A good menu does not list every page on your website. It helps visitors reach the information that matters. For a business website, that means understanding what you offer, finding relevant details and knowing how to get in touch. This guide explains how to organise WordPress menus, from selecting pages to checking navigation on desktop and mobile.
Choose pages around your visitors’ questions
Before editing your main menu, write down what someone visiting your website for the first time needs to know. Their questions are usually straightforward: what services do you offer, who do you work with, what experience do you have and how can they request a quote? Your website navigation should reflect those needs, rather than the order in which you published your pages.
For a furniture workshop, a useful starting point might be „Services”, „Projects”, „About us” and „Contact”. A page about materials can be linked from the relevant service pages, while administrative information can sit in the footer. Not every page needs a place in the header.
- Keep destinations that matter to most visitors in the main menu.
- Link to detailed pages from relevant overview pages.
- Move secondary information and administrative links to the footer.
- Use your logo as a link to the homepage and check that it leads to the right destination.
If your website has only a few pages, a simple structure is enough. Avoid creating empty categories just to make the menu look more substantial.
Use clear labels and a consistent order
A menu label should explain its destination before someone selects it. „Services” is easier to interpret than „What we can do for you”, while „Projects” may work better than a creative title that gives no indication of the page’s content. Clarity matters more than originality here.
Your menu label can be shorter than the page title. For example, a page called „Accounting services for small businesses” could appear as „Accounting” in the navigation, provided that the meaning remains clear in context.
- Avoid long labels that wrap onto several lines.
- Do not use different names for the same destination across your main navigation menus.
- Choose a logical order: your offering, examples of your work, information about the business and contact details.
- If you highlight an action, use specific wording such as „Request a quote”.
Resist the temptation to make every item a prominent button. When „Services”, „Projects” and „Contact” all demand equal visual attention, visitors may find it harder to recognise the action you want to prioritise.
Organise submenus without hiding important information
Submenus are useful when they group related pages. Under „Services”, for instance, you could place „Interior design”, „Furniture design” and „Installation”. This grouping makes sense because every item answers the same question: what can the business do for its customers?
For a business website, start by trying a single level of submenu. Deeper structures can become difficult to follow, particularly on small screens. If you offer many services, a well-organised overview page may be more useful than a series of menus opening to the side.
Decide how the parent item should work
An item such as „Services” can link to an overview page, with a separate control opening its submenu. Check how your theme handles that distinction. Visitors should be able both to read the overview and to expand the list of individual services.
Avoid makeshift links that jump to the top of the page simply to imitate a button. If an item exists only to expand a submenu, look for an implementation that treats it as a button rather than a link to a destination that does not really exist.
Build the structure in WordPress and check where it appears
The editing process depends on your active theme and the tools used to build your header. With a block theme, you may edit navigation through the Navigation block in the Site Editor. Many classic themes provide menu management under Appearance. A visual page builder may have its own header settings.
- Identify the menu actually displayed in your website’s header.
- Add your chosen pages and adjust their visible labels.
- Arrange the items and establish the relationships between parent items and subpages.
- Check that the menu is assigned to the correct display location, if your theme uses menu locations.
- Save your changes and open the website in a browser window where you are not logged in.
For example, if you edit a menu but the header stays the same, check that you changed the correct navigation and whether your theme uses a separate mobile header. If caching is in use, also check the version displayed after refreshing the relevant cache.
When you publish new pages, check whether they are added to the menu automatically. If that setting is enabled, your navigation can gradually fill up with pages you never deliberately selected.
Test the mobile menu with real tasks
A mobile menu is more than a narrower version of the desktop menu. Its options are often hidden behind a button, and submenus open with a tap. Check the experience on a real phone rather than relying solely on the editor’s preview.
Try a specific task: open the homepage, expand the menu, find a service and then navigate to the contact page. Notice whether the next action is obvious and whether you can easily return to the page content.
- Check that the menu toggle has an accessible name, such as „Open menu”.
- Make sure links can be tapped without accidentally activating neighbouring items.
- Open and close every submenu, including after rotating the phone.
- Check that a long menu can scroll and that its close button remains accessible.
- Look for cookie banners or fixed elements that cover menu options.
On desktop, test with a keyboard too. Move through the options using Tab, look for a visible focus indicator and check that you can activate each item. Submenus should not be accessible only by hovering a pointer over them.
Run a short check before publishing
After reorganising the navigation, test complete journeys rather than simply inspecting the header. For example, start on a project page, move to the related service and then find the contact form. Repeat that journey on desktop and mobile.
- Does every item lead to the page its label promises?
- Are any links pointing to deleted, unpublished or replaced pages?
- Can you identify the current page through something other than a subtle colour change?
- Does the header remain usable when you enlarge the text?
- Does the menu behave consistently across your important pages?
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Start with a manageable task: choose your essential destinations, write clear labels and test one complete journey on your phone. Add further menu items only when you can explain which visitor need each one addresses.
