7 Common Website Mistakes and How to Avoid Them

 7 Website Mistakes Builders Make [28:30m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

BuilderRadio interviews Meredith Oliver, Meredith Communications

We don’t go too many weeks without coming back to a discussion of how to use the Internet to find more business.  This week we talk with Internet marketer, web designer and professional speaker, Meredith Oliver.

Meredith confirms what other guest experts have attested to:  Your website is unquestionably the most important tool in your sales toolbox.  It can supply you with a constant stream of new business, help you keep in touch with existing customers, and even help answer service issues… If you aren’t making these key mistakes.

1.  Not paying attention to your domain name.
Your domain name you chose will have a bearing on how easily people find you.  Meredith suggests that you do a key word search and try to incorporate popular key words into your URL, including common misspellings, variations and abbreviations.

Also, using your company name in your URL is generally a good thing, but be careful that you don’t inadvertently spell out something unexpected.  For example, C. A. Jones Construction would NOT want to use www.cajones.com!

2.  Using a dark background on webpages.
“There’s no question that black or dark green backgrounds can add a richness to a website,” says Oliver, “but the also make the text hard to read and tend to make your pictures look dark.”  She suggests that if you want to use dark colors, use them in the header, but dark text on a light background is easiest to read.

3.  Designing your website to please you instead of your customers.
Colors, styles and images should all be chosen to attract buyers.  Builders need to acknowledge that their customer’s tastes might be very different from yours.  “It’s not about you,” emphasizes Oliver.  “The best thing you can do is take the subjectivity out of your website, try to be objective about it, define your target market, and build it to their preferences.”

How do you find out what will be most appealing to you buyers?  “Go back over the last few sales that you’ve made and develop a profile of the customers who’ve purchased from you.  You’ll start to see trends.  Look at the demographic information, but more important will be the psychographics – What motivates this customer to buy? Where do they shop?  Where do they like to eat?  Once you have a profile, look at the marketing of the other stores or restaurants that your customers frequent and you’ll get a feel for what’s going to appeal to this person,” advises Oliver.

4.  Not hiring a professional to design your website.
You can find plenty of hobbyists who can build a website, but only someone who understands Internet marketing will be able to help your create a site that works to pull in buyers.  “And use professional photography on your professional website,” Oliver notes.

A truly effective website requires multiple skills – the ‘techie’ to build the site, a marketing professional who understands how to connect with buyers, a graphic artist to create a functional and attractive layout, great photography and good sales copy.  If you not willing to invest in all those elements, you won’t get the results you expect or should get from our site.

“The website should be seen as the hub of all your marketing efforts,” says Oliver.  “It has to rank very high in your marketing budget, maybe #1.  The great news is that the return on investment is so great that you can spend money on a site and get it back very quickly, and its still going to be a lower cost that most of the other marketing that you’re going to do.”

5. Not tracking your website traffic and conversions.
“You need to always know how your website is performing.  How many people visit?  Where did they come from?  How long did they stay?  What pages did they look at?  These analytics are like an EKG for your website; they tell us the health of your site.”

Some of the best analytic tools available are absolutely free, such as Google Analytics, so there’s really no excuse for not using them.  And the more familiar you become with the reports these tools can give you, the more you’ll learn about your buyer’s preferences, what their interested in, how better to reach them, and how to sell them.

6.  Not working the leads you get from your website.
“If you don’t properly train your sales agents and sell them on the value of those Internet leads and the need to work them fast, then they can sit on the back burner.  Getting them prioritized and into a database so they can get proper follow up, and being really fast can make a big difference.  You can start to see results quickly,” says Oliver.

7.  Not having a strong call to action.
Oliver lists what she calls her ‘3 Cs:’ “You want them to call, click, or come by.  Every page of your website should actively ask someone to do one of those three things.  You can’t really over-do it because you want to get people to engage.

“A lot of builders are using live chat and click-to-call.  Some are using Text – they ask their site visitors to text a number to receive more information.  There are a lot of ways you can get people to engage, but they won’t do it if you don’t ask them.

“You can amp that up even further by offering some type of an incentive.  I love to do a ‘Web Customer Only’ or a ‘VIIP – Very Important Internet Person’ promotion where if they purchase they’ll receive something that other folks aren’t receiving.”

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For more web marketing tips, visit Meredith’s website, www.creatingwow.com.

Need some help with your sales or marketing efforts?  Looking for a speaker for your next company event?  Would you benefit from one-on-one consulting with a seasoned industry sales or marketing veteran?  Or, do you just have one burning question about selling homes in this turbulent economy?  Then give us a call today for a free 15-minute consultation.

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