town, it is the border corridor. Here is how I approach it.
Your customers come from Saint-Julien, but also from Archamps, Neydens, Beaumont, Viry, Valleiry, Collonges-sous-Salève and Feigères. Declaring a wide service area in the Google Business Profile, and genuinely naming those towns in the site content, widens the catchment without extra effort — provided you do it honestly, naming only the towns where you really work.
A French business will not appear in Swiss local results without an establishment in Switzerland: that is a Google rule, not a question of optimisation. But a cross-border commuter living in Saint-Julien searches from Saint-Julien, and that is where you have to be unbeatable. The effort that pays is local, not cross-border.
Frequently asked
Rarely. The cross-border workers of the French Genevois are overwhelmingly French-speaking: it is the population of Geneva itself that is strongly international, not that of Saint-Julien. French is enough in the vast majority of cases. English makes sense if you are explicitly targeting the international community settled on the Swiss side, which is a different project.
Nothing prevents it, and it is common across the basin. What differs from a French client are the VAT and invoicing rules, and that is a matter for your accountant rather than your developer. What I can do on the site side: display prices in both currencies, and provide a payment method accepted on both sides of the border.
The quote is drawn up line by line, according to the number of pages, what has to be written, and what has to be connected — appointment booking, payment, reservations. No vague package: you see what you are paying for and why, and you can take a line out. The quote is free and you are committed to nothing until you have signed it.
Elsewhere in the region
Annemasse sits at the centre of the basin. I cover the French Genevois, the Chablais, the Arve valley, Annecy and the canton of Geneva.
