Reaping a rich harvest from your website
Small business marketing tips for the home building industry
Originally published in Toolbox Magazine [ Charleston Home Builders Association ], Sept 2008
By Tiffany Jonas
Use your website to fill your pipeline with prospects actively interested in what you can do for them... and subtly remind them every month that you're available to assist them. Here's how to get started.
___________________________________________________________________________________________
One of the most popular kinds of websites in Charleston is the online brochure: a series of pages in cyberspace offering information about your firm's products or services. Besides supplying information, such a site helps build credibility: visitors often regard a firm that has invested in a professionally designed online presence as a serious business that plans to be here—and successful—for years to come.
But your website can do much more; for instance, it can help you bring in new revenue by filling your pipeline with prospects actively interested in what you can do for them.
It starts with harvesting your prospects' contact information, a task at which websites can excel. (This is low-hanging fruit right now: a quick and informal survey of randomly selected CTHBA member websites found less than 10 percent doing so.)
To get started, hold a short brainstorming session to think about your offerings from your prospect's point of view. If your target market includes direct consumers, for instance, consider how you would advise a family member thinking of building a home. You might tell her what to look for in a builder, where she can cut corners without losing much value, how she might add a lot of value at fairly little cost, what costs will be well worth it years from now, and other valuable insider tips. (For a real-life example in another industry, order our free report on finding the right web designer.)
If your aunt or sister would like to know this, it's a good bet your prospects would too. And they may share their contact information and preferences with you to get it, provided you'll treat it with respect.
Next, block off a few hours each month to write a monthly e-newsletter filled with such tips. The content doesn't have to be Pulitzer material; it only has to be helpful to your recipients. Select a template from an email distributor like Vertical Response or Custom Contact that closely matches your company's image, or even better, have a custom template designed for you—it's a one-time investment you can use over and over again without additional cost, and it will strengthen your firm's brand identity in the bargain. Copy and paste your content into this template.
Then display your information offer prominently on your website. Make your visitor's next step easy: keep the signup form to four or fewer text fields asking for truly essential information, and test it in different browsers to make sure it works. Specify your privacy policy (it can be simple) and tell her what she's signing up for—if she's requesting a tip sheet, for instance, let her know she'll also receive your e-newsletter with other helpful tips and that she can unsubscribe anytime. Make the "submit" button obvious. When she presses it, ensure she's taken to a page thanking her and telling her when and how she should expect the information to arrive. And of course, send the promised information promptly.
Your marketing list is now one actively interested prospect stronger. And with each new visitor to your website, without new cost or effort on your part, the process can repeat indefinitely.
About the author
Aio Design founder Tiffany Jonas graduated magna cum laude with a Bachelor of Journalism degree in advertising from the Missouri School of Journalism, a top journalism school. She also holds a Bachelor of Arts degree in English and has taken coursework toward an MBA. She’s a member of Mensa, an organization for those who have tested in the top two percent of the population on a standardized intelligence test. She has been the two-time recipient of an 11-state award for design, honored at the Chicago Book & Media Show and was chosen as one of the Charleston Regional Business Journal’s 2008 Forty Under 40, honoring those who have achieved professional success while contributing to the community.
