When looking at your homepage, the most important question to answer is, “Does this homepage meet my customers’ needs?” Your website may look great from a business perspective, but if your prospects and customers can’t easily navigate to the information they need, it’s wasted cyber real estate. Let’s examine three homepage mistakes contractors often make that can turn your site into a digital desert:
Cluttering the Homepage – The purpose of your homepage is to guide the customer to where they need to go on the site. It’s meant to welcome visitors and is influential in converting these visitors into customers. If your homepage is littered with unnecessary text and graphics, then you drift further and further away from your customers’ needs – and the ultimate sale.
Overselling Products and Services – Prospects and customers come to your site for one reason: they have a contracting need. Your homepage is not the place to push products and services; it’s the place to demonstrate benefits to the consumer. The benefits draw visitors in to the products and services that fit their needs, leading to sales copy, and ultimately a call or appointment.
Talking “at” your customers – Make sure that your homepage talks “to” your customers and not “at” them. They don’t care about technical jargon and most won’t understand it. You have to assume that visitors to your homepage are starting at ground zero in terms of working knowledge of their various plumbing, electrical and HVAC home comfort systems. If they can’t understand your webpage, then they’ll look for another one they can. The main thing customers want to know is, “What’s in it for me?”
When you put your customers’ needs at the forefront of your homepage, then you should see an increase in traffic, which ultimately leads to more sales.