One of the challenges that many builders face with their websites is how to effectively showcase all their content so that it is searchable and useful to the user. Today, with a major emphasis on content creation as a means of educating the consumer, it’s critical that photos, videos, resources, inventory homes and more are thoughtfully organized and effectively displayed. The goal is always to lead prospective buyers along a digital journey that pulls them deeper into your website, resulting in more conversions.
This was the challenge that Weaver Homes faced when we began working with them on their website redesign. They actually had three separate objectives, but all were solved with the addition, and smart organization and management, of content. Here’s what we did:
The Challenge: Showcase Different Product Types
Weaver Homes builds 55+ lifestyle communities and traditional single-family home communities in the Greater Pittsburgh Area. Their old website, however, didn’t offer a way to filter by community type when someone landed on the homepage. As a result, users were wasting time searching through communities that didn’t suit their lifestyle.
The Solution:
On the homepage, we asked users a simple question: “How do you want to live?” We then directed them to either the Lifestyle page or the Single-Family page. Each community summary page lists the most important information to help the user filter down to a neighborhood that’s within the location and budget they want, with the floor plans that meet their lifestyle. The result is a faster, more seamless search process.
The Challenge: Showcase Current Inventory and Self-Tour Options
Weaver Homes offers quick move-in homes of many different floor plans and home types, and needed a way to organize them, tag them, and make them easily searchable. In addition, inventory had to be displayed neatly so that web visitors would not become overwhelmed and leave. Another challenge was how to offer the self-tour option for inventory homes in a user-friendly way that was a seamless part of the web journey.
The Solution:
Quick move-in homes are now filterable by a number of criteria: community type, county, city, price, sq. ft., bedrooms, and bathrooms, allowing users to drill down to the specific type of home they’re searching for. This helps to shorten their search time on the website, identify a small number of homes that fit their exact criteria, generate urgency and excitement, and encourages them to inquire about the homes sooner in the process.
To promote the self-tour option, there is now a dedicated page in the primary navigation that explains the process and links to specific QMIs where self-guided tours are offered. Users can sign up to tour those homes at whatever date and time is convenient for them, and the sales team now has their contact information for fast and personalized follow-up.
The Challenge: Increase SEO
The Weaver Homes website was underperforming in terms of organic traffic, primarily because there was not enough content to be optimized for Google and other search engines. The content that did exist was not updated, so it was both sparse and outdated — not the kind of website Google likes to rank.
The Solution:
We created a robust website filled with optimized content that home buyers search for. This included dedicated pages for inventory, floorplans, company story, processes, and the design studio. Since the launch of the new website, organic traffic has increased by 10% year-over-year, organic search visibility by 30%, and conversions by 120%. Weaver Homes’ website is now an information-packed online home shopping destination that guides visitors seamlessly along the buyer’s journey to the point of action.
Group Two’s web development team understands what great content can do for your website, and how to showcase it all to lead to more conversions, and ultimately, more qualified prospects in your pipeline. If your home builder website is not performing as well as you’d like, or you’re not sure what type of new content to add, feel free to reach out. We’d love to help!
