Who I am
I'm Jarred. Studio O'Brien is a one-person web design practice based in Shelby, North Carolina — and it's deliberately just me. When a business hires me, the person who plans the site is the same person who writes it, designs it, builds it, and picks up the phone. No account managers, no offshore handoff, no agency layer marking up someone else's work.
I've been building custom sites since 2014 for restaurants, shops, studios, and trades across Cleveland County and the wider Carolinas. Over those years I've watched what actually moves the needle for a small business online — and, just as often, what quietly wastes their money. That's what this blog is for.
Why I write this blog
Most small-business web advice is either vague agency filler or SEO copy written to rank, not to help. I started The Field Guide because the owners I work with kept asking the same sharp questions — does my Google profile really matter? is my slow site costing me sales? are these ADA lawsuit emails real? — and deserved straight answers with the numbers attached.
So every article here starts from a real question and gets backed by cited data. When I write that GBP signals control 32% of your local pack ranking, there's a source on that number. When I'm giving you my own read rather than a study, I say so. You can see exactly how each piece is researched and checked on the editorial standards page.
What I actually know
The topics I write about are the ones I do hands-on, week in and week out:
- Local SEO & Google Business Profile — category selection, review strategy, and getting found in the Map Pack in small markets.
- Web design & performance — Core Web Vitals, page speed, mobile experience, and redesigns that actually convert.
- Technical SEO & compliance — site migrations, structured data, and ADA/WCAG accessibility.
- Conversion — turning traffic a business already has into phone calls and form fills.
Work with me
If you run an independent business and your website isn't pulling its weight, that's the whole job. You can start a project, get a no-email cost estimate, or just email me a question. I answer my own inbox.