How the order is decided
Most directories won't tell you why a business is first. Here is our exact formula, why it exists, and the one thing that is structurally excluded from it: money.
The problem the formula solves
Of the businesses in this directory with at least one Google review, 56.6% are rated exactly 5.0 — the full distribution is published on the rating-inflation page. That is not a directory of perfect tradespeople — it is what happens when most reviews come from a handful of happy customers. A five-star rating from 3 reviews and one from 300 are not the same evidence, so sorting by stars alone would order your options roughly at random.
The formula, in full
score = log10(1 + review_count) × min(1, rating ÷ 5)
Review volume is the backbone — on a logarithmic curve, so 300 reviews beats 30, but not by ten times. Rating adjusts it, capped so nothing can score above its evidence. A business with zero reviews always ranks below anyone who has been judged at all. A 4.7 from 123 people outranks a 5.0 from 2 — because it is the better bet, and we'd rather be useful than flattering.
The inputs are Google's rating and review count, displayed unaltered on every listing beside the result — so you can check the order yourself. That is the test of a published formula: you can recompute it.
What is excluded: payment
Paying Domifyr does not move a business up this ranking — not Featured, not lead spending, nothing. Featured listings appear in a separate, labelled position (“Featured · paid”, at most two per page) and are never mixed into the ranked order. This exclusion is structural, not policy: the ranking code has no input for payment to influence.
We publish this because it is the thing platforms in this category quietly reverse. A published formula with payment excluded is a commitment you can hold us to — any change to this page will be dated in the changelog on the pricing page.
Known limits, stated plainly
The formula cannot see review recency yet, and it cannot detect purchased Google reviews — no formula reliably can. It is a way of weighing the public evidence, not a guarantee about a business. For checks that actually protect you — statutory registers, insurance — see the verification page.