Your website is frequently the first interaction policyholders will have with your agency. In fact, about 75 percent of visitors will judge your agency’s credibility based on how your website looks and functions. How can you ensure your agency’s homepage makes a good first impression?
8 tips to improve your homepage
Here are steps you can take to improve your agency’s website:
- Make navigation simple. According to web marketing experts, if visitors can’t find what they want within 10 seconds of landing on a webpage, they’ll move onto another insurance provider. Read that again. The person who designed your website may have a degree from a top design school, but if the site isn’t easy to navigate, all of those beautiful graphics are for naught. We’re used to looking for navigation bars at the top, middle, and/or bottom of the page; use that to your advantage—and give people access to the most important sections of your site easily. Here are some additional website navigation tips.
- Make it easy to find contact information. Whether you want your policyholders to reach out via email, phone, social media, or an online form—you should make it easy for them to get in touch with you directly.
- Make sure it’s mobile-friendly. About 50 percent of Americans search the web with a mobile device like a smartphone or tablet. You’ve likely noticed when a site isn’t optimized for smaller screens during your own mobile web searches: things look off-center, sometimes menus or links don’t work, or the page doesn’t load properly. It’s a real inconvenience. Check your agency’s website on a few different types of mobile devices (iPhone, Android, iPad, etc.) and contact your web developer if the site doesn’t look or function properly. Here are some additional tips to make your site mobile-friendly.
- Make sure your homepage (and the rest of your website) reflects your company’s brand. Branding is all of the ways you establish your agency’s image for your customers. Your website is a great tool you can—and should—use to project your agency’s brand to the world. Here are some additional tips for branding your insurance agency.
- Consider telling a story on your homepage. How can you use the art of storytelling to humanize the service you provide to draw visitors—and potential clients—into your website? What is your agency’s “why”?
- Don’t overload your site with large photos or unnecessary videos. While photos and videos may seem eye-catching, large files that take a long time to load will make your visitors move on. If a certain photo or video doesn’t help tell your agency’s story, consider losing it, or moving it to an appropriate interior page—and be sure to optimize it for easy viewing when you do.
- Add emergency alerts when appropriate. Got a COVID-19 update to share with your policyholders? Is there a weather threat in your area? Your agency should be proactive in preparing for emergencies—and your website should reflect that.
- Check your metrics and adjust accordingly. You (or someone on your team) should regularly review your website’s analytics. This can be through Google Analytics, WordPress, or whichever website hosting platform you are using. Look at where people are going on the site and how long it’s taking them to get there, and then adjust your navigation and design to make sure visitors can get to your most popular pages easily from the homepage. Also, if your site has a search function, take a look at what people are searching for and make sure you’re supplying what they need.
Thanks for reading our educational resource! Any above reference to a specific company, method, or product is meant for educational purposes only and is not specifically endorsed by Pie.
