What Is The Story We Are Telling On The Homepage, And How Do We Tell It?

The Lede:

Without a clear understanding of what needs to be accomplished with the homepage we’re bound to miss the mark.

Let’s look at how one might use particular text and images to tell The Story.

1. Recognize Our Visitor’s Challenges

We recognize that you have an issue/ a challenge /a pain. We know you, we understand you, we understand this situation.

Identify our target audience’s main concerns and acknowledge them. 

• For example: Our target audience wants to move out of a dense urban area and into a more rural area with a high quality of life. Our main hero image could be a serene landscape, a lake perhaps, with a smattering of homes dotted on the shore. Overlaying this beautiful, calming image is a bold statement such as, “Leave The Noise Behind.” Include a few more words below in smaller text to support that claim, “Life is just better in Greenville, NC*.” Finish it off with a clear call to action button/link: “Make your move.” This links to the ways to initiate a conversation with us (email, phone, text).

2. Provide Resolutions To Their Challenges.

We have what you need to overcome your challenge. Our skills, our knowledge, our product, and our experience will guide you to resolution.

• Continuing with the example above we need to round out our certain understanding of their concerns, and offer solutions.
  Choose only local images (not stock) and couple them with simple claims and offers build on their trust that we understand their hurdles.
  A few ideas:
  – Why We All Love Greenville (links to a page full of reasons and calls to action).
  – Get A Personal Tour From Greenville’s Relocation Expert (call to action).
  – Let’s Go See Homes You’ll Love Before They Hit The Market (call to action).
  – Is Greenville a Perfect Match for Your Family? (call to action).

The reason the above are so effective is because we are not just offering what everyone else is offering. We’re telling The Story that we are the guide to help them resolve their concerns. We are not just stating that we have been doing this a long time, and here are the tools everyone else offers (property search, featured listings, home values, etc). We are considering their specific needs and acknowledging them and offering resolution.

Pro Tip for Step 2. (If you can stick with it) Blogging with The Story in mind allows us to show a dedication to our target audience’s education all the while resolving their concerns. I can see the headlines now: How To Best Get To Know Greenville, NC In One Weekend. What Made Us Fall In Love With Greenville, NC. What Locals Do For Fun In Greenville, NC. What Locals Do When Their Family Comes To Visit Greenville, NC. The Top 10 Questions We Hear From People Moving To Greenville, NC. Feel free to steal any of these as primers for your blog.

3. Showcase The Trust of Others

We want to illustrate that others have taken this path before and we successfully guided them to overcome their challenge. This is done with testimonials (and images/video of past clients when possible) that directly express that we have helped them with the same challenges and concerns of our visitor.

Avoid lengthy client quotes – trim them if necessary. Keep it direct and to the point. A few perfect ones are better than long, fluffy ones that never get read.

4. The Introduction

Now that they trust that we understand them, and are capable of helping them, we introduce ourselves, our approachability, our willingness to help and connect immediately, our level of relevant experience, and the like.

If we introduce ourselves too strongly, too soon in The Story, then it can come off that we want the visitor to become part of our story, rather than us helping guide them through theirs.

Note: The above isn’t as much a rule as it is a suggestion. If your face, look, and name are a big part of your brand – then I can see the draw towards introducing yourself earlier on in The Story.

5. Call To Action

All throughout The Story above we should sprinkle in specific calls to action, but it is imperative that we close the homepage Story with specific requests for action. Just as a sales appointment should end with an action item (close a deal, schedule a next appointment, initiate paperwork, etc.) the homepage story needs to end with a strong call to action.

Reiterate and encourage that they communicate with us that they are ready to share in the solving of their challenge.

• Come for the weekend. Let me show you why we moved to Greenville, NC.
  (call to action links to contact)

*I’ve never been to Greenville, NC. I’ve heard it’s a very nice place to live, and therefore made for a fine example in this exercise.

If you would like to take a deeper dive on understanding how to tell the Homepage Story is just let us know. At no charge to you, we’d be happy to discuss this important topic. We’re available by email, text, phone, chat, or feel free to schedule an appointment at any time.