Video, live chat, agency portals to insurer websites, and client risk and coverage dashboards are really great value-adds, but visitors first and foremost want to be able to find your contact information and make sure your agents can be trusted. ACT News turned to Ryan Hanley, SVP of marketing at TrustedChoice.com and editor-in-chief at AgencyNation, to get some expert advice on creating an affordable, usable, winning agency website that assists current customers and attracts new ones.

RYAN HANLEY:  They are, but those are way beyond what most independent agencies need at this point. Most agencies need to either perfect—or in some cases get—the basics. 

Start with creating a clean, crisp, professionally built site that focuses on this simple goal: help people solve their problem. Make sure you have great execution so the site is easy to use and easy to understand. It has got to work on mobile. When a consumer Googles insurance in their area or you in particular, your agency website should show up on the hit list, and the website needs to be readable and navigable on a phone or other mobile device. Any competent website developer can make this happen. 

The most frustrating thing for a consumer is to land on a page where the contact information and get-a-quote links are hard to find. Think about how you use the Internet. That is what your consumers want. Put your phone number and address in large font up front, up top. They don't want to hunt for this stuff. 

Going back to the goal of the website, you need to define what you want to accomplish before diving in to creating pages. There are two basic groups you are feeding online: those who already know your firm and want to check something online and those who have a problem they want to solve and are seeking someone's help—hopefully yours. 

For the first group, both mobile access and your landing page are important. Contact information with links to driving directions should be the easiest thing to find on your page. Driving directions and touch to call, email or visit the website should pop up as part of a basic Internet search. You know, when you Google something and there is a box with buttons running along the baseline with photos of a phone, an arrow for directions, et cetera. Make yourself accessible in multiple ways so the customer can choose what best suits them at the moment. If it takes longer than a moment to get in touch, they might not bother, and that's a customer experience that goes in the negative column. 

For the second group, the consumer who is looking to solve a problem—maybe their rates went up and they are looking for a better deal, they don't understand something, or they want new coverage—you want the answers to be available or at least to provide information that helps them get closer to an answer. That means you need to have not only easily accessible contact information but also relevant content for the most frequently asked questions.  

ACT NEWS:  Many people search for information on the fly. I hate to say while driving, but there is that reality. 

RYAN:  Having video is very helpful. They can listen to their answers. It is simple to do. You can record it using your phone. I did that at The Murray group when I was still selling insurance. I created 90-second or so answers to hundreds of basic questions, gave them simple names—"How do I add a driver to my auto policy?"—and made the videos available on our website. Add a transcription to those videos for people who want to read, and you have a really great FAQ page that serves people's needs whether they want to read or hear answers. Make sure there's a call to action, like, "Call us at this phone number to talk to an expert or get coverage" or "Click here to contact an expert or get coverage." You can use YouTube; that's a great resource that is familiar to people. 

Make sure your website has quality content. Video, like I say, is good, but standard dropdown formats can be very helpful if they are labeled well. I would say the best versions of these have a short synopsis of the issue; for example: boat insurance, here are the basics on liability and physical damage, then have a "more" button for those who want greater detail. It is on that page you can really let your expertise shine. Some people just want a little information on something they aren't familiar with, but others want to vet an agency to see if it demonstrates a depth of knowledge. I think these longer pages should not be the standard 350-word review. They should be an in-depth treatment, almost like a white paper, of—for instance—everything about Tucson homeowners insurance: special concerns that are specific to that market. Do you have special weather issues, pests, a pool? Talk about things that matter to your area. If you have great information on certain specific issues and let local business partners like banks, realtors, pest control services, pool companies, et cetera know about it, they might promote your website to their clients. We call that center-of-influence referrals, and they are great. 

You'll also want to have a testimonials page that provides reviews of your service.  

If you're going to do a blog, define your goal first. I think there are three basic components to a successful blog: (1) have some news-oriented posts, topics that are of interest at the moment; (2) have long-tail, evergreen topics that might not get a burst of traffic but will respond well to search engine optimization tactics—hits on words typically searched, like "car insurance in Springfield"; and (3) post stories and photos that endear people to your agency—your charity events, staff personal achievements, human interest stuff. Then push your blog posts out on social media so you generate some hits. 

ACT NEWS:  There's an affordability concern at most agencies. 

RYAN:  This is an area that really gets me going. Building a good website is not that complicated and shouldn't be that expensive. I hear some agency principals tell me they are getting bids of $5,000, $10,000 to redesign a website. That is nuts. I would say $2,500 should be the ballpark. Maybe there will be a $100 a month upkeep fee. You do need to redesign or refresh your site every two years because of advances in technology and browser changes, so, yes, cost is a factor. But hire a professional group that knows your industry and you should get a good product at a reasonable cost. If you don't have someone in mind, ask other agencies whose websites you like who they used. 

ACT NEWS:  I'll plug ACT also. ACT members can be a great resource for that kind of information. 

RYAN:  The key questions you want to ask when creating your web presence are: why would someone love this page, who is our audience, and how will what we have here drive new business and serve current customers. When you get the basics perfected and have thousands of visitors a month, you might get to the point where you want to expand into some of the 301-level stuff, like live chat, that really start solving customer friction points. You'll know when you are there, and then you can start thinking about what resources you'll need to support that expansion. It does take more human resources. But first things first: perfect the basics.