When you run a contracting company, your website is a representation of your business on the web. In this day and age, it is often the first point of contact between your company and potential customers, and as such is very important to get right.

If you’d like your website to attract more customers, take a look at these five helpful tools.

1. Google Keyword Planner

If you don’t already have one, sign up for a free Google Adwords account to get access to their Keyword Planner tool. This tool will show you which keywords people are searching for which are relevant to your business, which you can then incorporate into the content of your website.

With this tool, you can also search by location to see how many people in your area are searching for services like yours, so you can target them by incorporating exactly which words they use to find local companies like yours.

2. A blog

The benefits of blogging for your contracting website are two-fold: first of all, regularly publishing blogs helps you show off your expertise and, second of all, blogs can help to attract more traffic to your site.

Speaking to the first benefit, one easy starting point is to write blogs related to questions you frequently receive from your customers. Doing this shows how knowledgeable you are and can also save you some time in terms of answering questions.

Your blog is another area where you can incorporate keywords that you discovered in the Keyword Planner, helping you attract more traffic.

500 words per post is a good amount to aim for.

3. Pictures of your projects

Your website should be visual. Getting professional pictures taken is oftentimes worth the investment. These pictures can serve as a portfolio of your work for homeowners who are looking for a contractor to hire for their projects.

For people who are shopping around online for a contractor, a picture is worth over a thousand words. They want to see the quality of your work before reaching out to you.

If you don’t have the budget to hire a professional, taking pictures with a smart phone in good lighting should suffice.

4. Customer testimonials

A happy customer is an invaluable asset to your business. Testimonials from satisfied customers are an important form of social proof to include on your website. When you’re done with your jobs, ask your clients to provide you with a review to post on your site. A collection of positive testimonials will speak volumes to potential customers browsing your website.

If you already have reviews on your Facebook page, Houzz profile, Yelp, or Google My Business page, you can also embed these into your website. 

5. Responsive design

Your website’s design must be responsive, which means that it adapts to the size of the screen from which it is being viewed. Whether your site is being viewed on a computer or a cell phone, it should adjust accordingly and maintain readability. If your website design is not responsive, it could be penalized by Google and other major search engines, resulting in less traffic.

These five tools will help you make your website for your contracting business more effective. Once your website is ready, you can start promoting it on social media as a starting point for those who want to work with you. You can read our blog post about taking control of social media here.