What makes a great Home/Landing Page in Local?

[StefanEarly]

I have read many times that your home/landing page is the most important page on your website, so I thought it would be interesting to start a discussion on what makes a great local home/landing page for small businesses.

I know you should make your contact details and operating hours visible and link to your main pages but there are lots of other things to consider, like what is the primary purpose of the home page? What are the essentials? Should you mention all your services or main products? How long should the page be? Should you embed a google map as well?

Thanks in advance for any replies

 

[Colan Nielsen]

Hey @StefanEarly I'd suggest that all the items in this example can be applied to the homepage as well.

 

[skyalphabet]

Because this is a search forum (SEO) and the question is about optimizing a local landing page for conversions, we would be inclined to pursue the following strategy:

1. Attract as much local traffic as possible by ensuring your city name is in all of the important places: page title (known as SEO title if you use Yoast with Wordpress), Heading 1 (don't use more than one H1), meta description and (very important) alt-text for the images.
2. Ensure your Google My Business is up to date and all service descriptions include your city name. Write a few posts that link to your home page. You can keep reposting these every 14 days if you don't want to write new ones.
3. Make sure the subheadings on the page (known as H2s) are based on related keywords. So if you are a mechanical contractor in Vermont, your H1 and page title would be "Mechanical Contractor Vermont" and the H2s might be "Pipe-Fitting for Vermont General Contractors," "HVAC Solutions for Multi-Family Residences," "Water Filtration for New Construction" and so on.
4. Make the page long. As long as you can. People love to scroll and Google loves to crawl.
Best wishes!

 

[MiriamEllis]

For me, one of the most influential aspects of any homepage is a USP that incorporates a statement of business ethics. I need to know the basics about location and product/service availability, but in choosing one brand over another, any content that builds consumer-brand affinity is tops in my book for conversions. Check out Patagonia's homepage as a great example of this: Patagonia Outdoor Clothing & Gear

 

[StefanEarly]

Thanks so much for the replies,
@Colan Nielsen - That screenshot from Carrie's presentation is awesome! I will definitely be using that as a reference moving forward, not just for home pages but content in general.
@skyalphabet - Great insights on Headers and page length.
@MiriamEllis - Excellent suggestions to include a "USP that incorporates a statement of business ethics" and "build consumer-brand affinity" both of which I had not previously considered
Sometimes getting the basics right like building a great home page can be harder than it seems, and all of these ideas are super helpful.

 

[AidanSEO]

I have read many times that your home/landing page is the most important page on your website, so I thought it would be interesting to start a discussion on what makes a great local home/landing page for small businesses.

I know you should make your contact details and operating hours visible and link to your main pages but there are lots of other things to consider, like what is the primary purpose of the home page? What are the essentials? Should you mention all your services or main products? How long should the page be? Should you embed a google map as well?

Thanks in advance for any replies

Thinking in more old school terms, the homepage is technically the "index page" of the site. That being said, the homepage should briefly discuss all the aspects of the company and services/products offered.

For example, with a HVAC company in Chicago, Illinois, the homepage title would be something like "HVAC Company Chicago Illinois | <Company Name>" and cover each service provided on the homepage like "Air Conditioning Repair", "Heating Repair" etc. The internal pages would then focus on those services in a local sense, being titled like "Air Conditioning Repair Chicago Illinois | <Company Name>".

You also want to showcase your review badges, association badges like BBB, and any satisfaction guarantee or money back guarantees that you offer. These are known as "friction reducers" which put the customer at ease and trust in the quality of services you provide.

 

[StefanEarly]

@AidanSEO - Excellent suggestions on Page titles and writing up the main services, and I really like the concept of using "friction reducers" such as reviews or money back guarantees.