As we kick off a new year, it’s time for homebuilders to reassess their marketing strategies from the last 12 months and look for areas of improvement.
When it comes to looking for a marketing medium to put more resources toward, you can’t go wrong with opting to invest more on your website. When a potential client or customer first engages with your company, your website is often where that initial interaction occurs. And first impressions are everything.
To ensure that your website is set up to help bring you more clients for the new year, here are five things every website needs in 2020.
1. An Updated Design and User-Friendly Interface
Your site’s overall design, as well as how easy it is for users to navigate through, are both critical components to your website’s effectiveness. According to a recent Standford study, judgments on a company’s credibility are 75% based on the company’s website design.
A quick way to tell if your site needs a refresh is to look at it and simply ask yourself, does your website’s quality reflect the quality of the work that you and your team do? If the answer is no, then it may be time to update your site’s layout and overall design.
Depending on how savvy you are with web design, this may require working with a professional web designer. But it will be well worth it in the end.
2. A Blog to Engage Potential Customers
With the start of a new decade, now is the perfect time to start that blog you’ve been thinking about adding to your website. But what exactly are the benefits of blogging for your company?
First, blogging helps position you as an authoritative figure in the construction industry. By creating well-written, thorough blogs on the latest industry trends and techniques, as well as news involving your business, visitors to your website will acknowledge your expertise.
Second, blogging can also help with your search engine optimization (SEO), which will help your business be easier to find on search engines like Google.
3. SEO to Be Discovered on Google
SEO is difficult to describe in just a few paragraphs. But, that’s because there are many different strategies and tactics—like blogging—that you can take to improve your overall SEO.
However, the concept behind SEO is quite simple. Essentially, it’s an activity that attempts to improve search engine rankings. Your search engine ranking is whichever numbered position your website is listed on a search engine results page.
So, if you Googled “Minnesota homebuilder” or “Prior Lake home remodeler,” if your website is the first one on that results page, your ranking would be 1 for that specific keyword. A keyword is a word or phrase that your customers commonly search when seeking your service.
If you notice that your website isn’t ranking high enough on Google (in other words, not on the first page for your ‘money-making keywords’), then it’s time to put some more effort into your SEO.
In addition to blogging, SEO tactics include getting other high-quality websites to link back to you (otherwise known as backlinks), having well-written web copy with keywords, writing meta titles and descriptions for all your website’s pages, technical optimization, and much, much more.
4. Landing Pages for Your Key Services
Having landing pages for your key and most profitable services is a great way to help you bring in more clients.
Imagine one of your prospective customers is looking for a kitchen remodeler in the Twin Cities Metro Area. They might try searching “modern kitchen remodeler Twin Cities.”
If you offer remodeling services, then creating a dedicated landing page titled “Twin Cities Modern Kitchen Remodeler” will help ensure that they find you while searching for a remodeler. And don’t forget to add a contact form on your landing pages to help promote conversions!
5. A Thorough “About” Page
Having a detailed “About Us” page that covers the company owners and your team is a must for homebuilders. Your clients want to know that they can trust whoever is working on their homes, and being transparent and open about who you are is a great way to win them over.
This page should include these three things: An emotionally persuasive story, what truly differentiates your company from others like you, and a video that focuses on how your company is the guide that helps your clients reach their goals and become their true, ideal self—otherwise known as your “story brand” (check out Donald Miller’s book “Building a StoryBrand” for more insight into this powerful marketing framework).
WRITTEN BY BRYCE BOYLE HOBAN, HOOK AGENCY
As a content strategist and copywriter at Hook Agency, Bryce develops and delivers clear, relevant content that addresses the customer’s pain points. Using keyword research supplied by Hook’s SEO team, Bryce is focused on creating compelling copy to draw in high-quality prospects for clients that will also improve their search rankings.
