Your homepage is the most important real estate on your health coach website. Even if people first land on a different website page, most of them will check out the homepage if they want to find out more about you.
That makes your homepage prime real estate! And if it’s done right, it will help you get more health coaching clients.
Unfortunately, very few people know how to create a good homepage. In fact, there are 3 common mistakes I see over and over again. I’ll cover them here. And I’ll also tell you how to fix them … and turn your homepage into a client magnet!
Mistake #1: Getting The Most Important Part of The Homepage Wrong
The headline section is the most important part of your homepage. That’s the part a person sees before they start to scroll.
Just how important is it? Well, if your homepage is considered prime real estate, the headline is the most expensive waterfront property.
When it’s done right, the headline section of your site will get people excited to find out more about you. Unfortunately, most of the sites I see don’t take advantage of this section. That’s a missed opportunity and can start things off on the wrong foot with your site visitor.
Here’s the biggest mistake I see …
Most sites use this part to feature the coach. They have a picture of the coach, their name, and often their credentials, such as Registered Dietitian, Hypnotherapist, or Personal Trainer.
The only time this approach might work is if you know that the “online brochure” type of site is best to support your business. (If you’re not sure which kind of health coach website is right for you, this article will help you decide.)
The other mistake I see with this area is that the space doesn’t say anything relevant to the site visitor. For example, it may have a beautiful picture of something like smoothies, or produce, or an inspiring quote.
Whatever it is, it doesn’t tell the website visitor if the health coach can help them.
Exactly What to Put on The Most Important Part of Your Site
Instead, this part of your website should grab the site visitor’s attention and wow them! And there’s a trick to getting this right …
You have to know your audience and the kind of message that will resonate strongly with them. That means you have to know who your ideal client is. In other words, you have to have a niche.
If you haven’t picked a niche yet, now’s the time. It will be #1 game-changer for your coaching business. My friend and marketing mentor, Brian Kurtz, says, “The power of choosing a niche should never be underestimated when bringing products and services to the marketplace.”
The reason why a niche is so important is that it makes every single thing you do to market your business work much, MUCH better. Including your website. So much so that picking a niche is one of the keys to creating an in-demand health & wellness coaching business.
Download How to Create an In-Demand Health & Wellness Coaching Business
Getting back to your homepage, one good way to think of it like a magazine cover. While people are first attracted to the photo on the cover, it’s usually the headline or one of the “cover blurbs” that makes people want to buy it.
And that brings me to the second mistake I see most often …
Mistake #2: Using The Wrong Images
As I said, magazines use the cover photo to get people’s attention. The right image can actually double magazine sales. So there’s a lot of thinking that goes into it.
Luckily, it’s a lot easier to pick the right images for your site.
The thing to keep in mind about images is that they send messages directly into your site visitor’s brain. That’s why they’re so powerful. And that’s also why you need to consider them an important part of your messaging.
A lot of health coach websites use images that send the wrong message … or they send a message that confuses the site visitor. Let me give you an example.
Let’s say a health coach helps people lose weight. And the photo or graphic on the headline part of their site shows several beautifully colored smoothies surrounded by a spread of fruits and vegetables.
Here are some of the messages a picture like that might convey:
- You’ll be drinking a lot of smoothies if you work with this coach!
- This coach takes a vegan or plant-based approach
- If you like meat, fish, and poultry, you’re out of luck
If those aren’t the types of messages you want to convey, then that kind of picture wouldn’t support your messaging.
So what kind of images should you use?
To answer that, let’s take a look at what your website should be doing for you.
The Real Purpose of a Health Coach Website
The purpose of your website is to position you as the best possible health coach for your site visitor. Your website visitor most likely has a health problem or goal. And they’re checking you out to see if you can help them with it.
So the results you help people get are an important part of your messaging. And one of the best ways to convey this is with pictures.
The pictures you use on your site should help the site visitor see what their future will be like if they work with you. In copywriting, we call this “future pacing.” It plants seeds of hope and lets your site visitor imagine what’s possible.
When I help health and wellness coaches with their websites, we create a future-pacing section right under the headline. This is usually a combination of images and text. The text will use a word or short phrase that describes one of the key benefits their ideal client is looking for … and the picture will illustrate it in action.
So look for pictures that will help your future client see what their life will be like once they get your help. What are the main benefits they’re looking forward to? Do they want to look great in a bathing suit? Do they want the energy to enjoy their favorite activities? Do they want the mental sharpness to play Scrabble or do a crossword puzzle?
You get the idea.
Now when it comes to positioning you as the best coach for your site visitor, there’s something else your website has to do. This is particularly crucial for health and wellness coaches.
You see, it’s not enough to show your site visitor the results they’ll get working with you. You also have to show them how they’ll get these results. Because there’s a very good chance they’ve already tried a bunch of things that didn’t work. So they’ll be skeptical…and they’ll have their guard up.
That brings me to the third mistake I see on health coach websites …
Mistake #3: Not Showing What Makes You Different
These days, health and wellness coaches are a dime a dozen. And you’re also competing against supplements and products that promise similar results.
The bottom line is, if you want to build a successful health coaching business, you need to show people why they’ll get results with you … even if the other things they’ve tried haven’t worked.
One of the best ways to do this is to show them you have a plan. I call it your Signature System. Now I’m not talking about a program or course you might be offering. What I’m talking about here is a marketing message … one that tells them, in simple terms, how they’ll get from where they are now to where they want to be.
Now, this part is really important. Ideally, your Signature System will address some kind of hidden factor or pitfall that’s stopped them from getting results in the past. (When you can do that, it turns your Signature System into a magic wand!)
To create your Signature System, think about what they need to do and why it’s important for the results they want.
For example, let’s say you help people lose weight. And part of your philosophy maybe about how inflammation shuts down people’s metabolism and causes them to store fat. Your Signature System could be:
- Calm Inflammation
- Restore Metabolism
- Release Fat
You would introduce your Signature System on the homepage and then go into more detail on the About page.
So that’s a quick look at the 3 most common mistakes health and wellness coach websites make on their homepage. If you make the few changes I suggested here, you’ll have the foundation of a health coach website that will help you get more clients!
If you want a more detailed look at how to create your Signature System and the other marketing assets you need to build your coaching business, download my free resource, How to Create an In-Demand Health & Wellness Coaching Business.
