How to Craft Compelling Website Content for Design/Build Leads: Expert Tips from BLC

Are you looking to attract more leads and grow your business? 

One of the key components to successfully attracting high-quality leads in today’s market is through a strong online presence. 

But what exactly are potential clients looking for when they visit your website? 

Our team at Builder Lead Converter will answer this burning question and provide you with insider knowledge on what website content design/build leads are searching for. 

Watch/Listen/Read and let’s dive into 3 questions with BLC on understanding what website content appeals most to design/build leads.

Builder Lead Converter ATTRACTS, CAPTURES & CONVERTS high-quality leads for home builders & remodelers so they can pick & choose their clients & jobs. Find out how at https://www.builderleadconverter.com

 

Transcripts:

Rick: Today on Conversations that Convert, we’re back talking about another three questions with Builder League Converter, and the topic Of the questions today is what website content, our design build leads looking for let’s jump in.

Narrator: Welcome to Conversations that Convert every week. We’ll spend about 10 to 15 minutes tackling relevant lead generation, marketing and sales topics for remodelers. Home improvement companies and home builders. Conversations that Convert is brought to you by Builder Lead Converter, your perfect sales assistant.

And now here’s Rick and Daiana. 

Rick: Hey everyone, welcome to Conversations that Convert. Daiana, it’s summer and it’s hot. Welcome. 

Daiana: Welcome. Yes, indeed. I confirm, summer, hot, crazy weather. 

Rick: Scott, crazy weather. It is about the middle of the summertime here right now. We hope you are staying cool wherever you’re at.

It’s right around the 4th of July here for Independence Day for the U. S. So hopefully you are getting some time to Spend time with family, take a little break from work and maybe even dip your toes in, in a lake or a stream or, or the ocean. So Daiana, what are we talking about today? 

Daiana: Today about the website content that design and bill leads are looking for.

Rick: Exactly. And this is all part of our series. Three questions with builder lead converter. And this is where we’re going to take this varying topics on marketing, sales. conversions, lead generation, and just break it down and do three simple questions. So one of the most common areas that we get asked questions is regarding websites.

There’s obviously anyone out there. A lot of people out there are willing to build you a website. Unfortunately, what we see way too often is that builders will hire a company to build a website for them, and then it just does not produce. So we’re going to sort of break that down and actually look at why it may not be producing.

And today’s focus is going to be on contents. We’re going to go through and ask three quick questions. So what do you say, Daiana? Should we jump in? 

Daiana: Yes. Are you ready for the first question? 

Rick: I am. Let’s do it. 

Daiana: So question number one. What type of content drives away leads from custom builders and remodelers?

Rick: You know, and this is something we call it and when I was a sales manager, we call it the, the sales prevention team. So in other words, you had sales people, then you had the sales prevention team, and sometimes the owner of the company was on the sales prevention team. So think of your website is there are things that you have on your website for content that is actually hurting you, not helping you.

The standard school thought is Hey, if it’s if it can go on your website, put it on your website. In other words, content, content, content, just keep putting content on there doesn’t really matter what it is, but that’s a good thing for a website. And really, what we find, Daiana, is that the opposite is true.

There is certain type of content that will drive leads away from a custom builder or remodeler. And as we discussed in the last episode, When people are shopping online, they shop by process of exclusion, which means they might go and look at 10 or 20 or 30 different builders websites. They only want to talk to maybe one, two or three of those builders.

So they’re going through and trying to cross you off the list and not trying to include you on their, on their shortlist. So if you have the wrong content it’s going to turn them off and that’s going to give them another reason to cross you off the list. And they’re just looking for any reason. So let’s not give him a reason, shall we?

So the rule of thumb that I use, Dinah, is called the 19 second rule. And your question probably is, Rick, what’s the 19 second rule? So statistically, when a lead lands on a builder’s homepage, you have 19 seconds to get the information that that lead is looking for. For in front of them 19 seconds.

And if it takes longer than that, you’re going to lose them. And we call it. So it used to be called a bounce where they would come and go on the same on the same page. This is just going to be really an exclusion. So 19 seconds to be able to get them to the content they’re looking for. So two things are in play here.

Number one is the format of the website, it has to be easy. So that lead can quickly find the content they’re looking for. And number two is don’t have bad content get in the way of the content that they’re looking for. And this is something that I try to hit home with a lot of builders. Daiana is that a lot of builders think that a lead, when they, when they first make contact with the builder, they want to look at their awards and they want to look at their processes and their systems and they want to, you know, read all about the the bios and the history of the builder and what makes them different.

And that’s really not the case. They will get to that point eventually, but when that lead first gets there, they are just trying to answer three simple question with questions, which we’ll, we’ll focus on next. So before I jump into that, I want to talk about the content that drives them away. So number one is anything that gets in the way of the information they’re getting, that they’re looking for, which would be.

Too much written copy. Now, you do need some written copy, yes, but I always look at it this way. Your leads think in a Twitter, in Twitter soundbites. So 140 characters or less, whatever Twitter used to be. But it’s gotta be a small amount of copy, just to show them that they’re in the right place. For the type of service that they’re looking for and then behave, that copy should simply be directing them to get to the information that they’re after.

The other thing that I see that really is a killer is unprofessional photos or visuals. So we see photos can be unprofessional in a couple different ways. Number one, bad lighting. I mean, when people are taking photos with their cell phone. And just bad angles, poor lighting just, and the other thing would be maybe dated designs.

So yeah, if having all that content, that great project you built five years ago, it might look great five years ago, but now it’s starting to look dated. And again, get any unfinished product photos off of your website. A lot of builders think that, Oh, I’m going to show before and after photos, like, you know, under construction photos for a new home or say before and after from a modeling.

That’s fine for social media. That’s even fine for the multiple listing service. If you’re going to go there, it should not be on your website. Okay. Why Rick, why should they not be in my website? I think it’s interesting. This is a builder talking here. The reason that you do not want to put that on your website is because think of your website is your virtual model home or virtual.

Showcase. So your showroom. In other words, the reason a builder builds a model home, the reason a remodeler has a showroom with vignettes is to create an emotional attachment. Emotional attachments are created by beautiful, stunning, well staged and designed homes and showrooms. The buyer says, Oh, I want that, right?

How can I have that in my home? And so when you start showing unfinished or under construction photos, you’re There is nothing emotionally attached attaching about that, right? So you’re going to turn them off and they’re gonna be like, oh, you know, I don’t want that even though every phase goes through the ugly ducking or every every job goes to the ugly ducking phase.

You don’t want to document on your website. So the other thing that we see, Thanks Awards process maps. Now you can get them on your website, but they shouldn’t be front and center. They shouldn’t be hiding some of the more important content. What do you think of that, Daiana? 

Daiana: Yeah, I think it’s impressive because you are tend to, to prepare and, and put everything on the website, but it just, I think it’s important to be a way.

Aware of what drives the way the leads. Yeah. The lead on the website. And if you’re not aware and you don’t know you, you think you’re doing great and you are just, you’re not, 

Rick: you know, it’s interesting. I had, we had a client at once that was in Canada and he had this section on his website for elevators to put elevators in homes.

He was a remodeler. And there was so little information on elevators and remodeling that Google thought that this website was the authority. So he was driving traffic from all over the world to this section on elevators on his website, and that was actually hurting him. You know, because he had all this traffic.

It wasn’t information that necessarily his leads were looking for. It was just some random person looking forward in, you know, different part of the world. And they happen to come to his website. So yes, that information is fine, but don’t. fall into the trap of thinking like, well, more is better as relates to content.

Usually less is more. Clean it up, get the, get the leads, the information they’re looking for and then don’t give them more than you than you need to. Yeah. Can you have a process map on your website? Sure. Should you have a bio on your team? Absolutely. Should it be front and center? So it blocks them from finding the other content they’re looking for?

Absolutely not. All right, should go to question number two. 

Daiana: Yes. Are you ready? Question number two. What type of content draws leads towards a custom builder or remodeler? 

Rick: Yeah. Okay. So this is the important one. So we talked about what content drives leads away from a custom builder or remodeler. Now we’re talking about the type of content that draws them to you.

Very simple and it’s in chronological order. So number one is going to be design ideas. design ideas. And that’s going to be if you’re a home builder, that will be floor plans. That will be portfolio pages with finished with finished photos. Most important. If you’re a remodeler, that’s going to be project pages.

Again, photos of finished projects. So most important design is always going to be. The most visited type pages and also the most compelling reason of why a lead would want to spend any amount of time on your, on your website and why they can’t visualize. I mean, the reason we build model homes, the reason we do showrooms, you know, It’s because people cannot visualize what it would look like, and they want to see it and touch it.

So again, being able to show them a floor plan, being able to show them a completed project page, that’s what’s most important. Now, again, I have this conversation all the time. It’s worth reiterating. Every custom builder we come to says, well, we don’t have floor plans because we design everything from scratch.

That’s great. And you probably will do that for your leads. However, if you don’t show floor plans or examples of your work on your page, you have zero context, the lead that cannot visualize what you are selling and you will lose them. So yes, as a custom builder, no matter what price point you are, you have to show.

For plans and or photos of completed projects. Most important thing being show a variety of different architectural motifs. And that goes for both remodelers. And home builders, I mean, show them as much variety as you can. So when they see that style that they’re looking for, they can fall in love with it and they’ll want to take the next step.

Now, the last or second thing is going to be pricing information. There’s different ways to do this from a pricing information, but you have to have some pricing information on your website. I’m not going to spend a whole lot of time on this. I’m just going to say. You need pricing information on your website, and you might say, Well, you know, our starting price is 2 million.

I said, Yeah, the reason you have to get priced information on your website is because if you are attracting leads that have a budget of 500, 000, it’s not doing you or them any good. So this is part of the qualifying process. And there is a way to go about this. It’s a very specific way. If you want to get into more of that, you can go ahead and schedule a strategy session with me and I’ll be happy to discuss that with you.

The third type of information they’re looking for will be the locations or service area that you build in. Okay, so if you’re a home builder and you have specific communities or lots that you either have access to or control, Those need to be listed. If you’re more scattered lot or remodeling that just has a certain radius service area that needs to be clearly articulated.

Both in a services page, excuse me, a service area page, as well as on the homepage. So when someone lands there, they know immediately where you build and what, and what you build. So that’s the three things, design ideas, pricing information, and locations and service area. 

Daiana: That’s amazing. That brings us to question number three.

That is what is the most important content a builder should have on the website? 

Rick: Well, we’re going to go back to what I mentioned in question number two. And that is in chronological order. What’s the most important, the type of content that draws a lead towards a builder, and that’s going to be design.

So going back to that any content that creates believability in the eyes of the lead. Okay, so this is what’s so important is that you have to be believable when they are on your website. So I give this example. I started out, Daiana, working model homes. And so I could be in a one level, say, 500, 000 model home.

And if I had a lead that came into that model home and their budget was 450, 000 and they wanted to build a one level home, they immediately believed that we could do that. Why? Because we had, we were showing a 500, 000 home. So we proved to them that we can do that. Now, conversely, let’s say I had a lead that walked in and they wanted to build a two story home and their budget was 750, 000.

They would immediately question if we knew how to build a 750, 000 two story. Why? Because we weren’t showing it. And because we weren’t showing it, they questioned it. So what you want to do right away is focus on content that creates believability in the eyes of the lead. So what would that look like?

Well, number one, high resolution images of the types of projects you offer, or here’s a big one. You want to offer because we deal with a lot of builders that say, Rick, you know what? I don’t want to do 20, 000 bathrooms anymore. I want to focus on 80, 000 kitchen. It’s like, okay, great. Well let’s make sure we have lots of photos of 80, 000 or more expensive kitchens, which creates believability in the eyes of that lead that you could do the same thing for them.

Same thing for your floor plans. You know, if you’re showing, A lot of builders, they want to ratchet up their average sales price. They may have a nice portfolio of 800, 000 million dollar homes, but now they want to look at that 1. 5 million projects. You have to show 2 million projects on there in order to create that believability.

That that lead who has a 1. 5 million budget that you can, that you can do that. So again, it’s either projects you are, you, you do want to sell or on projects that you are selling. Now, the other thing which is a big one is case studies of happy clients. So case studies do a couple of different things.

Number one, it creates proof that you have actual happy clients and a case study. Usually it’s just an expose of the project that you did. Okay. Ideally, you would have a video of the, your client in the side of the project. So whether it’s their kitchen that you did or a whole house remodel, or perhaps it’s a custom home, and then they are talking about what you did for them as far as, you know, remodeling their home or, you know, building their new home.

You also should have reviews from trusted platforms. So that would be number one is going to be Google business profile reviews. Number one, most trusted review out there. House reviews would be, you know a distant second. Facebook reviews a distant second. If you’re into Yelp, that sort of thing, it’s, it’s important, but Google reviews are really the gold standard when it comes there.

And then last would be like photos of clients with a written testimonial. Again, if they see the client in a video and hear them telling how great you are, that is the most powerful form of endorsement. If they see a photo with a written testimony next to it, That is the second most powerful, and then the third will be just a written testimonial with not being on a trusted platform like Google.

A Google review is right up there with, again, a video testimonial because again, that is a trusted platform for your leads. That’s it! Just to, as far as what is the most important content ability you should have on your website, anything that creates believability in the eyes of the lead. So focus on imagery, focus on case studies, reviews, testimonials, etc, etc.

What do you think of that, Daiana? 

Daiana: That’s amazing. So if you just pay attention to the answer to those three questions, I think you’ll you’ll have an amazing website and you will attract the right leads to you. 

Rick: Absolutely. Yeah. And we can get into SEO and all that good stuff too. But this is again, what I always say to a builder, I said, what good does it do to pay a bunch of money to drive traffic to your website?

It has the wrong content on it. 

Daiana: Right. 

Rick: What good does it do to drive traffic to a website that maybe has the right content, but doesn’t have the right call to actions or lead magnets to capture the lead? And then if you capture a lead, what good does it do to capture lead? If you don’t follow up properly and convert that lead into an appointment.

So it’s a closed loop system here. The website’s just one component within that, within that system, which you have to be thinking about all different parts of that system to really have a reliable client acquisition funnel. That’s going, you’re going to be able to replicate and duplicate on demand.

Make sense. 

Daiana: Yes, absolutely. So how can we contact you? 

Rick: Well, if you would like to schedule your strategy call and find out how we can attract, capture and convert high quality leads for you, so you can pick and choose your clients and jobs, there’ll be a link right below the video. Go ahead and click on that link.

Tell me a good time to call you. We’ll talk about your company and see if we might be able to help you with that. So hopefully you enjoyed this content here today. And for my brothers and sisters in Christ, may the grace to the Lord Jesus Christ, the love of God, and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with you all always.

We’ll see you next time on Conversations that Convert. Bye bye, everyone.