Don’t Underestimate the Importance of Website Design for Home Services Businesses

Don’t Underestimate the Importance of Website Design for Home Services Businesses

When people buy a new computer, they might spend weeks researching online which one they want to buy and comparing prices, features, and shipping times.  The computer they end up buying arrives by package delivery service, and it could have originated very far away.  This is not the case when people hire someone to clean their swimming pool and adjust its chemical levels or to install new hardwood floors in their kitchen.  The only businesses they can reasonably hire are the ones located nearby.  Despite this, when customers are looking to make a local purchase, just as when they are looking to make an “anywhere” purchase, the place they search for it is Google.  This means that your website is instrumental to the success of your local home services business.  If your company has had the same website for years and has not improved upon it as the Internet has exponentially increased its role in interactions between consumers and businesses, you are short changing and losing out on prospective customers.  One of the biggest favors you can do for your company is to have High Converting Media build a new, up-to-date website for your business.

User-Friendly Websites Are Not Just for Fancy Hotels

You have probably seen websites that look like they cost a fortune.  On these posh websites, artistic photographs of people, places, and things related to the business glide in and out of view almost at the moment you think of them, sometimes even without you clicking on anything.  As impressive as these websites are, you probably assume that they are beyond your budget.  Perhaps they are, and perhaps all those bells and whistles are unnecessary, but your home services company deserves better than the Geocities page that your nerdy cousin built for you in 1997 in exchange for you building a shed in his backyard.

Now that so many consumer-to-business interactions take place online, a user-friendly website is necessary, not merely optional.  Of all of these kinds of home services companies, their customers usually initially contact them online:

•   Home renovations and remodeling
•   Interior decorating
•   Lawn maintenance
•   Swimming pool installation
•   Swimming pool cleaning and care
•   Pet services, such as pet sitting, dog grooming, and dog walking
•   Window washing and repair
•   Power washing
•   Gutter cleaning
•   Tree trimming

A user-friendly website that has an intuitive layout and readable fonts is a sign of professionalism.  By contrast, a buggy website that takes a long time to load and does not format well on mobile devices makes a bad first impression on prospective customers.

Website Design Is a Form of Digital Marketing

Prospective customers are not the only ones who notice when your home services business website is old and in disrepair; Google notices, too.  Specifically, Google notices that, when users visit your website, they quickly get frustrated with its glitches and click back to the search results page, so that they can then click on the website of one of your competitors.  If your competitors’ website convinces you that their company has what the customer needs, the customer will contact that company; in digital marketing terms, contacting a business as a result of visiting its website is called “conversion.”  Google notices all of this; it gives business websites credit for users’ time on page as well as their conversion rate, and it ranks the ones with longer time on page and higher conversion rates higher on search results pages.  In other words, your old, buggy website is directing customers away from you and toward your competitors.

Once you have a user-friendly website, you are already doing an important part of search engine optimization (SEO).  Staying at the top of the organic search results requires ongoing analytics research and updates to your site.  Website design is a cornerstone of digital marketing, but it is not the only thing you need to do to make your company’s website perform well on Google and make a good impression on customers who find your site on Google searches.  Digital marketing is a big job, but it is essential to the success of local small businesses.  High Converting Media can plan and implement a comprehensive digital marketing strategy for your home services business.