Optimizing your insurance agency website is vital to show up in local search results. It’s also important to help searchers find the correct page on your website.
If you find the website optimization process confusing, don’t worry. I’m here to break it down for you and show you where to start.
What is website optimization? It is the process of using tools, strategies, and experiments to accomplish these four objectives:
- Improve the performance of your website
- Drive more traffic
- Increase conversions
- Grow revenue
Start with these three places to begin optimizing your insurance agency website:
- Your metadata
- Your content
- Your load speeds
Optimize Your Metadata
The metadata does not directly affect rankings, as Google does not take these into consideration. However, it is vital to make a positive first impression with potential customers.
What is Metadata?
Metadata appears on search engine results pages (SERP) under the URL. It includes the title of the page and its meta description (descriptive text below the title). (Websightdesign.com)
Title Tag
Let’s begin with the title tag.
The title tag is an HTML element that specifies the title of the web page. The title tag will appear within the tab of your website. See the image below for reference.
But, it also shows up on search results as the link title (red box).
Image Source: Google
This title tag on specific product pages should include that product. And, if you have a local focus, what city you are targeting. Many agents use the city of their primary location.
Meta Description
The meta description is a short paragraph that appears under the title tag in search results (orange box). When deciding what to include in this description, make it readable and compelling. It needs to be unique but also get the point across. You want to entice users to click on your link instead of a competitor.
Keywords
Keywords are commonly searched words or phrases that indicate intent from a user. Ranking for keyword search is a separate skill in itself. But, generally speaking, it’s a critical aspect of showing up in search results.
You can see the bolded words in the orange box. These are keywords that were included in the search query. To do keyword research for your website, we recommend the free Ubersuggest Google Chrome plugin.
To edit the title tag, meta description, or keywords for your Insurance Website Builder website, follow these simple steps.
Optimize Content on Every Product Page
After optimizing your website’s metadata on each product page, it’s time to look at its content. It is important to start with the main title, or the H1, to cover what the content is talking about and the areas you are serving. This will help with local searches.
Example: Auto Insurance in Dallas, Texas – John Smith Insurance Agency
Each product page needs a title like this. That way, when someone is searching for a specific type of insurance using the term near me, your website will be more likely to show up if you are in their area.
Google has made a few updates to its algorithm, but the most noticeable update has been its focus around content. Quality content has become critical when ranking websites in search results. Google suggests looking over the following when creating content:
- Does the content provide original information, reporting, research, or analysis?
- Does the content provide a substantial, complete, or comprehensive description of the topic?
- Does the content provide insightful analysis or interesting information that is beyond obvious?
- If the content draws on other sources, does it avoid simply copying or rewriting those sources instead of providing substantial additional value and originality?
- Does the headline and/or page title provide a descriptive, helpful summary of the content?
- Does the headline and/or page title avoid being exaggerating or shocking in nature?
- Is this the sort of page you’d want to bookmark, share with a friend, or recommend?
- Would you expect to see this content in or referenced by a printed magazine, encyclopedia, or book?
You can view more questions to ask yourself when creating content here.
Optimize Your Homepage Load Speed
The homepage is almost always going to be the top landing page of your website. To create positive first impressions with website visitors, your homepage needs to load quickly. Why? Because consumers place a lot of value in website load speed.
- Forty-seven percent of users expect a webpage to load in two seconds or less.
- Forty percent of consumers will wait no longer than three seconds for a web page to render before abandoning the website.
Load times are another SEO ranking factor. It affects more than where you rank in search engine results, though. If your website takes too long to load, consumers will look elsewhere.
To evaluate your website’s load speed, there are plenty of free tools. Page Speed, YSlow, and WebPagetest are a few useful resources to test page load speed.
Here are some factors that can influence an insurance agency’s website load speed:
1: Bad server/hosting issues
2: Poor coding standards
3: Too many features, widgets, or plugins
4: Poorly hosted images or videos
Professionally created websites typically follow site-building best practices and avoid these no-nos. Request a free website consultation to learn more about how you can optimize your website.
Website optimization is a continuous process. Make it part of your strategy to evaluate the effectiveness of your website content. Set goals and continually tweak your content. Do A/B testing to find what works best. These three places – your metadata, content, and website load speed - are great places to start.
To learn more about website optimization and search engine optimization (SEO), check out the free resources below.
- The SEO Guidebook for Insurance Agents
- The Website Traffic Manual
- Creating A Website for Your Agency
- Design Your Website to Build Trust and Generate Leads
About the Author
More Content by Amanda O'Brien
