There is no magic 8-ball for what you should have on your website that is going to bring in leads and change your business overnight. However, being in the platform development and lead generation industry for HVAC, home performance and solar for as long as we have, we know a thing or two about what works and what doesn’t — because we’ve seen it.
Here are the top five things we think you should have on your company’s site:
1. Easy to find contact information.
Don’t hide your contact information on your contact page alone — your contact information should be available across your site.
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Phone Number
I’m sure you recall a time when you had to scour a site to find the phone number. Your phone number should be clear and available on every single page of your site. Let the user choose how and from what page to contact you, but give them the opportunity to on every page.
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Forms
It’s great to give potential customers the opportunity to contact you the way they prefer to contact you. For many people, that is still the phone — but for others, they prefer to fill out a form. Your website should have a form option on every page as well. Use the form for a call-to-action (CTA) for the relevant service for an added boost!
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Live Chat
If you have decided to jump into live chat — great! Live chat is a fantastic way to allow for instant correspondence. Just make sure you have a representative active and ready to answer. There is nothing worse than starting a live chat session and having to wait for what feels like ages for a response.
Need a little more time to do some research? Let the person know - “I am checking with Joe Plumber on his schedule, I will be back to give you his availability in a few moments. Please leave the chat window open.”
2. Google Analytics, Goal Conversion & Lead Tracking
Do you currently know how your website is converting? If so, fantastic! If not...well, that’s actually a simple fix. Google Analytics can help track goals or conversions based on events that users complete. Make sure you have Google Analytics running on your site — it’s just a simple code that needs to be placed in the HTML.
Make sure you are getting the most information about your leads with a call tracking software like CallRail. CallRail allows you to set up unique tracking numbers for your various campaigns and then monitor, score and track them. You get information from the caller’s number and area, to the recorded call so you can monitor what converts and what doesn’t.
At Energy Circle, we like tracking first-time callers and form submissions as goal conversions — so that’s how we set up the goals.
Moving forward, you will be able to see how many people are filling out forms and how many new calls you are getting from your digital marketing efforts. This will help you strategize which pages you should focus on.
3. CTAs
A call-to-action, or CTA, is a must-have on your website. Tell them what they need!
“Contact the experts at Joe’s Plumbing today so that you never run out of warm water again!”
These CTAs shouldn’t just be left as a one-liner. Make sure you provide a form for the user to fill out AND a number to call. Remember — people like different methods of communication, so it’s important to provide multiple points of contact.
4. SEO basics
There is a lot that can be done in the world of SEO, but there a few areas that I would consider top-priority.
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Meta Titles
Your meta title tells Google and your site visitors exactly what the page is about in a concise manner. The title tag shows up in the search engine search results as the blue link.
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Meta Descriptions
Your meta description should summarize the content on the page in 320 characters or less. This shows up below the title tag in search results
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Alt Tags
Alt tags tell Google and other search engines what an image is about. You don’t need to write a paragraph - just a simple sentence!
5. Well-written, relevant copy with clear titles
You don’t now how many sites ive seen with bad grammer, typos or mispellings. (Yes, that sentence is an example).
Not only is grammar, punctuation and spelling important, but also the keywords that you have on your various pages, the flow of copy and how much copy is on the page. Too much copy makes it hard for a user to find the information they are looking for. Too little copy will leave them looking for more. The just right amount of copy, with clear headings, is the sweet spot to be in.
I used to love coming up with new, fun ways to name things. Now, it sends me screaming! Yes, it’s a fun exercise - but are you adding confusion for your potential customers?
If you have a blog, call it a blog. If you offer insulation, please, I’m begging, do not call it ‘Wall-Fluff.’ People are not searching for ‘Wall-Fluff’, they are searching for insulation. You also don’t want to hide your other pages under non-descriptive titles.
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Home Page Copy
Google loves your homepage. Make sure you have copy on your homepage that reflects the services you offer. It should be clear, concise, and direct your users to more information.
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Service Page Copy
The copy on your service pages should provide more information on the services you offer. You should be giving some technical information, but remember that this page isn’t for people who work in the industry - so save the technical details for your service team.
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Blog Copy
People are searching for things like ‘Why is my house so cold?’ A great way to get that traffic is to create blog posts that help answer those questions. They may not know they need insulation and air sealing, so blogs are a great way to answer any questions and get more organic traffic.
Before you go making changes to your site, it’s important to reflect back on your strategy. One of the most important questions to continue to ask throughout any marketing activities is “Does it keep with the strategy we are currently using and does it help us accomplish our goals?”. If the goal is to not generate leads, then you may not want to take my advice above. But if your goals and strategy revolve around generating traffic and leads from your site, the five tactics above should be considered.