Jetty Hop
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How we rank listings

Plain answers to two questions: in what order do things appear in the guide, and what can a business pay for? Safety, mooring and navigation information never depends on payment.

In short

  • Stops follow the water, not popularity.
  • Search ranks results by how well they match your words. Paying never moves a result up.
  • A paid listing may come first among businesses of its kind at a stop, and it is always labelled “Ad · Sponsored”.
  • Nothing paid ever appears above safety, mooring or navigation information.
  • Blocks labelled “Our marketplace” show buz.ie, the boat marketplace run by the same team as Jetty Hop. Nobody can pay for a place in them.

How each list is ordered

Wherever the guide shows a list, this is what decides the order.

  • Waterways

    Order
    A fixed geographical order: the Shannon from south to north, then the Erne, the canals and the other lakes.
    Payment
    Payment has no influence.

  • Stops on a waterway

    Order
    Route order along the water, the way you meet them on a trip.
    Payment
    Payment has no influence.

  • Moorings at a stop

    Order
    Every mooring we know of, in the order we recorded it, each with who may berth there.
    Payment
    Payment has no influence. Mooring facts are never for sale.

  • Businesses at a stop

    Order
    Grouped by kind (food and drink, things to do, services) and shown after the moorings. Within each group a featured listing comes first, then the others from A to Z.
    Payment
    A featured listing may come first in its group, always labelled “Ad · Sponsored”.

  • Search results

    Order
    How well the result matches your words, then the kind of result, with a small boost for the waterway you are looking at.
    Payment
    Payment never ranks a result higher. Paid listings are labelled in the result itself.

  • The map

    Order
    Every stop and listing we have, drawn the same way.
    Payment
    A paid listing gets no bigger pin; its card carries the label.

  • Events

    Order
    By date, soonest first.
    Payment
    A paid event is labelled “Ad · Sponsored” and keeps its place in the date order.

  • Hire companies

    Order
    From A to Z by name.
    Payment
    A paid company is labelled; the order does not change.

  • Trip planner

    Order
    Overnight stops are chosen only from public moorings and moorings that welcome visitors.
    Payment
    Payment has no influence on the plan.

  • Ready-made trips

    Order
    Written and ordered by our editors, by waterway.
    Payment
    Payment has no influence.

  • Boats for sale (buz.ie)

    Order
    Newest first, with sellers taking turns, so that one dealer cannot fill a block. A block that shows more than one kind starts with the newest of each kind, in this order: motor boats, RIBs, small boats, kayaks and canoes, outboard engines, parts. Then every seller gets a turn: each one’s newest listing, newest first, then each one’s next, and so on. On a waterway page, the listings from the counties along it come first, in the same order, then the rest of Ireland.
    Payment
    Not paid placement: buz.ie is our own marketplace, and every block says so. Featuring or promoting an ad on buz.ie changes nothing in this order.

The main parameters, and how much they count

Two lists mix listings from different businesses: the businesses at a stop, and the search results. These are their parameters, from the most to the least important.

Businesses at a stop

  1. The kind of business. It decides the group: food and drink, things to do, services.

  2. A featured (paid) listing. It decides the first place within the group, and is always labelled.

  3. The name, from A to Z. It decides the order of all the others.

  1. Searches about buying or selling a boat, an engine, a kayak or parts (“boat for sale”, “kayak”) list buz.ie first, our marketplace run by the same team and labelled “Our marketplace”, then our boats-for-sale page. It is our own link, not a paid one.

  2. How well the result matches your words. The name counts most, then other names, then the kind, the place and the services.

  3. The kind of result. Waterways and stops come before businesses when the match is equally good.

  4. The waterway you are looking at. Results on it get a small boost.

  5. The length of the name. A shorter name comes first when everything else is equal.

Payment is not a parameter of search.

What the law asks, in plain language

Consumer Protection Act 2007, section 46(3A)

Where you can search or compare listings from different businesses, we must tell you the main things that decide the order, and how much each one counts. This page does that, and the label on every paid listing links here.

Consumer Protection Act 2007, section 55(1)(qa)

Search results must clearly show any paid advertisement, and any payment made to rank higher. Our paid listings say “Ad · Sponsored” in the result itself, and payment never ranks a result higher.

Consumer Protection Act 2007, section 55(1)(q)

Editorial content that a business has paid for must be clearly marked as paid. A description we write for a paying business carries the same label.

Sections 46(3A) and 55(1)(qa) were added by the Consumer Rights Act 2022. In Northern Ireland, UK consumer law also requires advertising to be obviously identifiable, and we use the same labels there. This is our plain-language summary, not legal advice.

What paid placement can do

  • Show a larger card with an offer for boat crews
  • Come first among businesses of the same kind at a stop
  • Highlight events in the calendar
  • Add a booking link marked “Partner link”

What it can never do

  • Appear above safety, mooring or navigation information
  • Change or hide mooring facts, access, prices or services
  • Change lock and bridge times, warnings or notices
  • Rank higher in search
  • Influence the trip planner’s overnight stops
  • Buy a review, a rating or a badge, or remove a competitor
  • Put the free offline maps behind a payment

Our marketplace

Our marketplace: buz.ie

Jetty Hop and buz.ie are run by the same team. The blocks of boats, engines and parts for sale labelled “Our marketplace” promote our own marketplace. No seller or dealer pays us to appear in them, so they are not labelled “Ad · Sponsored”; the label is there so that you always know whose they are.

Boats for sale

  • Whether a seller has a free or a paid buz.ie account, or promotes an ad, makes no difference to whether or where a listing appears on Jetty Hop.
  • They never appear on the map, and never above safety, mooring or navigation information.
  • Sellers publish the listings and photos on buz.ie. We do not check them: see a boat before you pay.
  • We show no seller’s personal details, and nothing about you goes to buz.ie unless you follow a link.
  • Links to buz.ie open in a new tab and tell buz.ie which part of the guide you came from.

The labels, explained

The small labels you meet across the guide, and what each one tells you.

A business paid for this placement. “Why am I seeing this?” leads to this page.
Book onlinePartner link
We may earn a commission if you book through this link. It opens the company’s own website, and search engines are told that it is a paid link.
Illustration
A drawing made for the guide, never a photo of the place.
Not yet checked
We have not yet confirmed this on site. Call ahead.
Private · not yet checked
A private marina or club whose rules for visiting boats we have not yet checked. Call ahead and never assume you can berth.
Desk research, not yet checked on site
Taken from public sources: we have not been there yet to check.
Automatically translated, not yet reviewed.
Translated automatically and not yet reviewed by a native speaker.
Our marketplace
Our own marketplace, buz.ie, run by the same team as Jetty Hop. Not paid placement, and never hidden.

Questions or a complaint?

If you think a listing is wrong, or a paid placement is not labelled as it should be, tell us with the report form.

Running a business by the water? Our offer is on the page for businesses.

Report a change For businesses

Last updated 23 Oct 2026