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Eight Ways to Drive Internet Leads and Sales

The 11th in a series of tech talks for builders.

Try these eight simple ways to make your Web site a more effective sales tool.

• Put a person and a process in place to follow up on all leads in a timely manner.
  
  Let's start at the end of your sales funnel. You have a smart marketing strategy. You have lots of Web site visitor traffic. You receive a great number of leads. Yet, if no sales come out of the other end, what's the point? Put someone in charge of follow-up.
  
  
• Leverage builder portals (Web sites like www.newhomes.com, for example, or www.homebuilder.com that aim to attract as many visitors as possible in a niche market) to drive leads.
  
  The number and quality of distribution options continue to grow. You need a marketing presence where home shoppers look for homes. For example, you may prefer the Dallas Morning News to the Fort Worth Star Telegram. However, if 40% of home shoppers are looking at your non-preferred weekend paper, you may still want to advertise there. It works the same way online.

• Make your Web site faster and easier to navigate.
  
  An amazing thing happens when your Web site becomes faster and users find it easier to use: You immediately see a substantial increase in both visitors and leads. Try this test:
  
  Simplify and reduce the size (in kilobytes) of your homepage and then measure your visitors and leads over one week. Did your ratio of leads to visitors improve? Did you notice an unusual pick-up in visitor and repeat visitor traffic?
  
  
• Make it easy and compelling for Web site visitors to start a dialogue with you.
  
  Make sure your contact links are where visitors can find them and be careful to name them in a way that makes people want to click. For example, "Request Brochure" will probably get more clicks than "Have a salesman call me." In addition, put an 800 number on your Web site and offer to answer your visitors’ questions.
  
  Don't ask Web site visitors for too much information on online forms. While you might want to know their phone number and quite a few other things, requiring this information may discourage them from completing your form.
  
  
• Review your driving directions and update them as if your Web site visitor is relocating from out of town.
  
  This is one of the easiest ways to build traffic and probably the single most overlooked piece of content on home builder Web sites. Is it possible that your advertising dollars were effective enough to motivate a shopper, but your driving directions were so poor that the shopper found another builder's community to visit?
  
  
• Create a good auto-response for every community you build.
  
  Every time you get a lead, that’s a chance to start a dialogue. Most builders use auto-responders that spit out automatic text replies to online queries, and in most cases the copy is lame. This is your opportunity to set an expectation and sell the community a second time. You can't stop there. You still have to follow-up.
  
  
• Call every contact who gives you a phone number.
  
  On most builder Web sites and builder portals, Web site visitors are not required to give their phone numbers. If they give you a phone number, it is an invitation to call. Accept it and call.
  
  
• Highlight your "coming soon" communities and create interest groups for e-mail campaigns.
  
  Turn your "coming soon" communities into backlog builders. It is a place where you have the potential to create excitement. Let your Web site visitors join your VIP list or preferred buyer program.

Blair Kuhnen is the owner of Lux Solutions, a Fort Worth, TX-based consulting firm serving the home building industry by providing Internet related sales and marketing solutions.He can be reached at 817-923-4026 or via e-mail.