The 12 Fundamentals For Creating a Successful Website

The 12 Fundamentals For Creating a Successful Website

1 2 1.Telephone Number Your phone number should appear number a simple instruction like call large and bold in the top right hand now can make all the difference. corner of every page. Make sure it is Landline phone numbers demonstrate part of the header template so that more trust than mobiles so always use your visitors never have to search for a landline where possible. Depending it. Don't make them click on a link that on the size of company you are trying says 'contact us' to find out your to portray, a 1800 or a 1300 number contact number. It should be easy to will increase the trust level of your find and prominent wherever they are website. on your website so that they can pick up the phone at any time and contact you. Studies show that enquiries are significantly increased when you tell your visitors what to do. So just above or below your phone 2

2.Marketing Hook When a visitor lands on your website you have 6 seconds to grab their attention. After that, they are off to your competitor s site. Reducing the bounce rate (the percentage of visitors who leave after viewing a single page) is crucial for your conversion rate but it also helps your ranking in the search engines as Google uses your bounce rate as a factor in it s algorithms. To grab a visitor s attention we use a Marketing Hook. A Marketing Hook has 4 components: 1.Speak To Your Target Market 2.Identify Their Situation 3.Proclaim A New Idea 4.Make A Promise For example, you could say, professional couples who are time poor are watching their new home being built without having to visit the site every week thanks to revolutionary new software that keeps builders and clients on the same page and eliminates 100% of selections mistakes. Target Market - Professional Couples Situation - Looking To Build A New Home but are time poor New Idea - Communication Software that keeps clients & builders in touch (www.co-construct.com) Promise - There will be no selections mistakes When a visitor lands on your website you have 6 seconds to grab their attention! 3

3.Lead Magnet Let s be clear, contact us forms on a website do not work. To generate enquiries from a website you have to give your visitors a reason to contact you. To achieve this we use a lead magnet. A lead magnet is a guide/report/template, checklist or anything that delivers value to your target market, can be consumed in under 10 minutes and can be given away for free (but has a high perceived value to the recipient.) Your offer (Lead Magnet) must be able to grab the attention of a website visitor within 6 seconds and compel them to submit their email address in return for your free guide. Try experimenting with different lead magnets to see what works best for your business. You can even employ multiple Lead Magnets on your site such as a free guide The 7 Secrets other builders don't want you to know!" and then Click Here To Download A Price List 4

4.Images 5 The images on your site need to be large. Critically you can't use images that have been taken with your phone. Get a professional in! If you aren't prepared to do that, buy some stock images that best represent what you do and use them. It is a crucial component that the imagery is high quality and large. Also, ensure the Alt tags on your images contain the keywords you are chasing as this will assist with your SEO strategy. Include Lifestyle shots rather than just before and after images. Use stock images that depict these benefits and display them all through your website to create an emotional connection. People buy based on benefits not features. What is the benefit of a new home? The swimming pool, the family BBQ s, the modern new kitchen making cooking a pleasure, the outdoor seating area where you can catch up with friends over a glass of chilled white wine? Use stock images that depict these benefits and display them all through your website to create an emotional connection.

5. Contact Us Page Although no one fills in a Contact Us form, the Contact Us page is used for credibility. Google, in effect, is the new yellow pages for someone wanting to check out your company. Instead of seeing if you are listed in the yellow pages, they will now Google you and make sure you have a website. Once you've got a website, the next thing that they're going to check these few things: Landline Phone Number. This gives Assurance - its not crucial. A mobile is better than nothing but a landline or a 1300 number certainly instills a lot more confidence. Domain Email Address. Gmail, Bigpond, Live, Hotmail etc. These are all free accounts that give you no credibility as a business. Not just on your website but on your business cards too, you must have an email address with the same domain as your website. e.g. Joe@yourcompanyname.com.au. Avoid using a role and domain (i.e. sales@yourcompanyname.com.au) Physical Company Address. A PO Box is better than nothing but to get complete credibility a valid street address, even if it is a home office, will add a lot of value to your credibility. An Image of Your Premises. This again adds to the credibility factor. If you work from home or don't have an image of your premises then an image of your team in uniform will also suffice, again we are looking to give tangible evidence that you are a reputable company. The Contact Us page has recently become important to Google as well. A recent press release by Google suggests it will now be part of the algorithm that determines your position in their search results. 6

6.About Us Page Again, Google have indicated this page will also be considered important when it comes to Search Engine results but it is also important for creditability. when you are not building? Add a picture, a phone number, and your builders licence number, anything to make it personal and create a connection. Remember, people buy from people so this is a great opportunity to tell your prospects all about you. Make it personal. Why did you start building? How did you get started? What have you achieved? What do you do 7

7.Frequently Asked Questions Think about all the (stupid?) questions you get asked, jot them down then FAQ s select 6-10 of the most common or most interesting questions. Answer them in full and post them on your website, simple as that. This is a great resource for visitors to your website and also a great time saver when dealing with questions in the future. Simply copy the answer from your website, paste it into an email and send it to your prospect while also directing them to your FAQ page in case they have any other questions. 8

8.Authority The Internet is a scary place, full of scammers, hackers and cowboy builders. To eliminate fear we tap into borrowed authority. Use the logos from any organisations you are a member of. Master Builders, HIA, The Association Of Professional Builders. Anything at all, use the logo to use the trust built up by another organisation to your own advantage. Also include details of any awards that have been won, your builder s licence (Be careful when using government logos though). Authority should appear all over your website so consider using logo s in the header and footer. 9

9.Plan Range Custom Builder? Don t need one? Yes you do. Custom Home Builders, renovation companies, projects homebuilders. It does not matter; every building company needs a plan range. You may never build a home from your plan range, but this is where your visitors will spend 80% of their time. Think about it, when you go to meet a prospect onsite for the first time, what do you do? You pull out plans and show them to the prospect right? Well, it s the same when they arrive on your website, they are looking for ideas, inspiration. Don t disappoint them or they will go to your competition. 10

10.Request A. This should be top dead centre of your home page. It s a bit like those impulse buy s at the supermarket. A quick click, they enter their name, email and phone number and submit. Experiment with different calls to action. Request a Call, Request a Site Visit, Request A Price List. See which one works for you. The name of the game is conversion, the number of visitors that convert to an enquiry. This little known tactic has the power to DOUBLE your conversion rate that in effect halves the cost of acquisition. Don t ignore it! This is also a good time to mention the 2 steps opt in process. A 2 step opt in does not display the required the data fields (name & email) on the offer page, they only appear once the call to action link is clicked. For instance, maybe you have a big call to action that says Click Here to Request A Site Meeting. Once they click the link a pop up box appears for the user to enter their name and email (and any other information you are requesting). 2 step opt in's convert over 30% higher than traditional one step opt in's so do not ignore them. This little known tactic to DOUBLE your conversion rate 11

11.Client Testimonials This is another page that helps to build trust. Establish a strategy and make sure you are gathering testimonials from every client. Establish a process for adding these testimonials to your website and make sure you include video (where possible), photo s, name and location. Happy clients are more than willing to provide a testimonial so, do not be shy! Also consider a strategy for obtaining reviews through Google Plus, as this will positively affect your SEO efforts. 12

12.Google Analytics You must have a way of tracking the stats on your website. How many visitors, where did they come from, what did they look at, how long did they stay and what is your bounce rate? These questions and literally a thousand others can all be answered by simply installing the Google Analytics tracking code on your website. With Google Analytics you can also create a remarketing list, which is a list of all your visitors, and advertise to them very cheaply on the Google Display Network. This could be the most cost effective advertising available to you. 13

And here is an extra bonus for you, 13.Traffic Once your website is optimised and you have your analytics reporting in place you are ready to scale up your traffic. This is the easy part as there are so many opportunities to get visitors to your site. However, forget the free traffic strategies like SEO, at least for now anyway. SEO is hugely expensive for builders and not something that should be attempted without first establishing the keywords that are profitable and secondly establishing a budget per click. This is the amount you can afford to spend getting visitors to your site. So, if you convert 50% of your quotes into a contract that on average makes you 14 $10k net profit and it takes 10 enquires to produce a qualified lead that you are prepared to quote for, the only remaining question is how many website visitors do you need to produce each enquiry. If the answer is 50 then we can calculate the value of each visitor to our website. 1x2x10x50=1,000 So, for every 1,000 visitors we produce $10,000 in net profit therefore we can afford to pay up to $10 per visitor and still break even. If we pay $1 per click to Google for traffic we are making $9 on every visitor. Armed with this information you can now advertise on Google Adwords, Google Remarketing, Facebook or anywhere else you like. You can even pay an SEO company to improve your ranking in the search engines because you now that a top 3 position in Google will equate to xx of visitors which means you will produce a sale every xx months just from SEO! I hope you found this guide of interest and that it helps you to optimise your website for conversion and you create a Lead Generation Monster. More information on the Marketing process can be found at www.acristraining.com

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