What No One Tells You About Funeral Home Websites
What’s more important: eating balanced meals or exercising regularly?
Most of us can agree that maintaining a healthy lifestyle is important. But even though we understand being healthy is essential, many of us fail to consistently apply healthy habits to our lives. We struggle to eat the right foods, stay physically active, sleep long enough, and do other things that will help us improve our health.
The challenge isn’t our understanding of “why” we should be healthy or what’s more important. Both healthy eating and exercise are essential. It’s the “how” that gives us problems.
How can I make a lifestyle change in the middle of a busy season of life?
How do I choose the right foods in a grocery store with millions of options?
How do I maintain consistency in my meals and exercise?
Understanding the “why” can often be straightforward, but wrestling with the “how” can lead to frustration and stall progress. The conflict between “why” and “how” can also impact other parts of your life, like your funeral home. Specifically, your funeral home website.
You’ve likely heard about how vital your website is to your funeral home. There are many resources available that discuss the need for funeral home websites to look great, use new technology, and guide families through their preneed and at-need options.
But has anyone shown you how to do any of that?
>>> Click here to learn why your website should be your funeral home’s new storefront.
Before your website can properly serve new families and your business, you need a plan to make it welcoming to families, use time-saving integrations, and effectively market your merchandise.
Here are 3 “how-to” strategies that can help you make all that possible.
1. How to make your funeral home website look welcoming
From the landscaping outside to the chairs in your arrangement room, you likely gave a lot of thought to making your funeral home welcoming and comforting. You understand why making families feel at ease is important and how to make your funeral home feel that way.
The same goes for your website.
According to a study on website design, it takes the average person 0.05 seconds (that’s 50 milliseconds!) to make a first impression of your website. A website that looks simple, easy to navigate, and up-to-date can help you show respect to a grieving family.
Your website can be a place that encourages peace, not adds to their stress because they can’t find what they need.
Make your website welcoming by:
– Utilizing white space to make it easier for families to read your content.
– Listing only the most important details on your homepage so you don’t overwhelm families.
– Using calls to action to direct families to the answers they’re looking for and their next steps.
– Being mobile-friendly and working just as well on cell phones as on laptops and desktops.
>>> Discover more helpful tips on how to make your website look welcoming and inviting to families.
2. How to use timesaving integrations
It’s important to make your funeral home website an extension of your service to families, but you also want to ensure that it maximizes your efficiency.
Your website can improve your funeral home’s reporting, case management, preneed and aftercare programs, and more by using innovative technology and timesaving integrations. These will help you focus more on caring for families and less on data entry.
Integrations help your website send and receive information online from other digital platforms. These connections share data to help you optimize your processes, improve your services, and identify areas of improvement.
There are two types of integrations: one-way and two-way. One-way integrations send information from one platform to another, while two-way integrations have data travel back and forth between your website and other platforms. You need both to maximize your website.
Best one-way integrations
Reporting: Your funeral home can’t improve without a record of your performance. To ensure your business is efficient, use a reporting integration (like Google Analytics) to understand the state of your business.
Leads: Your preneed program is the lifeblood of your funeral home. You need an efficient way to track, organize, and follow up with families interested in you. Use a customer relationship management (CRM) integration to make sure you connect with all of those interested in your services.
Content Widgets: Have you seen other websites with Facebook posts and Google reviews on their homepage? These websites use widgets – powerful tools to help improve your website’s functionality and content.
Best two-way integrations
Case Management: A two-way integration for case management allows your funeral home to send and receive information about your business and families. Specific case management integrations (like Passare) allow funeral homes to transfer obituaries from the case management platform to the funeral home’s website, eliminating the need to post the obituary twice.
Website Management: Some two-way integrations truly are time savers for you and your staff. The integration with Tukios lets funeral professionals edit obituaries on the funeral home’s website, which are automatically updated in the case management platform. That way, the obituary can be updated just once.
>>> See more time-saving integrations that can help you serve families and manage your business.
3. How to connect with online consumers
In a consumer study we did, we learned 57% of families are most concerned about cost when planning a funeral.
Many families who enter your funeral home are unsure about what to expect, but you can change that. And a great place to educate families is on your website.
Many of today’s families look for answers on social media or Google. You need a plan to drive traffic from these platforms to your website so that families can find accurate information and learn more about your funeral home.
This article explains 6 strategies you can use to encourage families to visit your website from Facebook. For Google, you’ll want to use Google ads to reach families who are searching for funeral prices and other funeral-related topics in your area.
Once you’ve gotten families to your funeral home’s website from other online platforms, you can introduce them to your prices and options in one of two ways:
– Direct families to your online planning tool to clearly showcase your packages and prices.
– Use calls to action to encourage families to meet with you so you can fully explain their options.
Either way, your funeral home is involved through every step of a family’s planning process. But before you can educate families on their options, you have to know how to connect with online consumers.
Make your funeral home website an extension of your service.
Your website is more than your digital storefront; it’s a way for you to connect with families, manage your business, and serve your community.
But it all starts with knowing how to get started. And having the time to dedicate to improving your website.
We believe your time should be spent serving families. That’s why we can handle all your website needs.
Our digital marketing packages include website management designed to make your website attract families, guide families to an easier planning process, and more.
From how your website looks to how it operates, we’ll take care of everything.
Fill out the form to meet with our team and get a demo.
Want to learn more about funeral home websites? Click below!
– Can A Custom Website Help Grow Your Funeral Home?
– 6 Must-Haves for Every Funeral Home Website
– 4 Reasons to Make Your Website Your Funeral Home’s New Storefront
