Construction Website Design and the Art of Getting Leads

The Opportunity

While consumers refer to local listings and reviews, expect them to turn to your website when they need comprehensive information about your business. What goes on your construction website is under your control, which makes you responsible for the message it conveys to your target audience. Your website also gives potential customers a glimpse into your company’s values. Unfortunately, not many companies are taking advantage of the opportunity that the right kind of website design for construction has to offer when it comes to generating leads.

Invest in SEO

The best construction websites pay due attention to search engine optimization (SEO) because one of the smartest ways to generate online leads is via search engines. When done right, SEO can get the pages of your website to rank well on search engine results pages (SERPs). While this helps drive plenty of organic traffic to your website, it also helps increase your brand’s visibility and build customer trust. Bear in mind, though, that SEO does not produce overnight results and you need to view the money you spend as a long-term investment.

Think Beyond a Portfolio

Your website gives you the ability to put forth much more than before and after photos of completed projects, which is why run-of-the-mill construction website templates are now passé. A photographic portfolio is part of the parcel, no doubt, but this section comes with immense potential when it comes to generating leads. Your projects’ listings serve as an important element of the overall website, which is why this aspect requires careful consideration.

While portfolios of projects and case studies give you easy means to promote the end result, they also let you demonstrate expertise, strategic consideration, and problem-solving skills. Not surprisingly, you may find this to be rather common when you look at the best construction website designs.

If you feel you don’t have a sizeable list of before and after photos, consider adding more to the collection. Use photos that illustrate your customers’ goals, the barriers you faced, and what you did to overcome challenges.

Content is an important element of construction industry website design. If you feel you don’t have much to put across textually, understand that even a single paragraph can be beneficial, as long as it talks about a problem and solution.

Use Videos

If you look for construction website design ideas, you’ll notice that using videos makes it to most lists. Even if you run a small construction company website, videos give you an easy means to showcase your expertise, offer insight about your company, and provide different types of information your target audience might find of interest. Besides, videos can serve as a more engaging tool than text for many users, helping them stay on your website for longer and move toward performing desired actions.

Some of the other benefits of using videos as part of your overall website design include:

• They provide visual appeal.
• You may use them to demonstrate different construction-related complexities.
• Behind-the-scenes videos can help establish trust.
• Educational videos can position you as an industry expert.
• Video testimonials can help build emotional connections.
• The use of videos is great from the SEO point of view.

Determine the Goal of Your CTA

Before building a construction company website, ask yourself what action you want its visitors to perform the most. Usually, the call to action (CTA) is to schedule a call or visit a physical location. For example, your CTA could focus on getting potential customers to set up a meeting. Alternatively, depending on your business model, you could eliminate this step and encourage your website’s visitors to hire a crew to take care of their projects. When you determine the goal of your CTA, you can use specific words to convert your website’s visitors into leads.

Focus on User Experience

With regard to web design, user experience (UX) refers to how a visitor feels when using and interacting with a website. While a good UX leads to high engagement levels and conversion rates, a poor UX can result in high bounce rates. The latter is when people leave a web page without performing any action.

Since building credibility is important if you wish to generate leads and build customer loyalty, paying attention to the UX your website delivers is crucial. While providing a good UX is ideal if you wish to convert web traffic into leads and leads into customers, it has a positive effect on SEO as well. This is because search engines like Google consider UX as an important ranking parameter.

Publish Reviews and Testimonials

An increasing number of consumers read reviews and testimonials before making purchasing decisions. Consider these numbers collated by Vendasta:

• 92% of consumers go through at least one online review prior to making a purchase.
• 40% of consumers read just one to three reviews to form an opinion about a business.
• The biggest factor that consumers rely on to judge businesses is star rating.
• Half of all consumers find online reviews more motivating than promotional offers.
• 81% of consumers evaluate local businesses by turning to Google reviews.

Testimonials are powerful, of course, but there can be a downside as well. For instance, displaying a customer’s testimonial on your website might end up causing more harm than good. While testimonials give you an easy way to establish a positive brand image and build customer trust, there are a few aspects that require your attention:

• Not without permission. If you plan to get a customer to endorse your business, make sure you get permission in writing. It will serve your business well to include a clause in your company’s Privacy Policy or Terms and Conditions stating you may use user reviews and testimonials for marketing purposes. Remember, it is better to err on the side of caution when it comes to using your customers’ reviews/testimonials.
• Use of photos. Photo testimonials are effective, and it’s not because people in them are popular, because they probably aren’t. According to Vero, adding pictures has a positive impact on click-through rates. Besides, potential customers like putting a face to a name. It gives them a feeling that the testimonials come from real people, making them more confident about your claims.

Address Negative Reviews

It is not uncommon for disgruntled customers to be rude and loud. However, it is imperative that you address these concerns, especially when your business is in a position to defend itself. When replying to negative feedback, take time to formulate a suitable answer.

Keeping your replies simple is the ideal way to go, and don’t forget to thank your customers for their patronage and feedback. Remember that a simple apology makes way for a human connection, showing potential customers that your business is accountable.

According to Pew Research, while 43% of Americans pay more attention to positive reviews when making purchasing decisions, around 55% focus more on negative reviews. As a result, ignoring negative reviews is not the best way forward, all the more so because your potential customers get to see how you handle them.

Display Awards and Accreditations

You should display all the awards and accreditations your business has received for the world to see, as this is another important aspect of website design for construction companies. If you don’t have any awards yet, start by partaking in local and regional competitions. As and when you win, include their mention on your website, and issue press releases. After all, an award serves as a guarantee of quality, and a good digital marketing team should be able to capitalize on it in the right manner, by boosting brand awareness and driving inbound leads.

Don’t Forget Social Media

Is getting your construction company website design right enough to generate adequate leads? The truth is that while a great website can do wonders for your business, it might be worth your while to turn to social media for lead generation.

Listening to your customers and engaging with them plays an important role in marketing, and this moves beyond effective construction industry website design. Simply being available and helpful can have a positive impact on the number of potential clients who wish to get in touch with your business, and social media platforms give you the ability to do this with ease.

Consider these statistics collated by Sprout Social and WordStream:

• Internet users spend more than two and a half hours on social media platforms each day.
• Social media is now a more preferred advertising channel than paid search.
• More than 90% of businesses use social media marketing.
• 90% of users on Instagram follow at least one business account.
• 87% of marketers feel they have generated more sales because of video marketing.
• Facebook and Instagram are the top two social media platforms that marketers use.

With different social media platforms at your disposal, you get a great opportunity to build brand authority and generate quality leads. While social media remains rather underutilized by the construction industry, it gives you a quick and easy way to connect with your customers, listen to their concerns, and provide suitable solutions.

Remain Active

Data provided by Statista indicates that the U.S. alone is home to around 308 million social media users. Using social media as a marketing tool might be time-consuming, although not jumping on the bandwagon in this day and age is akin to not having a website. So, how do you remain active? If people are asking you similar questions, post helpful links on your social media accounts. Do the same each time you win an award.

Relevancy is important when it comes to what you share via social media. While industry-related news might seem interesting around the office, it is unlikely that your customers will benefit from the same information.

Your main aim should be to create content that people find worthy of sharing. What also helps is several social media platforms work in indexing content for search engines, providing you with an even greater outreach. For instance, if you answer a customer’s question about what kind of roofing to use, others with similar queries stand to benefit as well.

Return on investment (ROI) is not easy to track with social media. However, it should be an important part of trying to create positive word of mouth. Ignoring social media is a folly, especially for a construction business, where much depends on customers’ feedback and reviews.

Conclusion

If you look at any list of top 10 construction company websites, you’ll notice they share several commonalities. For starters, they pay due attention to search engine optimization, which is perfect for attracting organic traffic and generating leads. They also focus on delivering great user experiences, which goes a long way in converting leads into customers. The top construction companies also invest in social media marketing as this gives them the means to reach out to audiences where they hang around the most.

If you feel your business might benefit from what construction website design has to offer, consider partnering with a digital agency that has relevant experience. This is because expertise and great results typically go hand in hand.