Devstars

Devstars Custom web software and digital growth consultancy. Jersey & London. The team at Devstars has a wealth of web industry experience.

We build bespoke platforms, optimise for AI-era search (GEO), and provide fractional CMO direction. 20+ years, clients include Heathrow, MoD, and Dash Rides. Over the years we have grown steadily and during this time nurtured a competent group of highly skilled web developers. We like to get involved from conception to completion and put as much emphasis on our consultancy and management as we do on the actual build and aftercare. As well as working directly for clients like Royal Academy of Music, Timberland and Cutler and Gross, we increasingly provide programming support for graphic design agencies, advertising agencies and even other web designers. We value our growing and successful list of long-term clients and want to work with you.

When Headmasters came to us, their WordPress site was so overloaded with plugins it barely functioned. Slow, unstable, a...
01/10/2026

When Headmasters came to us, their WordPress site was so overloaded with plugins it barely functioned. Slow, unstable, and losing bookings by the day.

We stripped it back, built a lightweight bespoke site, then turned the whole search strategy toward the moment customers actually search "hairdressers near me".

Over eight years, that meant dominant local rankings across all 56 locations, 60% faster load times, and £6.7M turnover supported with an 18% profit increase alongside it.

Doing great work isn't enough if people can't find you at the moment they're ready to book.

A huge thank you to the Headmasters team for eight years of trust and hard work together.

If you'd like to talk through your own site's visibility, get in touch, we're always happy to have a proper chat.

The code looks right. Systems have to stay right at scale.We've built queue-timing for Heathrow (ran 10 years), turned G...
29/09/2026

The code looks right. Systems have to stay right at scale.

We've built queue-timing for Heathrow (ran 10 years), turned G4S from four-week-old PDFs into real-time intelligence, and connected Shopify, payroll and stock feeds for Dash.

Try prompting that. You'll get something that looks like it works until a Shopify variant won't reconcile with a payroll calendar, or the architecture won't scale, or real-world pressure breaks it.

AI accelerates the code. But the hard parts — understanding what the system actually needs to deliver, the architectural decisions that determine whether something scales — those still need experienced people.

If you've got a problem that doesn't fit existing tools, that's the conversation worth having. Drop us a line.

Most agencies are treating GEO like a checkbox.Schema. Blog posts rewritten. ChatGPT mentions monitored. Report back: "G...
25/09/2026

Most agencies are treating GEO like a checkbox.

Schema. Blog posts rewritten. ChatGPT mentions monitored. Report back: "GEO implemented." The reality is that's not a strategy.

58–65% of Google searches now end without a click. AI Overviews are on 30%+ of queries. If your strategy doesn't account for people researching in AI tools and buying on websites, you're optimising for yesterday.

A real visibility system has five layers. Structured authority. Citation architecture. AI-ready content. Multi-platform presence. Measurement that matters.

We've refined our process with auto dealerships, hair salons and realtors, and clients are now asking, "What if we increased your budget?"

In 30 years, we've never heard that on organic.

The proof is in the sales, when the phone rings and the right people are calling
🔗 https://www.devstars.com/blog/geo-strategies/

The map pack is where it happens.42% of local searchers click the map pack. That's where the conversion actually happens...
22/09/2026

The map pack is where it happens.

42% of local searchers click the map pack. That's where the conversion actually happens. They don't visit your website. They call you. Get directions. Become a customer.

We've been building this for 56 salons, storage facilities, and dealerships across the South West.

Our real results:

Giant Storage. Frome profile generating more than a third of their traffic with a 75% engagement rate. Higher quality than organic search or paid ads.

Headmasters, 56 salons. Built them to rank "hairdresser near me" in the exact areas where the salons sit.

South Coast Powersports. Brand new dealership, brand new domain. Nothing to start with. Ranked 24 keywords top-10 in 60 days.

Consistent business name and address everywhere. Location pages on your site, regular photos and reviews. Unglamorous work. Pretty damn effective.

Read the full article or give us a call. We'll sort this out for you properly.

🔗 https://www.devstars.com/blog/does-a-google-business-profile-help-seo/

Do you still need a website in 2026? 🤔It's a fair question when fewer people click through to websites than at any point...
16/09/2026

Do you still need a website in 2026? 🤔

It's a fair question when fewer people click through to websites than at any point in the last 20 years. After three decades building them, here's the honest answer.

Social platforms are rented space, Meta's own data shows 97.8% of Facebook feed views now include no link out at all. Your website is the one thing you actually own, and it's what AI tools pull from when deciding who to recommend to your customers.

• Visitors from AI tools now convert 42% better
• Slow sites get up to 18x fewer AI citations
• You've got about 10 seconds to make an impression

The website hasn't died. It's changed jobs, from traffic magnet to source of truth.

This is the shift we keep telling clients about.

The fake invoice trick still works. Official tone, tight deadline, real-sounding threat. People pay it anyway. But here’...
14/09/2026

The fake invoice trick still works. Official tone, tight deadline, real-sounding threat. People pay it anyway.

But here’s what’s coming next.

Cloning a voice takes minutes of audio these days, not a studio. So, if you've ever recorded a video for your business, the raw material already exists.

In August 2026, Google, Microsoft and 100+ other companies signed an open letter warning AI's about to make cyber attacks far more widespread. The weaknesses they named describe most small businesses, not just the big targets.

We wrote up ten habits that shut most of that down. Long unique passwords, two-factor authentication starting with your domain, a locked domain, tested backups.

None of it is clever. That's exactly why it works.

🔗 www.devstars.com/blog/small-business-cyber-security/

TideSense, a a few months on 🌊I built a beach safety forecast for Jersey on the weekend, and a month later it's still gr...
11/09/2026

TideSense, a a few months on 🌊

I built a beach safety forecast for Jersey on the weekend, and a month later it's still growing.

It blends live weather, tide and swell data with the actual shape of the island, so it knows where the cliffs shelter you and where they bounce the wind straight back.

There's a water quality layer too, flagging the day after heavy rainfall.

The bit we're proudest of, it's built on open, publicly funded data. Stitched together for one job. Helping people use the ocean here, safely.

Simple on the surface, detailed underneath.

We love building things like this. Got an idea for your own business? Drop us a line.

Try TideSense: https://www.tidesense.co.uk/

I was a bit shocked, if I'm honest.Cloudflare now sees more than half of web page visits coming from bots rather than pe...
11/09/2026

I was a bit shocked, if I'm honest.

Cloudflare now sees more than half of web page visits coming from bots rather than people. 59.1% worldwide.

Thirty years building websites, all of it about human behaviour. How people read, what they click, how long they'll wait. And now the majority reader has no eyes.

But my first reaction was wrong.

An AI agent reading your site isn't the end of the line. It's reading for somebody who asked it a question. So you're still marketing to a person. You're just reaching them through something that reads differently.

Not really new, that. A journalist writing about you is an intermediary. A directory listing is an intermediary. This one just reads faster and takes everything literally.

Three months to 7 September, web pages only:

• North America 69.7%
• Europe 60.8%
• Worldwide 59.1%
• UK 41.2%
• Jersey 28.6%

Forty points between top and bottom, so be careful quoting a global figure locally.

What it means: build for humans and machines at once. The overlap is bigger than people assume. Clear structure, short paragraphs, a direct answer near the top. Helps a person skim, helps an agent extract.

The real difference is that humans infer and machines don't.

Do you still need a website in 2026? 🤔Fewer clicks are reaching websites than ever before, and it's a fair question to a...
10/08/2026

Do you still need a website in 2026? 🤔

Fewer clicks are reaching websites than ever before, and it's a fair question to ask. So we went looking for honest answers, backed by numbers you can check.

The short version: the website hasn't died, it's changed jobs. It used to be a traffic magnet. Now it's your source of truth and your conversion point.

68% of Google searches end without a click these days. But visitors who do arrive from AI tools convert 42% better than they did a year ago. Fewer visitors, better ones.

And speed matters more than ever, not just for people but for the AI crawlers deciding whether to quote you at all. A slow site can mean up to 18 times fewer citations.

Your social posts are rented space. Your website is the one thing you own outright.

More on this soon.

Address

Ground Floor, Digital Hub, Forum 4, Block 3 Grenville Street
London
JE24UF

Opening Hours

Monday 9am - 6pm
Tuesday 9am - 6pm
Wednesday 9am - 6pm
Thursday 9am - 6pm
Friday 9am - 6pm

Telephone

+442088983993

Website

Alerts

Be the first to know and let us send you an email when Devstars posts news and promotions. Your email address will not be used for any other purpose, and you can unsubscribe at any time.

Contact The Business

Send a message to Devstars:

Shortcuts

Share

Category