In today's fast-paced, busy world, we're all -- well -- busy. Especially funeral professionals. If you happen to be reading this, chances are it's after 7pm, and you've probably just dealt with several grieving families, a few employee issues, a handful of vendor calls, one (or more) funeral services, and crunching some numbers to figure out if you're going to meet payroll. Sound familiar?And because you're so busy, it's probably why your website (if you're like 95% of most funeral professionals) has taken a back-seat to the rest of the important items on your plate. You've relegated it to contain just the basic of details of your funeral home. In fact, everything about it is pretty basic: the layout, the content, the pictures.
According to Google, there were over 50 Million searches for the term "Funeral Home" last year. What did these people see when visiting your website? Consider the following questions:
Does your website look like every other funeral home's website in your area?
- If yes, you could be giving the impression that your funeral home is just like every other funeral home in the area. Don't you want to differentiate your funeral home?
Does your website look pretty similar to what it looked like, say, 10 years ago?
- If yes, you could be giving the impression that the services you offer may be outdated.
Do you offer only very basic information about your funeral home?
- If yes, your funeral home could be perceived as no-frills. If that's your niche, maybe this is OK. But if you're trying to be the high end funeral home in town, you're doomed.
Don't worry -- there are a couple of actionable things you can do right now to reverse course:
- Create a blog: There are simple tools such as Blogger or Typepad that allow you to create content quickly, and usually for free. Creating and maintaining a blog can often be a great way to convey your brand's voice. You can also use social media properties to do this. Before you jump in though, you might want to listen to what Ryan Thogmartin has to say about creating a strategy first.
- Consult a professional: Would you call an auto-mechanic to come and fix the boiler at your house? Of course not. So consider have your website managed by a company that manages websites. There are few solid ones in this profession -- FuneralOne and DigitalEdge Websites come to mind (who as of this post, we have no commercial relationship with). A simple google search can find you many more. Consider talking to groups like these to create a web presence that actually speaks to your brand.
One thing is for sure -- staying with the status quo is likely not a viable option in order to stand out. After all, when all of these people online end up on your website -- what will they think?
