The world is getting more modern by the minute, and homeowners are expecting the same from the service providers they hire. 75% of consumers admit that they judge a business’s credibility based on its website. And 38% of people will completely stop engaging with a website if the layout or content is undesirable.
An attractive, functional, and serviceable website is more important than ever for contracting businesses. With so much competition, you can’t afford to lose out on valuable leads simply because your competitors are upgrading their websites and you aren’t.
Take a look at 5 tech upgrades every roofing website should have:
Call Rail
CompanyCam
HOVER
A good CRM system
Custom WordPress theme and hosting
1. Call Rail
Call Rail is one of the best tech upgrades you can add to your website. It’s vital as a contracting business to know where your customers are finding you and which marketing efforts are working and which ones aren’t.
Call Rail earns you efficiency with both time and money. Essentially, it puts a dynamic phone number on your website or on each campaign. It will swap out the number on your website on these campaigns, but they redirect to your office phone number.
Call Rail tracks these phone numbers, so you know exactly which medium the phone call came from.
For example, your paid ad campaigns, print marketing, and website would all have a different phone number provided by Call Rail, but they all re-route to your general phone number. The system then tracks which calls came from which numbers, and you can view your stats on a dynamic dashboard so you know exactly how your leads are finding you.
This is helpful to roofing companies because you can more accurately allocate your marketing money. If a large majority of your calls are coming in organically from your website but only a spattering are coming in from mail marketing, then you can reallocate your budget to further support your organic search marketing and spend less on a method that isn’t fruitful.
2. CompanyCam
Any home service provider needs to have recent photos of their completed projects so potential customers know what to expect. Putting together comprehensive case studies can be incredibly difficult no matter the size of the company. Configuring this portion of your website is very time-consuming and tedious. That’s where CompanyCam comes to the rescue.
CompanyCam allows you to document your projects with unlimited photos as you go and communicate with your crews in real-time. You have access to an unlimited number of photos you take throughout the course of every project, and you can showcase those photos on your website.
CompanyCam has a gallery feature called a Showcase that lets you add photos from projects you’ve completed. You can pick and choose the photos and projects you want to add, and you get a gallery of the projects that automatically updates when you add a new project. This upgrade is beneficial for many reasons, including:
Crew members spend less time uploading photos at the end of the day
Owners get visibility on the day-to-day happenings of their projects
Project managers are aware of job site progress
Administrators don’t have to track down photos from crew members
Potential customers get an accurate and recent picture of real work your company completes each week
3. HOVER
Everyone likes to have an accurate idea of what their project will cost and look like before they get serious about pursuing it. HOVER helps keep any surprises out of the process.
HOVER allows homeowners to take pictures of their house to ultimately get a 3D visualization of what their home project could look like. Additionally, they’ll get:
Material options
Accurate cost estimates
Quicker insurance claim process
Keep in mind that these upgrades do cost money, so you’ll have to as yourself: Is it worth it to pay for these services?
Determine your cost per lead first, then determine if you can afford the extra cost for a service like HOVER to help you get a lead. A service like this is valuable because it’s a way to create buy-in and increase the customer’s reward to see what they’d be investing in, so if you have the budget, an upgrade like this can help your business excel.
4. CRM Systems
As a roofing or other contracting business, you need some way to track leads and clients. A great Customer Relationship Management (CRM) system is the best way to do this.
CRMs are needed when you start to get to 50 – 100 leads a month. Don’t worry about a CRM when you’re just starting out.
There’s a great debate about which CRM is the best for contractors. Some proven options in the industry are:
Ultimately, the best CRM is the one you actually use. Make sure you have enough leads for it and make sure you actually use it. When you’re operating with less than 50 leads a month, make your CRM and follow-up process as simple and lightweight as possible.
When you’re on the come-up, you may not need to automate your lead tracking and clients, but you can still automate the follow-up process. Try Powrline— automated texting and email follow-up. You can connect it to your forms and it’ll automatically follow up with leads.
5. Custom WordPress Theme
Finally, upgrading your website design itself can be one of the best things you can do as a business owner. There are hundreds of options out there to get a cheap website built on a theme, so why would you ever pay more for a fully custom website?
Ultimately, having a custom, expandable website allows your site to grow with your business rather than constrict you. Keep in mind that design and navigation are incredibly important, but Google really cares about a good customer experience, so site speed also matters. Site speed ties in directly with who you host your website with. Common website hosts include:
Bluehost
GoDaddy
WPEngine
SiteGround
DreamHost
You want to choose a mid-premium option. There will always be options that are far cheaper and far more expensive. Over here at Hook Agency, we’re big proponents for WPEngine. At the end of the day, just don’t pick a shared hosting plan.
Keep Your Roofing Business Modern and Up-to-Date
Any one of these website upgrades will be incredibly valuable for your contracting business. Combining multiple of them will help you excel beyond belief.
Always remember to keep up with the times and accommodate what your potential customers are looking for. Using services like Company Cam help turn potential customers into paying customers.
And if you need a helping hand with your digital marketing, hit up our Google specialized team over at Hook Agency. Our proven web design, SEO, and paid ads strategies help you show up exactly where consumers are looking for you.
