Must-Haves for the Best Remodeling Websites

How can you tell highly successful remodeling websites from less successful ones? If you’re in the remodeling or home service contracting industry, you probably have no idea.

We can’t blame you. You simply don’t have the time to think about these details because you have a lot on your hands. You’re making sure payroll is kept, you manage your staff, and you’re making sure that your daily operations are taken care of.

Most importantly, you are focused on making your clients happy. You don’t have time for the fine details separating highly successful and high converting remodeling service website design and a mediocre online presence.

Regardless, this is one issue you cannot continue to ignore or overlook. If you have a website and you are treating it like an online business card, you are leaving a lot of money on the table. You really are.

How come? According to marketing research, 93% of all online business experiences start with a search on Google or other search engines. You have a problem on your hands if your prospective customers can’t find your company website through a simple search.

It doesn’t matter how long your website has been online. If your target customers can’t find it, it’s as if you didn’t put up a website at all.

 

 

If you want to make more money this year, you have to change how you view your website. At the very least, you must insist that it have the key elements that will help increase its visibility on search engines. Moreover, you should also pay attention to how well it converts online visitors into actual customers.

The good news? Changing your website from a mere online business card to an actual service booking source or conversion platform is not as hard as you think. At WebyGeeks, we can help optimize your website so it can attract more of the right eyeballs.

We have a dedicated team of professionals that have analyzed, optimized, and fine tuned and tested home remodeling and service contractor websites so they live up to their fullest conversion and customer booking potential.

Thanks to the collective experience of our professional search engine optimization team, we know why some websites in your industry do a better job booking customers than others.

To get a breakdown of the factors that play a major role in increasing remodeling website sales effectiveness, please read the tips below. We will walk you through some relatively easy to implement tips to help you level up your remodeling contractor company’s website as far as visibility and conversions go.

 

 

Remember This: Your Remodeling Website is Your Online Sales Rep

Please understand that your website is not a brochure, nor is it a business card. It doesn’t just tell the world that you have an address somewhere and that you perform certain services. Instead, you have to look at your website as an online sales representative or booking agent.

This means that when somebody ends up on your website, you have to make sure that this person is qualified. This person has to be actually looking for remodeling or home renovation services.

On top of that, your website has to have features that would enable qualified, eager and interested visitors to book an estimate with your company. This means you have to call them to action. This means you have to give them the information they need so they can make a decision.

A lot of companies don’t do this. They just put up a website that says basic generic information and leave it at that. Talk about a wasted opportunity.

Not only can your website open a sales prospect, it can also close the deal. It just has to have the right elements.

What Do the Most Effective Home Remodeling Websites Have in Common?

To cut to the chase, here are the 9 Key Features all successful home remodeling and home renovation service websites have in common.

 

 

They Load Quickly

If you want people to stick around to figure out what your company is all about, make sure that your page loads in 3 seconds or less. Average online consumers will quickly close a search tab or click the back button if the webpage they’re trying to visit doesn’t load in 3 seconds or less.

To make sure this happens, all the elements of your website design has to be fully optimized. Heavy loading features like interactive elements, photo galleries, and videos need to be set up properly on your webpage so they don’t slow down the browsers of people visiting your site.

If you set up a service portal where clients need to sign up and then log in to get in touch with your company’s designers, you have to make sure that all page processes load very quickly. Not only does website loading speed impact your customer’s perception of your site, page load speed is also a factor used by Google in ranking your website.

To test your current website load speed, CLICK HERE

 

 

Your Home Remodeling Website Must Be Optimized for Mobile Devices

The vast majority of online traffic is mobile traffic. More and more people are using mobile devices like smartphones and tablets to access the internet. Your website must look good regardless of the size of the device screen used to load it. This means special coding of your web pages.

In fact, Google has made it abundantly clear that it will prioritize mobile-friendly web designs when it comes to search engine ranking. You have to look at this for what it is: a penalty against websites that are not mobile-ready or mobile-friendly.

Secure Home Remodeling Websites Enjoy a Search Engine Ranking Advantage

When you get hosting services for your website, make sure you get an https address. This is very important because the information your users leave or interact with on your website may be compromised.

This is such a big concern for Google that it is actually giving a ranking advantage to websites with an https instead of an http address. Just making this simple switch with your hosting company can go a long way in your business getting a nice healthy boost in its search engine rankings.

 

 

Compelling Home Remodeling Website Designs Make All the Difference

Since you’re in the remodeling industry, you know full well that your customers are very visual in nature. They want you to walk your talk.

You can’t just advertise yourself as a remodeling company only to have a website that looks like it was designed in 1996. That’s not going to fly. You have to invest in up to date website design.

Not only should your color schemes be pleasing to the eye, but whatever images you put on your website must be automatically resized regardless of the screen size of the devices used by your customers to view your website

You must also use the right fonts so the readers of your content don’t get tired. You should also stay away from large, intimidating blocks of text that nobody wants to read.

You have to keep your eye on the ball as far as these design details go. You cannot afford to ignore these because they impact the overall reception of your design by your target audience.

On top of this, all your design must look good on mobile devices. That is non-negotiable. Just because your page looks awesome on a desktop, it doesn’t mean that it would look good when viewed on a mobile phone.

Make Sure You Have Your Vital Information Posted on your Home Remodeling website

You’d be surprised as to how many home remodeling companies fail to include their name, physical address, and phone number on their website. They just have a nice logo, some slick design elements, maybe a video, and that’s pretty much it.

That’s going to be a problem because businesses’ local search rankings on Google are directly affected by the presence and repetition of their name, address, phone number, and other contact information. This has to be properly formatted on your website.

And if you are posting this information on local directories, it should contain the same info as your site. Otherwise, you’re tripping up Google in ranking your website. You might end up with duplicate entries on Google, and this might lead to your site being penalized.

Also, there’s a practical effect to this. How can you expect people to pick up the phone and contact your business if you leave off your phone number or other crucial details?

Your Phone Number Must Be Front and Center

It’s really important to make your phone number as visible as possible. In fact, a lot of high performing home remodeling service websites put their phone number in plain old text at the upper right side of all their pages. It’s very hard to miss that detail.

Also, it is in plain website text. It is not an image. This way, search engines can easily pick it up, process it and rank it accordingly. Also, your customers are more likely to copy and paste it without a problem.

However you do it, make sure that your presentation of your phone number makes your prospective customers’ lives easier. If they have an easy time navigating your home remodeling service website, they have a higher chance of remembering you. This means that there’s a good chance that they will revisit your service website.

Feature an Easy to Understand “About Page”

Putting together a highly effective About Page for a home remodeling service website is not as easy as you think. You can’t use the same language as a Plumbing or HVAC contracting website. That’s not going to work. You have to look at the mindset of people who look for your type of service.

Unlike somebody needing a plumber in the middle of the night or an air-condition repair crew in the middle of a hot, summer day, there’s really no intense urgency to get in touch with your business. Usually, people think of remodeling when they have the budget for it. It is not exactly high priority.

Knowing this, you should set up your About Page as some sort of consumer guide. It helps prospective customers sort through questions in their minds so as to get them to feel more certain about getting your services.

Also, it’s a good idea to step them through an educational series where you explain otherwise convoluted, complicated or confusing details regarding the home remodeling process and the different types of projects that they may be interested in.

Finally, your About Page should highlight your qualifications. Remember, the “product” that you are advertising is your competence. Put it front and center. Show it, don’t say it.

It’s a good idea to include the following information in your About Page. First, spell out a list of the services your company offers. Break down each service into smaller sub-services so it becomes abundantly clear what these specific services are.

Instead of just saying you do kitchen remodeling, spell it out. Do you do sink designs, kitchen top designs, etc.?

List out your service experience. Be clear about how many years you’ve been in business. Itemize whatever certifications your business has, etc. Make a big deal of any rewards your business won.

Whether you got a small community award or a solid industry recognition, this is no time to be shy. Lay it all out. No award or accolade is too small.

Next, make things personal by including a picture of your crew. This must be your complete staff picture so people must be able to associate the things that you say in your About Page as well as the service descriptions from the rest of your site with flesh and blood human beings. A staff picture goes a long way in communicating this.

Finally, make room for testimonials. Put abbreviated versions of testimonials on your About Page and then link it to a standalone page jampacked with testimonials and personal stories of people who have actually used your service.

Invest in High Quality Photos

Remember, you are in the home remodeling business. This is a very visual business. Your website can’t just feature generic stock photos involving business. You have to show actual before and after pictures.

Walk the visitor through the process of remodeling. Remember, they are not happy with the way their homes look now, so “prove” to them, through your pictures, that you have the skills, design philosophy and experience needed to give them the results that they are looking for.

Put as many pictures on your website, but optimize them so they don’t slow down your page. Set up your website in such a way that there are enough pictures on a page, but the page itself is not too heavy.

Also, to maximize visibility on Google, use ALT tags that target your search engine keywords. This way, people can pull up your remodeling website service pictures when doing Google Image searches.

Whatever you do, your portfolio must stand out. It must highlight the past work you’ve done, the wide range of services you provide, and key parts of your service process.

 

 

Put Up a Blog

A lot of business owners think that blogging takes too much effort and time. You might want to reconsider. Blogging is actually a very potent marketing method for home remodeling websites.

Your website can only go so far in telling the story of your past projects. When you keep a blog, you can pack a lot of important details on a case by case basis.

Your blog is essentially a collection of your service case studies. It tracks your service calls. You tell a story regarding the initial ideas of the customer, and how you work with your client from concept to execution. Best of all, you show before pictures of the work site, and then you highlight what the work site looks like after the remodeling process.

Blogging enables your remodeling site to get many bites at the apple. You don’t really know what kind of specific keywords your potential customers will use to search for your service. They may be using completely different keywords. When you post a blog, your blog posts can be retrieved using a wide range of keyword combinations, and this can lead to more visibility.

The more traffic you pull from search engines and the internet in general through your blog, the higher the chance you will get leads from your website. These are people who book an appointment, which can lead to sales.

Whip Your Remodeling Contractor Service Website Into Shape Today

Stop giving yourself excuses. Stop kicking the can down the road. If you want to make sure that your home remodeling website lives up to its fullest commercial potential, we have solutions for you.

WebyGeeks offers search engine specific website design and structuring services that can not only make your business’ website look more professional, but we can also drive more traffic and help you convert more of these visitors into customers. Contact us today.