Your Website Is Costing You Leads (Here's Why)

If you're a service-based business owner looking to double your website conversions, book a call with my team NOW: https://eastbound.digital/book-now/ 
 
🔗 Grab our FREE training here: https://tradies.eastbound.digital/free-training 
 
In this episode of Marketing for Tradies, Shannon reveals why sending paid ad traffic to your main website is basically burning money. She walks through the three critical components of a high-converting landing page that actually turns clicks into leads and jobs booked. 
Most tradies think their website is their lead generation tool. 
 
But here's the hard truth: your website is a digital brochure. A landing page is a conversion machine. When you get this right, inbound leads can double or even triple almost overnight. 
 
This episode covers: 
◼️ Why your main website is costing you leads from paid ads 
◼️ The three critical components of a high-converting landing page 
◼️ How to create a distraction-free experience that keeps customers focused 
◼️ The headline formula that confirms customers are in the right place 
◼️ The call to action that actually converts hot leads into jobs 

 00:00:00 Introduction 
 00:00:11  From Inconsistent Leads to Predictable Jobs 
 00:00:35 The #1 Mistake Killing Your Paid Traffic 
 00:01:15  Why Your Website Isn’t Built to Convert 
 00:02:00 Website Visitors vs Ready-to-Buy Leads 
 00:02:45  What Actually Makes a Landing Page Convert 
 00:03:30 Remove Distractions, Increase Conversions 
 00:04:15  Why Navigation Bars Hurt Your Results 
 00:05:00  The Library vs Emergency Room Mindset 
 00:05:45  Writing Headlines That Solve Real Problems 
 00:06:45  The Simple Service + Location Formula 
 00:07:45  Calls to Action That Actually Convert 
 00:08:30  “Get a Quote” vs “Contact Us” 
 00:09:30  Make It Easy to Take Action (Call + Form) 
 00:10:15  Why Action Words Drive More Leads

Stay Connected:

• Eastbound Digital Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/eastbounddigital_/
• Shannon's Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/shannonbain1/
• LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/shannon-bain-2a18b2105/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/eastbounddigitalagency

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Why you should be sending traffic to a high converting landing page and not a generic website. If you get this wrong and you send ad traffic to a generic website, you are basically burning money or throwing it down the drain. A proper high converting landing page has no exit signs, there's no navigation bar, there is only one passboard, and that is your call tag. On your main website, a headline like Sydney's Most Trusted Builder is fine for branding. But on a landing page, it's just too generic. If your headline doesn't immediately scream, I solve this specific problem, the visitor will assume they're in the wrong place and leave. The final component of a landing page that can burst is to use an effective call to action and make sure that it's easy and accessible for people to find. The final component of a landing page that can burst is to use an effective call to action and make sure that it's easy and accessible for people to find. It should be a big Welcome to Marketing for Tradies, the podcast where we help trades and service-based businesses with straight-up marketing advice to get more leads and win more jobs. I'm your host, Shannon, and my agency has helped over a hundred businesses go from inconsistent work and relying on word of mouth to getting a steady flow of jobs coming in every single week. In this podcast, I'm walking you through simple practical strategies that actually help you grow your business without the guesswork. So let's get into it. Today we're talking about the simple funnel that actually gets tradies' jobs booked. And more importantly, in this episode, we're gonna settle the debate about why you should be sending traffic to a high converting landing page and not a generic website. If you get this wrong and you send ad traffic to a generic website, you are basically burning money or throwing it down the drain. You're driving traffic from ads, but the phone isn't ringing, and it's because you're sending those valuable leads into a digital maze that's designed to make them get lost. Now, most business owners think their main website is their lead generation tool. And it makes sense, right? You have a website, why wouldn't you send people there if you start running ads? But here's the hard truth your website's job is not to convert leads from ads. Your website is a digital brochure or capability statement at best. Its job is to serve everyone. Referrals checking you out, existing customers looking for your details, even potential employees. It has to have an about page, a gallery, a list of services. It's a general purpose tool. But a hot lead from an ad is not just everyone. They are one person with one specific urgent problem. They don't need a brochure, they need a solution. And for that, you need a special purpose tool. A simple, ruthlessly efficient landing page designed for one job and one job only, converting that visitor into a lead. We've seen it dozens of times when a client has come to us with a beautiful website they've had done that isn't generating any leads from their ads. We build them a simple high converting landing page using our frameworks, restructure their ads, and send the same ad traffic to it, and their inbound leads double or even triple almost overnight. The difference is using the right tool for the right job and sending people to the right place. So in this episode, I'm gonna walk you through the three critical components of a landing page that's built to convert and show you exactly why it works for paid ad traffic better than your main generic website. Starting with the first component of a landing page that actually converts, a dedicated distraction-free experience. This is not like your main website. So on your main website, it's gonna have a lot of things that are gonna be great for building authority for your brand. It's also gonna have a navigation bar with links to pages like home, about, gallery, the contact page, different things that people can browse through. But for a hot lead coming from an ad, all those links are doing is providing exit signs, exit ramps, ways for them to get distracted and pull them away from the one action you want them to take. A homeowner with a burst pipe or that needs a new roof or is looking to get a retaining wall who just clicked on an ad doesn't need a self-guided tour of your company history. They have a problem, a need, a goal, a desire, and they are looking for a solution right now. A proper high converting landing page has no exit signs. There's no navigation bar. There is only one path forward, and that is your call to action, which is generally to get a quote or call. So think of it like this: your main website is a library. It's a place for people to browse and explore. A landing page is an emergency room. You don't want someone with a critical injury wandering around the library. You want them in a straight hallway with one door at the end that says, get help now. This is the foundation of the entire funnel that any trades business needs that's gonna generate leads and get jobs booked. You must send your ad traffic to a separate dedicated page that has absolutely no navigation at the top. And that single change is the first step to building a funnel that actually converts. The second component is the headline at the very top of the landing page. Its only job is to confirm to the visitor that they're in the right place to solve their immediate problem. On your main website, a headline like Sydney's Most Trusted Builder is fine for branding, but on a landing page, it's just too generic. If your headline doesn't immediately scream, I solve this specific problem, the visitor will assume they're in the wrong place and leave. A headline that gets you calls and leads is about the customer's problem. It says things like reliable roof leak repairs for Sydney's Eastern suburbs or on-time electrician for renovations in Perth. It's specific, it's clear, and it speaks directly to the person who clicks the ad. So what I want you to do is look at the headline on the page you send ad traffic to right now. Does it clearly state the specific service and location for the problem a customer is trying to solve? If not, it's not gonna get you as many leads and jobs as it would if you used a formula that's so so simple but is just service for location. So you want to expand on that, but the generic framework of that headline should outline the service that you're providing and the location that you provide that in. The final component of a landing page that converts is to use an effective call to action and make sure that it's easy and accessible for people to find. It should be a big, obvious, clickable button or a form right in the hero banner. You should not be asking people just to contact you. So this is fine on your generic website for general inquiries, but for a hot lead from an ad, it's gonna kill the amount of conversions coming through because people want to be requesting things like to get a quote or a free inspection or to get something in return. There's gonna be an additional step for any trades business. So you want to put that as your call to action. No one wants to contact a business to just have a conversation unless they're a low-quality lead. So using terminology like get a quote or get your inspection or design an assessment or whatever it is for your business that's relevant for you, you want to use that as your call to action and have the ability for people to call you and make sure that the call button is clickable. So the difference between using terminology like that, that's more generic and designed for a generic main website compared to a landing page that's built to convert, and the terminology being more action-focused, is can make a huge difference in terms of the number of conversions that come through. Remember that a homeowner looking for a tradee from an ad is ready to hire someone now. And someone that's further down their buying journey and has that intent are gonna want to get a quote, an inspection, an assessment of some sort. They're gonna want to start the conversation and someone to come out and provide them with pricing and to understand what they need to do next. So if you're just asking people to contact you compared to get a free quote or terminology like that, you will find that conversions won't be as high because the mindset of someone that is looking for a fast solution and is ready to convert or buy right now is going to be more likely to want to take the next step in their buyer's journey, which in many cases for our clients is to get a quote, get an assessment, an inspection, or something along those lines. So when you do move from using a generic main website for your ads to a high converting landing page, replace your contact us call to action with a more prominent, clear, easy to access call to action, like get a free quote with a form and allow people to call you directly from that page as well. So a lot of people are gonna want to call trades businesses, but those two should be the defining calls to action on a high converting landing page. So let's recap a little bit here. Your website should not be used for paid traffic, you should have a dedicated landing page, and that landing page is the foundation of a high converting sales funnel that is gonna get you more leads and jobs booked. When you make this landing page, make sure that it's a dedicated, distraction-free experience. So no navigation, no exit signs, or minimize them at least. Have a crystal clear problem-solving headline, and three, make sure that your call to action is obvious, easy to use, and actionable. That's it. So just remember your website is great for authority. You do need it. But a high converting landing page is specifically designed to take paid traffic and turn it into leads. And this is just one step inside of the tradies marketing system, which is all about building a high performance, high converting funnel for trades businesses that want to sell more services. So if you want to see how we build this lead generation machine for our clients, you can click the link below to book a call with our team and we'll show you exactly what your funnel would look like and give you a plan to get it built. So don't let another lead slip through the cracks. No more sending paid traffic to your main website. Thank you for tuning in to the Marketing for Tradies podcast. If you got something out of this episode, don't forget to like, follow, and subscribe or leave us a review on whatever platform you're listening on. And if you're a service based business owner who'd rather have someone handle your marketing for you, book a call with my team using the link below and let's see how we can help.