3 Biggest Mistakes Construction Companies Make With Their Website

We’ve reviewed over 1,100 large construction company websites and noticed that many of them are making the same critical mistakes. Why is this important for you to know? Because these very mistakes could be keeping you off bid lists and costing you work.  According to a recent study performed by Harvard’s Corporate Executive Board,  57% of the buying decision research for B2B (Business-to-Business) is completed before a prospect makes their first contact with your company. The scary part is that you don’t even know what you’ve missed out on.

While the overall list of mistakes is much longer, we wanted to hone in on three of the biggest mistakes so you can fix them immediately!

1. Using Flash®

Flash animations may look good, but incorporating Flash means that your mobile visitors cannot not see your website. Instead, they see this:

Statistics show that over 18% of website traffic is through a mobile device, and that number is escalating quickly. It only takes one blown opportunity to come away with a dated website that can cost you thousands of dollars. Also, Flash is difficult to update and is not search engine-friendly, which means your prospective customers will have difficulty finding your website and seeing it! Why are we talking about Flash in 2014? Because over 100 of the websites we viewed STILL use Flash, and many of them are on ENR’s Top 400 Contractors list. [How do you know if your website is using Flash? Right click the main image – if it lists any of the following options: Play, Settings, and/or About Flash Player – you have a Flash website.]

2. No Phone Number
A prospect cannot call you if you do not list your phone number. Many construction companies have a form for visitors to fill out on their contact page, which is fine, but don’t make that their only option. If you do not list your phone number because you are trying to keep salespeople at bay, you should realize that this is a small bump in the road for them, but it is a HUGE roadblock when someone is trying to give you money, like your clients and prospects.

3. No Differentiation or Soul
After viewing 1,000+ websites, there were only 15-20 of them that actually stood out to me. I realize that your prospects are not going to look at 1,000 other websites, but they will look at 7-12 of your competitors’ websites.

Try this test: Google your type of construction and one of your geographic markets, then look at the first page of every website. I’m sure at least eight of those websites will look and sound so similar to one another that they will immediately get lost in the mix. Gone are the days of “on time and on budget” being all it takes to drum up business. Today, that is merely the baseline, and you need to be stand out from the pack and be memorable in order to be successful.

If you take care of these three items, you’re already doing better than most, and the cream is what rises to the top and gets the best business.