3 Easy Website Changes Home Builders Can Make to Increase Leads
As a home builder, you probably spend a lot of time juggling all kinds of moving parts. When you’re dealing with clients, contractors, and realtors, there’s not always a lot of extra time left over to manage things like your website. But if you’re looking for more leads, your home builder website is probably the answer. So how can you devote enough time to your website to get the leads you want, without running yourself into the ground?
Check out these three easy ways to improve your website and get more leads! Each of these changes is relatively low maintenance, can be implemented fairly quickly by yourself of a hired professional, and will undoubtedly help you get those leads you’re looking for. Let’s get started:
#1 Site Plan and Pricing Requests
Your potential clients might not always be certain that they’re ready for a new home. If that’s true, they’re probably in the researching phase of their buying cycle. This means that they’re considering a new home, but they haven’t decided if building a home is right for them. At this point, site plan and pricing requests are your best bet to getting a foot in the door. It’s low pressure, doesn’t require a commitment, and provides the information they’re looking for. If you offer potential customers the option to either request more information, or request a quote, you’ll bump up the number of leads your website is generating in no time.
But how do you implement these requests?
Well, in the digital marketing biz, we call them calls-to-action. Basically, they’re brightly-colored buttons on your website that offer your site viewers a service that a legitimate client would want. For home builders, this tends to be an offer for more information about site plans, or for an estimate. This is a great way to weed the windows shoppers from the potential clients who are actually considering building a home.
Why do they work?
By putting calls-to-action in visible locations on your site, you’re making it very easy for people to contact you. Most often, calls-to-action appeal to two types of people:
- Those who are on the go, and don’t have time to sit down and talk to you, but are considering building and legitimately want more information.
- Those who don’t like to talk on the phone, but want to build.
It’s true that people are busier and busier all the time. Many people surfing the web are on their phones between meetings or on lunch, and while they don’t want to talk on the phone at the moment, they do have the time to put in a simple request for more information. So make sure you have these requests readily available for your busy clients, and more importantly, make sure you respond. Someone filling out a request isn’t doing it to waste your time. They’re a legitimate lead, so make sure you treat them that way.
#2 Landing Pages
Another one of the easiest ways to boost your lead generation is to incorporate landing pages into your website. They’re a top converter, and get you the contact information of potential clients right away. But let’s start at the beginning. What is a landing page?
A landing page is a unique page of your website that lets you capture contact information, like name, email address, and phone number, through a conversion form that site visitors voluntarily fill out.
It’s pretty easy to see how landing pages get you leads: you get the contact information, and can then call or email the potential client. But how do you get site viewers to fill out the landing page conversion form in the first place?
It sounds like it might be a tough task, but actually, if you’re offering that viewer something in return for their information, landing pages can be one of your biggest lead generators. Say you have a content offer, like “How to Design your Dream Home.” A qualified client really wants that content, and since it’s free, they won’t have much of a problem putting their email address in as collateral if it’s something that will genuinely help them.
It’s a lead generation best practice to direct site viewers to relevant landing pages whenever they’re coming to your site. If you’re sending out emails to potential clients, and especially if you’re running internet ads, it’s a waste of your time to direct site viewers to your home page. While this does get them to your website, you’re not actively converting potential clients. Instead, make sure that those links take site viewers to a relevant landing page. You’ll start to see the results in no time.
#3 Houzz
If you’re looking to generate leads, there’s no better platform for home builders than Houzz. It’s an entire website created by home service professionals for those seeking home improvement and home building inspiration.
Houzz is super useful for you, because everyone on Houzz is a potential client. The majority of Houzz users are looking to either build or renovate, which means that your target market is literally at your fingertips. Simply having a Houzz account and linking it to your website will bump up your online presence exponentially.
If you’re active on Houzz, which you should be, your presence and lead generation opportunities increase that much more. Thousands of people use Houzz every day to find inspiration, and more importantly, to find home building professionals in their area. To optimize your lead generation potential, your Houzz account should display pictures of your previous projects, and link over to your website.
We hope these tips help you modify your website to generate more leads for your home building company! If you’re looking for more information about improving your website, make sure to reach out to us and let us know any questions you may have!
