TRIBUTE VIDEOS
Easy-to-create cinematic-quality memorial videos for familes. With nearly 200 intros and endings, almost 400 licensed songs, 850 high-quality stock video clips, and 500 themes for DVD packaging, you can create a meaningful, completely personalized video for families in minutes. C O N TA C T U S F O R M O R E I N F O , O R V I S I T O U R W E B S I T E TO D O W N LOA D T R I B U T E C E N T E R F O R F R E E !
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ISSUE 14
Table of Contents
Ways to 06 Simple Customize Your
You Know 23 Do All the Features
Funeral Home’s Website
of Your FrazerPowered Website?
Show families how your funeral home stands out from the rest with these tips.
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Be More Productive with a Frazer-Powered Funeral Home Website Learn how Frazerpowered websites are designed with busy funeral directors in mind!
Families 11 What Look for When
Going to a Funeral Home Website When families visit your funeral home’s website, they are looking for these specific features.
Your funeral home website can become a business solution for your firm.
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F E AT U R E A R T I C L E
What Makes a Good Funeral Home Website? Your funeral home can’t just have any ordinary website design and expect to have a successful online presence.
Flexible 27 How Payment Options Benefit You and Your Families
Show families you care by offering them multiple ways to pay for their funeral expenses.
Pay Turns 28 Tribute Your Frazer Funeral Home Website into a Business Solution
Let your Frazer-powered website do some of the work for you.
a Responsive 36 How Website Makes
Viewing Obituaries Easier Many families come to your website to view their loved one’s obituary. Make it a positive experience.
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F E AT U R E A R T I C L E
Why Your Funeral Home Needs a Responsive Website A responsive website is a must if you want your funeral home’s website to be mobile-friendly.
38 Employee Features Meet two members of our Frazer family — Brooks and Monica — and see what they have to say about website customization.
Benefits of 41 The Tribute Store for
Your Funeral Home Tribute Store creates an easier process for your funeral home, families, and local florists.
Top Website 44 The Design Mistakes to Watch out for
Avoid these website design mistakes on your funeral home’s website.
Your Funeral 46 Why Home Should Have a Blog
Having a blog on your website comes with all kinds of benefits.
Letter from the Editor Dear readers, Welcome to The Meaningful Funeral magazine, an exclusive publication by Frazer Consultants. Our goal with this magazine is to be a resource for your funeral home and to help you learn new skills, keep up with funeral trends, and serve your current client families in more meaningful ways. This issue is all about funeral home website customization and how a good website design helps your funeral home’s business. By having a custom funeral home website, you can design it to be easy to read and navigate. Not only does a responsive, customized design look visually appealing, it also helps increase website traffic and gather new leads. In this issue, we’ll discuss all the benefits of having a custom, well-built funeral home website. Want to read The Meaningful Funeral on the go? Every issue is available for free on our website, all you have to do is visit frazerconsultants.com/meaningful and click “Resources” at the top of the page. I hope you enjoy reading this issue of The Meaningful Funeral, and I look forward to hearing your feedback. If you have any suggestions for future magazine content, we would love to hear them — just email us at marketing@frazerconsultants.com. And if you really love our content, visit frazerconsultants.com/meaningful and sign up for our newsletter to have fresh content and funeral news delivered to your inbox every week!
M AT T F R A Z E R P R E S I D E N T, F R A Z E R C O N S U LTA N T S
Exciting website customization options are on their way! It’s our commitment to build you a one-of-a-kind website that showcases everything your firm has to offer. So, we are excited to announce that more website customization options will soon be available to Frazer clients. With these options, our designers will be able to make your website even more unique to your funeral home’s brand. S TAY T U N E D F O R W H E N W E I M P L E M E N T T H E S E E X C I T I N G N E W F E AT U R E S !
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Simple Ways to Customize Your Funeral Home’s Website Show your local families how your funeral home is different than the rest. With a Frazer-powered website, your funeral home will stand out from your competitors.
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As more funeral homes get websites, it’s important to have a website that isn’t cookie cutter. Our production team’s main goal is to customize a website to highlight what’s special about your business. This is important because your website is often the first impression families get of your funeral home. So, let’s dive into how we can help you customize your website in order to make it stand out in the sea of other websites. O U R W E B S I T E PA C K A G E S
At Frazer Consultants, we have three tiers of packages. They are custom, custom plus, and custom ultimate. While all our packages allow customization, the higher the tier, the more we can tailor it to your specific business. S TA N D O U T F R O M T H E R E S T
Some of the basic ways you can customize your website are to choose a theme color that matches your existing branding. This way, your entire brand has a cohesive feel. We recommend you use the same colors on your website, social media accounts, and marketing materials. This way families can easily identify your brand and your funeral home comes off as more professional and put together. A layout design that highlights what’s most important to your business is important too. For instance, if you offer alternative kinds of services such as alkaline hydrolysis or natural burial, you should showcase them. These are
often selling points for families with these specific end-of-life preferences. Some additional personal touches include updating your logo, adding photos of your facilities to give people an idea of what they’re walking into, and videos if you have them. OUR STREAMLINED PROCESS
After your funeral home enters the website production process, you’ll be assigned a project manager who will guide you through the entire website creation process. They’re experts in this field, so they can help make sure your website truly reflects your business, services, and what you’re all about. Our goal is to create a website that showcases what you have to offer and then launch it as quickly as possible so that you can begin to use some of the Frazer tools that we’ve created to make your lives easier. While it’s important to get your website up and running as soon as possible, we also take the time to make sure your funeral home’s website highlights everything that you want to stand out. We want your website to be something your funeral home is proud of. At Frazer, we aren’t just experts in website design — we’re experts in designing websites specifically for funeral homes. So, your funeral home can rest assured that we will help you customize your website with your firm in mind. T O R E A D M O R E , V I S I T:
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Be More Productive with a Frazer-Powered Funeral Home Website Does it seem like there’s never enough time in your day to get everything done? Don’t worry, you’re not alone. Busy, unpredictable schedules are the norm for funeral professionals. By finding ways to save time, your funeral home’s staff can be more productive and check more items off your to-do lists. One major way you can be more productive is by having a Frazer-powered funeral home website. With all the features it includes, your staff’s day-to-day tasks will become much simpler. Let’s explore some must-have Frazer-powered website features and how they help with productivity. PREPLANNING FORM
By having an online preplanning form on your funeral home’s website, you can help families start the funeral preplanning process on their own. Then, they can submit it, and your staff can follow up with them to schedule a meeting time. This way, they meet with your funeral home’s staff once they have more of an idea of what they what. Of course, you should express that they can always come to you with questions if they’re ever unsure. But by having this website form, it saves your staff time when meeting with the family about their funeral plans. All Frazerpowered funeral home websites come with a convenient online preplanning form. O N L I N E PAY M E N T O P T I O N S
Online payment options also save both you and your families time. Instead of having to meet
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with you in person to pay the funeral expenses, they can do it online from the comfort of their own home. It’s also less paperwork for your funeral home’s staff to fill out and keep track of. Frazer websites come with Tribute Pay, our allin-one payment center. Not only does it accept credit card payments and eChecks, it also has crowdfunding, financing, and life insurance assignments capabilities. All of Tribute Pay’s features are designed to create less paperwork for your staff and offer a quick and easy process for everyone involved. E D U C AT I O N A L R E S O U R C E S
By including educational resources on your funeral home’s website, you can save your staff from repeatedly answering the same questions. For example, Frazer websites come with an FAQ page to help answer families’ recurring questions. From what to wear to a funeral to the different burial types, they’ll appreciate this helpful information. There are many other online resources you can offer to answer families’ questions without taking up your staff’s time, such as by starting a blog on your website, sharing links to grief resources, creating inspirational infographics, and including details about your funeral home’s products, services, and prices.
S M A R T I N T E G R AT I O N S
Frazer-powered funeral home websites have smart integrations to eliminate double data entry and other time-sucking tasks. They integrate with the top answering services and data management software, in addition to Tribute Center, our all-in-one personalization suite. This way, you only have to enter the deceased’s information once and can create an endless number of memorial products.
Tribute Store also makes flower orders easier for everyone. Families can order funeral flowers directly on their loved one’s Tribute Wall. Our staff also handles all the customer service. Only you can do what you do, so let our staff and your Frazer-powered funeral home website handle these tasks for you. T O R E A D M O R E , V I S I T:
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What Families Look for When Going to a Funeral Home Website Typically, families don’t casually browse funeral home websites. They seek them out when they have specific needs, whether that be preneed or at-need funeral services or finding a loved one’s funeral service information. That’s why it’s so important to make information easy to find, or else families may move on to another funeral home’s website. We’re highlighting some of the major things families are looking for when they visit your funeral home’s website. By keeping these things in mind, you can better cater to families and stand out among your competitors. I N F O R M AT I V E O B I T U A R I E S
Many families will visit a funeral home website to find their loved one’s obituary. There, they can find the visitation and funeral service information. With a Frazer-powered website, they can also get directions to the service via text or email. Also, they can share a memory, condolence message, and photos or videos on their loved one’s Tribute Wall. In addition, they can directly order flowers for the service and share the obituary to social media. Y O U R C O N TA C T I N F O R M AT I O N
Your contact information should be easy for families to find. By including it in the header and footer of your website, families can find it on any of your website’s pages. Also, include a contact page so families can send you a direct message and see a map of where your funeral home is. S E R V I C E S YO U O F F E R
It’s important to be detailed about the services you offer. With more alternatives to traditional burial than ever, families won’t assume you provide every service they’re looking for.
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F L E X I B L E PAY M E N T O P T I O N S
When you choose a Frazer-powered website, you get access to Tribute Pay — our all-in-one payment platform. Tribute Pay is directly on your website, so families can pay for all their funeral expenses right from their computer or mobile device. They can choose from a variety of payment options including credit cards, eChecks, Tribute Crowdfunding, Tribute Loans, and Tribute Insurance Assignments. USEFUL RESOURCES
It is key to have concise and informational content on your website. If you have too many pages of content, families won't view them. When including resources on your funeral home website, think of what you would find useful if your loved one had just passed away. Things like support group information or a blog about coping with a loss will help families in their grief journey.  T O R E A D M O R E , V I S I T:
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TRIBUTE INSURANCE ASSIGNMENTS
Life insurance assignments, now easier than ever before. Combined, our insurance team has more than 65 years of experience. We know the requirements of more than 300 insurance companies, so we can process claims efficiently and accurately and fund your funeral home in as little as 24 hours. C A L L T O D AY F O R M O R E I N F O R M AT I O N A B O U T TRIBUTE INSURANCE ASSIGNMENTS!
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What Makes a Good Funeral Home Website? Your funeral home can’t just have any ordinary website design and expect to have a successful online presence. So, what features make a good funeral home website design? Your funeral home’s website is the face of your business. Oftentimes, families will search for your funeral home online before visiting in person. So, it’s important that it’s easy to navigate and reflects your funeral home’s brand. If done right, your funeral home’s website also can become a business solution. By having innovative features for capturing new leads and
nurturing current ones, your website can be a valuable marketing tool for your funeral home. With a Frazer-powered funeral home website, your funeral home can accomplish everything mentioned above and so much more. But, don’t just take our word for it. In these next few pages, we welcome you to explore what makes Frazer-powered websites so great.
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01 — RESPONSIVE DESIGN
A responsive design means that the website responds to whatever device type the user is viewing it from. Whether it’s a desktop, smartphone, or tablet, your funeral home’s website will look beautiful on all devices. 02 — PERSONALIZED THEME
Your website’s overall theme should reflect what makes your funeral home unique and
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stand out from the rest. Design elements like the colors, imagery, and overall website layout can help you showcase what your funeral home is all about. 03 — OBITUARIES BEING FRONT AND CENTER
A lot of your website traffic comes from users viewing their loved ones’ obituaries, so it’s important that these are quick and easy to find. By having them on your funeral home’s homepage, users won’t have to dig around.
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04 — SSL SECURITY
An SSL certificate protects your families’ personal information. You can easily tell if a website is secure by the beginning of its URL. Secure websites start with HTTPS, while unsecure websites start with HTTP. 0 5 — O N L I N E PAY M E N T S Y S T E M
Families don’t just want the option to pay online; they expect it. By having an online payment platform, the process is easier for your staff and families. Plus, with Tribute Pay, you can offer additional payment options like life insurance assignments, loans, and crowdfunding. 0 6 — L E A D G E N E R AT I O N F O R M S
By including forms on your website, such as a preplanning or contact us form, you can easily gain new leads for your funeral home. You also can create your own free downloadable content. For these, users can submit their contact information to get the resource.
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0 7 — E D U C AT I O N A L R E S O U R C E S
0 8 — I N F O R M AT I V E C O N T E N T
Don’t let families feel alone in their grief. By sharing educational grief resources on your website, you can help them discover healthy ways to cope with their loss. For example, Frazer-powered websites come with our grief email subscription 365 Days of Healing to support families during their grief.
The content on your funeral home’s website should be concise, yet informative. Whether someone is at-need, preneed, or simply looking for a loved one’s obituary, no one wants to read walls of text to try to find the information they’re looking for. Your content should be straightforward and to the point.
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WA N T T O R E A D M O R E ?
Visit our blog to learn more about our funeral home websites!
frazerconsultants.com/meaningful
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Do You Know All the Features of Your FrazerPowered Website? Having a funeral home website isn’t just about having an online presence. If done right, your funeral home’s website can become more than just a website and be a business solution. With a Frazer-powered website, your website can accomplish so much more for both your funeral home and client families. In addition to
to start! For many of these, it’s as simple as turning the feature on and letting it do the work for you.
a responsive design to beautifully display your website content, it also comes with many other
A L L- I N - O N E PAY M E N T P L AT F O R M T R I B U T E PAY
features to make funeral planning even easier.
Some families may feel more comfortable making the funeral payments from the comfort of their own home. With Tribute Pay, you can offer your families an all-in-one online payment solution. Now, they can feel at ease as they conveniently pay online with their credit card or by eCheck.
Since funeral directors are constantly full of ideas but strapped for time, we are doing everything we can to help. If you’re not using the features below that come free with your Frazer-powered website, now is the time
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If a family has more specific funeral payment needs, you can present multiple solutions with Tribute Pay. Maybe they need more time to pay or don’t want to deplete their savings, so they’d benefit from a loan. Or, maybe they have a life insurance policy they want to use as funeral payment. Or, maybe they’re interested in setting up a crowdfunding campaign to reach out to their community for support. With Tribute Pay, all these solutions are made possible and easier than ever. It only takes a few minutes for your funeral home to enroll in Tribute Pay, and then, you can simply activate Tribute Pay’s other features. R E V E N U E - G E N E R AT I N G T R I B U T E S T O R E
With Tribute Store, you can turn your website’s obituary traffic into a consistent source of revenue for your funeral home. It makes the flower ordering process easier for your funeral home, families, and local florists. By letting families easily place flower orders directly on a loved one’s obituary, it benefits everyone involved. Families are relieved of stress, your funeral home gains additional website traffic and an extra source of revenue, and your local florists see more business. It’s also less added work for your funeral home because we handle maintaining the website and providing customer support. This way, your funeral home’s staff can focus on helping your families and using that extra revenue to conquer that project you put on hold. I N F O R M AT I V E W E B S I T E S TAT I S T I C S
One of the lesser-known features of a Frazerpowered website is the website statistics feature. With this tool, your funeral home can gain valuable insight into who is visiting your website. For example, you can see a general
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overview of your frequent website visitors versus new visitors, the most popular Tribute Walls and obituaries, obituaries shared on social media, and much more. With this vital information, your funeral home can gain new leads, which brings us to the next feature. I N N O VAT I V E L E A D G E N E R AT I O N T O O L S
With website forms, such as the contact us and preplanning forms, your funeral home can step up your lead generation techniques. In return for the information you’re offering, your funeral home receives potential client families’ contact information for additional marketing efforts. Whether it’s answering their funeral questions or helping them preplan, these forms make that process even easier. I N S P I R AT I O N A L A F T E R C A R E R E S O U R C E S
Your website also is a valuable aftercare solution. With your Frazer-powered website, families can easily sign up for the free grief email subscription 365 Days of Healing. When signing up for this subscription, subscribers receive a daily inspirational email during year one of grief. In turn, your funeral home receives their contact information for even more aftercare efforts, such as inviting them to any events or support groups you organize. OTHER FRAZER-POWERED WEBSITE F E AT U R E S
Additionally, your Frazer-powered website comes with many more innovative features, including a Text Directions feature. Families can have once less thing to worry about when attending the funeral, as they’ll receive the directions to the funeral on their phones. T O R E A D M O R E , V I S I T:
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T R I B U T E PAY
Make it easier to get paid up front. Tribute Pay puts your funeral home back in control of your accounts receivable. Offer credit card payments, financing, crowdfunding, life insurance assignments, and electronic checks all in one place — and get paid up front no matter what option families choose. CALL TO REQUEST A FREE D E M O N S T R AT I O N T O D AY !
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How Flexible Payment Options Benefit You and Your Families By offering multiple ways to pay for a funeral service, you’re benefiting both your families and your funeral home. With Tribute Pay, families won’t have to worry about paying for their funeral expenses up front. Every family’s financial situation is unique. Some may have a loved one who preplanned their funeral and won’t need to worry about funeral costs. On the other hand, some families experience sudden losses and don’t have the financial means to pay for their loved one’s funeral up front. That’s why it’s so important for funeral homes to offer families multiple ways to pay for their loved one’s funeral expenses. By providing flexible payment options, families can focus on their grief journey while your funeral home still gets paid.
Y O U S AV E T I M E
When families choose to use Tribute Pay, our team handles most of the paperwork and other tedious tasks your funeral home is normally stuck doing. We know how precious time is for busy funeral directors! Y O U G E T PA I D R I G H T AWAY
When families use Tribute Pay, your funeral home gets paid right away. This way you don’t need to reach out to families about payment and can continue doing what you do best, serving your families.
W H AT I S T R I B U T E PAY ?
First things first, let’s go over what Tribute Pay is. It’s an all-in-one funeral payment platform that gives your client families many ways to pay. They can choose to pay with a credit card, eCheck, loan, crowdfunding campaign, or life insurance assignment. This entire payment platform comes with your Frazer-powered website. So, families can pay directly on your funeral home’s website. Y O U S TAY C O M P E T I T I V E
If you can’t offer multiple ways to finance a funeral, families who are struggling financially will move on to a different funeral home with more options. By offering flexible payment options, it shows that your funeral home is committed to customer service.
FA M I L I E S C A N B E G I N T O H E A L
For many families, with the death of a loved one comes a lot of stress, much of which is due to financial constraints. Make funeral planning a peaceful and meaningful experience for families by making paying for it easier. FA M I L I E S F E E L A C C O M M O D AT E D
Overall, what matters the most is how you make families feel while serving them. Families want a funeral home that shows compassion and empathy in their time of need. With Tribute Pay, you’re showing them you care about their financial wellbeing. T O R E A D M O R E , V I S I T:
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Tribute Pay Turns Your Frazer Funeral Home Website into a Business Solution Your funeral home needs a website, so why not turn it into a business solution with Tribute Pay as well? Your website can do so much more for your funeral home and client families besides providing online information. With our all-in-one payment platform, Tribute Pay, you can give families multiple ways to pay for funeral expenses. Plus, this platform comes free with your Frazer-powered website. Per CNBC, only 40% of Americans can afford an unexpected $1,000 expense. So, if a loved one dies unexpectedly, they may not be able to pay the funeral expenses up front. Or, maybe they’d rather keep their savings and use an alternative funeral payment method instead. That’s where the Tribute Pay platform comes in. With this platform, your families have the convenience of paying the funeral expenses online directly on your funeral home’s website. And no matter their financial situation or personal preferences, you can help them find the right funeral payment solution for them. They can choose between a credit card payment, eCheck, loan, crowdfunding campaign, and life insurance assignment as funeral payment. Let’s discuss Tribute Pay’s funeral payment options in more detail. T R I B U T E PAY C R E D I T C A R D P R O C E S S I N G
Tribute Pay accepts all major credit cards as funeral payment. This way, families can
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conveniently make the funeral payment from the comfort of their own home. It also helps you keep these payments more organized. Plus, it just takes a few quick and easy steps for your funeral home to enroll in the payment platform. Then, it is easy to activate the platform’s other payment options. ECHECKS
Families also can choose to pay by eCheck, also known as an ACH (Automated Clearing House) payment. This way, it replaces the paper check payment and lets families conveniently pay online, like with credit card processing. Plus, the eCheck processing fee is less than other online payment options, so your funeral home saves money when families pay with an eCheck. FINANCING
With Tribute Loans, families don’t have to worry about paying the funeral expenses up front. Instead, they can choose Tribute Loans as a more flexible funeral payment method. They can conveniently apply on your funeral home’s website and pay the funeral expenses to the lender over time at their own pace and
comfort level. The rates start as low as 4.99% APR, and the payment plans can range from 12 to 48 months. Tribute Loans uses multiple lenders to ensure families get the best deal possible. And, since they make the payments directly to the lender, your funeral home gets paid right away. Your funeral home also stays notified throughout the entire process. It’s a win-win situation for both your funeral home and client families. CROWDFUNDING
With Tribute Crowdfunding, families can turn to their community members for support during a difficult time. You can easily turn on a Tribute Crowdfunding campaign directly on a loved one’s obituary on their Tribute Wall. This way, it’s not only convenient for families but traffic stays on your funeral home’s website. Your funeral home also doesn’t have to worry about where the funds are going. Unlike thirdparty crowdfunding sites, your funeral home
is in control of the funds raised from a Tribute Crowdfunding campaign. INSURANCE ASSIGNMENTS
Another Tribute Pay payment option is Tribute Insurance Assignments. With this program, families can pay for the funeral expenses with a life insurance assignment. No more waiting months to get paid or endless piles of daunting paperwork. This program’s paperwork process is completely online, and the Tribute Insurance Assignments team handles most of the paperwork and other tedious tasks on behalf of your funeral home. In just a few minutes, you can submit a claim in your funeral home website’s admin panel. Then, the claim is verified for funding in 24 to 48 hours. And, your funeral home gets paid in as little as 24 hours. T O R E A D M O R E , V I S I T:
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Why Your Funeral Home Needs a Responsive Website Most likely, you’ve come across a website that looked the same no matter what device you viewed it on. Without a responsive website design, your website is hard for users to navigate, read, and find the information they need.
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HOW RESPONSIVE WEBSITES WORK
Responsive websites work by using proportions rather than pixel sizes. Instead of determining that part of a website, like a photo or graphic, should be a specific size, they are set up to be a certain percentage of the page so that when the page sizes change so do the different aspects of a website. Responsive website design uses a single HTML code base for all platforms. These websites also use a fluid grid, so that other aspects of a website can reduce in size when necessary. For example, a website with a fluid grid could go from having three columns of content to two or one, depending on how narrow the screen is. This way, the website displays nicely whether the user is on a desktop computer, smartphone, or tablet. The problem with responsive websites is that they require more than just the regular code a desktop website needs. If you want your website to respond beautifully to every screen, there is a lot of development involved. This includes setting minimum and maximum sizes for certain content (so that the same content looks good on a screen that’s 320px wide as
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well as a 2560px wide desktop monitor), setting up breaking points for different screen sizes, making content line up vertically on small screens rather than a horizontal line, using media queries, and so much more. But you don’t need to worry about all that — unless you plan to become a coding and website design expert in addition to being a funeral director, you’ll most likely hire a firm to create a responsive website for you. A major pitfall for responsive websites is that you must carefully manage your content so that mobile devices don’t become overburdened, especially for users with 3G rather than 4G or poor WiFi connections. This can result in the need to get rid of some website content. ADAPTIVE WEBSITES VS. RESPONSIVE WEBSITES
Both responsive and adaptive websites change appearance based on the width of the screen being used. The main difference is that adaptive websites change at certain size intervals, while responsive websites change size fluidly.
These size intervals are most commonly 320, 480, 760, 960, 1200, and 1600px, but those numbers can change depending on what sizes your website is most often accessed with. One advantage that adaptive websites have over responsive websites is that they can be a good way to update an existing website to be
mobile-friendly, whereas you will almost always need to start from scratch to build a responsive website design. But although responsive websites are more difficult to create, they are much easier to maintain because you don’t have to develop separate HTML and CSS code for each layout
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as with adaptive websites. In the long run, it’s more efficient to go with a responsive website.
better responsive experiences for all aspects of funeral home websites, including obituaries.
MOBILE WEBSITES VS. RESPONSIVE WEBSITES
IS A MOBILE APP WORTH THE INVESTMENT?
Mobile websites are typically seen in a mobile browser with an ‘m.’ in front of the URL instead of ‘www.’ A separate mobile website allows you to customize the experience for different users, and there are ways that you can optimize how users find the mobile website. One method is to set up a redirect that takes you to a mobile or desktop website depending on what device the URL is accessed on.
A native mobile app has some advantages for companies with loyal customers who regularly purchase goods or services from them. For companies like department or home improvement stores, an app might be worth investing in — they can include technology that allows users to explore different outfits, paint colors, etc.
Another method to help users get to the right website is to use dynamic serving. If a website has dynamic serving, that means the website has the same URL no matter what device is being used, but the appearance and functions change depending on the device. Dynamic serving uses a single URL, so users don’t need to type in different URLs for different devices. Users simply type in the URL, and your website detects the device they are using and shows a different version of the website based on that. According to the Content Marketing Institute, content that works in one context may not work in another, no matter how responsive its design. Mobile websites used to be the solution for filling the gaps here. Today, however, more websites are being redesigned with mobilefriendliness as the top consideration. Content is being cut and reorganized to make responsive designs work anywhere, since so many people are now using mobile as their main or even sole source of internet browsing. The web is moving away from mobile websites and toward responsive websites exclusively. Even Google puts preference on responsive websites over mobile websites when it comes to ranking websites in their search results. That’s why we now exclusively offer responsive website designs and are constantly developing
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Apps also allow you to gain insight into customers by collecting data based on their use of the app and how they personalize their experience. And apps can incorporate other functions on mobile devices, such as the device’s camera. For a funeral home, however, it’s not worth the investment. There isn’t anything that you could put in an app for a funeral home that wouldn’t already be on your responsive website, so it’s most likely not worth the investment of time and money. Apps also are housed separate from the crawlers online that determine search engine optimization (SEO), so there is no benefit in terms of SEO to develop an app.
WA N T T O R E A D M O R E ?
Download the rest of our free eBook to learn more about the importance of responsive website design!
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T R I B U T E LOA N S
Offer the flexibility your families need with Tribute Loans. With financing, families can afford to give their loved ones the send-off they deserve. Offering financing directly on your website means one more service you offer families, and it also means your funeral home gets paid up front. C A L L T O R E Q U E S T A F R E E D E M O N S T R AT I O N O F T R I B U T E L O A N S T O D AY !
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How a Responsive Website Makes Viewing Obituaries Easier Many families will visit your funeral home’s website to view their loved one’s obituary. Having a responsive website is important, so they can view them on any device.
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More people primarily surf the web on their mobile devices now than ever before. That’s why it’s so important for your funeral home’s website to have a responsive design. This way, families can easily view your website’s content, including obituaries, comfortably from any device. W H AT I S A R E S P O N S I V E W E B S I T E ?
Let’s talk about what responsive actually means. A responsive website responds to the type of screen you’re viewing it on. So, whether those who are visiting your website are on a desktop, smartphone, tablet, or any other device, they’re easily able to navigate and view your website in its entirety. When a website isn’t responsively designed, users must pinch and drag to see your obituaries and other content in its entirety. This becomes frustrating and makes obituary information difficult to read. After a loved one passes away, the last thing families need to feel is frustration. Give them a pleasant, easy website experience. THE FUTURE IS RESPONSIVE
Today more so than ever, much of the traffic driven to your website is from a mobile device. And of that traffic, about 80% of people are searching for obituary information. Frazer has taken many advances to make sure that our obituaries are easy to navigate on any device. On our obituaries, users can find information about the service, share the obituary to their social media accounts, view a map of where the service is, and get text directions. They also can leave a heartfelt condolence on their loved one’s Tribute Wall. And like we said earlier, this can be done from any device. Responsive website designs are among the numerous changes Google has made to ensure that websites are searchable to the public. So, having a responsive website also impacts your search engine optimization and how you’re ranking in search engine results. Those search engines are determining your rankings based on ease of use, responsiveness of your website, and the content that is displayed. T O R E A D M O R E , V I S I T:
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Getting to Know Frazer Consultants Meet two members of our Frazer family — Brooks and Monica — and see what they have to say about the importance of website customization.
NAME
Brooks YEARS
One ROLE
Sales Development Representative
W H AT I D O AT F R A Z E R
I am a sales development representative here at Frazer Consultants. The focus of my role at Frazer is to work with business owners and funeral directors to help them figure out their website and online technology needs. Ultimately, I help to find the product and solution that fits their specific business needs. Before starting my role here, I was a business owner myself for four years, so I can relate to the everyday battles that business owners face. I find great passion and pride for my work because I get to work with business owners to help improve efficiencies, create working business solutions, increase revenue, and give them extra tools to help them create the most meaningful funeral experience possible.
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I M P O R TA N C E O F W E B S I T E C U S T O M I Z AT I O N
I also know how hard it can be to find the time to work on the business and not just in it. That is why we have systems and processes in place to work with you around your busy schedules. It’s amazing how many people don’t do this, and it is so important to take a step back and look at how you can make your business better. One way to do that is by looking at your website and learning about how it could be improved. It’s a business tool that can be constantly working for you 24/7. I know the importance of differentiation and brand identity in your business and specifically in your local market, which is why we work hard to make your website unique to your brand! HOW FRAZER CAN HELP
We are here to help you throughout the entire process of getting your new funeral home website. If you would like to talk to me about your website needs or to see a no-obligation website demonstration, give me a call directly at 608-472-4963 or contact me by email at brooks@frazerconsultants.com.
NAME
Monica YEARS
Two ROLE
Website Launch Specialist
W H AT I D O AT F R A Z E R
As a launch specialist, it is my job to help our customers through the go-live process of their new Frazer-powered websites. After your website has been built and approved by our project management team, I am introduced to carry out the technical side of publishing your website to the public. Launching a new website has a lot of moving pieces, and the technical nature of the process can be intimidating for many. I understand how crucial your website is to your business, so it’s my goal to ease any nerves and make the process as seamless and easy as possible. I pride myself in treating every website with care and am constantly learning new ways to streamline the process. This is an exciting time of change and progress for your business. It is my job to ensure the transition goes smoothly so you can start taking advantage of all the Frazer products your new website has to offer as quickly as possible.
I M P O R TA N C E O F W E B S I T E C U S T O M I Z AT I O N
These days, when searching for a funeral home, many people turn to the internet first to evaluate their options. Your website is often the first impression someone will have of your business, so it is important your website conveys the message you want to your families and is consistent with your funeral home’s brand. There are so many options just a click away, and it can be hard to stand out from your funeral home’s competitors. HOW FRAZER CAN HELP
Frazer-powered websites offer a multitude of customization options, allowing you to stand out above your competition. Frazer provides not only beautiful websites but also services that set you apart from the competition, such as being able to order funeral flowers directly from your funeral home’s website and paying online for funeral expenses. When you choose Frazer, one of our project managers will discuss your goals for the website and offer their customization suggestions to give your families the best experience possible. We have built our platform around the feedback from our customers. Whatever your customization needs may be, our project managers are trained and dedicated to help you build a website that not only showcases your business, but also gives families a comfortable and easy-to-use experience.
Frazer-powered websites offer a multitude of customization options, allowing you to stand out above your competition.
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The Benefits of Tribute Store for Your Funeral Home Flowers serve as meaningful tributes to a loved one and help their family and friends grieve their loss. Is your funeral home making the most of funeral floral arrangements? With Tribute Store, flower ordering is an easier and more convenient process for both your funeral home and the families you serve! It comes free with all Frazer-powered websites and provides your funeral home with new opportunities to better serve your client families and run your funeral home more efficiently. Let’s discuss these benefits below! E A S I E R P RO C E S S F O R E V E R YO N E
Tribute Store creates an easier process for everyone involved: your funeral home, families, and local florists. Families can easily place flower orders directly from their loved one’s obituary on their Tribute Wall. This way, they don’t have waste time searching around or stress over where to order flowers from. Having the option directly on your funeral home’s website makes it a convenient and easy process for everyone.
providing customer support. This way, your staff can focus on caring for your families. We also handle the maintenance of the Flower Network, which is the collection of florists that choose to work with the funeral homes who use Tribute Store. M O R E O P T I O N S F O R FA M I L I E S
The floral catalog we offer has more than 150 different floral arrangements to choose from. The arrangements can be ordered and delivered on the same day as the service if placed before 3 p.m., in most cases. If it’s after the deadline, the delivery is auto directed to the family’s home address or the next available service time. If a floral arrangement is out of stock, the florist can use the customer contact information to see if they want a different floral arrangement of equal value. S U P P O RT YO U R LO C A L F LO R I S T S
L E S S W O R K F O R YO U R F U N E R A L H O M E
It’s also less work for your funeral home’s staff. We take care of maintaining the website and
Your funeral home can choose which local florists you want to work with. If there are multiple florists, the flower orders can be split
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evenly between them. This is a great way to support your community’s businesses and build good relationships with your local florists.
florists are seeing more business as well. On a loved one’s Tribute Wall, they also can can leave condolence messages or donate to a Tribute Crowdfunding campaign.
MORE WEBSITE TRAFFIC
By offering flower purchases on your website, you’re keeping traffic on your funeral home’s website. This way, you can find more potential client families and boost your funeral home’s search engine optimization and search engine results page rankings. It’s also convenient for people who live out of town. Like mentioned before, they can conveniently order flowers directly from their loved one’s Tribute Wall. This way, your local
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TRIBUTE STORE BRINGS EXTRA REVENUE
Ultimately, Tribute Store is an extra revenue source for funeral homes. This way, you have some extra funds to tackle other projects you’ve been wanting to take on. Whether it’s hosting a community event or renovating your facility, this feature can turn that idea into a reality! T O R E A D M O R E , V I S I T:
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TRIBUTE CROWDFUNDING
Crowdfunding options without the risk. With Frazer-powered websites, your families can host crowdfunding campaigns for memorial funds, medical expenses, charity donations, funeral expenses, and more. The best part? Your funeral home is in charge, traffic stays on your website, and you get paid up front. C A L L T O D AY F O R M O R E I N F O R M AT I O N ABOUT TRIBUTE CROWDFUNDING!
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The Top Website Design Mistakes to Watch out for Today’s families are more web-savvy. They want a website that’s both beautiful and usable. That means even a subtle mistake that impacts a website’s usability or aesthetic can be off-putting. Mistakes on your funeral home’s website, no matter how small, can cause families to look elsewhere. Let’s go over the top website design mistakes that hurt website traffic. U N E X P E C T E D L O C AT I O N S F O R C O N T E N T
You might have some great, informative content on your website. But it won’t matter if families can’t find it easily. And if families can’t find what they are looking for, they’ll search elsewhere. For example, let’s say a person is searching to learn more about the different personalization services you offer. But they can’t easily find that information directly on your homepage. Instead, they have to search through a layer of different menus or click several links to get to what they want to know. They’ll eventually get frustrated and search another website. Your website’s site structure — or how the individual subpages of your website are linked to one another and how a user navigates through them — impacts your search engine optimization (SEO) ranking and website traffic. So, what does having good site structure mean? You want to start by thinking like your families. What are they visiting your website for? Your menus and site structure should be laid out in a way that makes sense to their search needs.
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T O O M U C H I N F O R M AT I O N O N A S I N G L E PA G E
Another common design problem is having too much information. Having website pages with paragraphs that go on forever is another design mistake that costs you traffic. Don’t overwhelm families with information. For example, if you have a page titled Services, and it lists every single service you offer including pricing options, memorial options, veteran service options, and so on, then consider splitting it up into multiple pages with related links to each page. If families can’t find what they are looking for and have to scroll through mountains of text, then they will often look for the information elsewhere. R E LY I N G O N A D I Y W E B S I T E P L AT F O R M
Everyone likes free things. But the adage “You get what you pay for.” is all too true. Some of the common problems of using a free, DIY website platform include: Extremely slow websites. This is because the providers put hundreds of the websites on the same server, which is bad for both your SEO and website speed. Hidden charges. Sometimes free doesn’t always mean free. Free, DIY website providers might roll out new features but usually at a price.
Locking down your data. If you ever decide to move your website somewhere else, they might make it difficult by not offering tools to migrate your website content elsewhere.
the greatest benefits of having a responsive website. Unresponsive websites usually distort the way your website appears on devices like mobile, and tablet…” Having one unified look across all devices increases a family’s trust
NOT USING RESPONSIVE DESIGN
with your brand and helps your funeral home’s
Responsive design is now the standard of all website design. And for good reason. It makes your website work — and look good — on any device. Mobile searches now account for more than half of all website traffic. Having a website that’s easy to navigate and use on any device means you’ll retain — and gain — mobile traffic.
website look more professional and polished.
It also provides a seamless user experience. A family can search from a smartphone, tablet, or desktop, and still get the same experience from visiting your funeral home’s website. According to an article in Forbes, “This is by far one of
In addition, having a responsive website design gives a boost to your search engine rankings. Google recommends responsive websites as a best practice and rewards websites that are responsive. Which could mean your website starts appearing above your competitors in the search engine rankings. T O R E A D M O R E , V I S I T:
frazerconsultants.com/meaningful
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Why Your Funeral Home Should Have a Blog Does your funeral home have a blog? If not, it’s never too late to start! It’s a great opportunity to educate your community about funerals, grief, and your products and services. Per a 2016 Demand Gen Report, 47% of buyers viewed three to five pieces of content before engaging with a sales representative. Let’s say Jane wants to preplan her funeral but doesn’t know where to start. While on your website, she clicks on your blog and reads your post “Funeral Planning for First-Time Funeral Planners.” Then, she clicks a link in that post
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that takes her to your preplanning webpage. There, she sees your online preplanning form and fills it out following the outline in your post. This is just one hypothetical example of how a blog can generate more leads for your funeral home. Still not quite convinced yet? Let’s go over the benefits of starting a funeral home blog.
INCREASE FUNERAL PREPLANNING
Like Jane’s example, it can increase funeral preplanning — which helps your funeral home gain more leads. For instance, you can write a series of posts about funeral preplanning, such as why it’s important, what materials you need to include, and information about prepaying for your funeral. This way, families can make more educated funeral decisions and know the basics before meeting with your staff. BECOME A THOUGHT LEADER
By educating your families, you’re establishing yourselves as thought leaders about everything related to funerals and grief. You can become the go-to resource in your community for everything regarding death, funerals, and coping with a loss. Since you already have the knowledge, you just need to write it in a format that’s understandable to someone not immersed in the funeral profession. This way,
your followers also will be more likely to use your funeral home’s services in the future. B O O S T Y O U R S E A R C H E N G I N E O P T I M I Z AT I O N
Additionally, having a blog boosts your funeral home’s search engine optimization. By having it directly on your firm’s website, you’re keeping traffic on your website instead of taking people to a different place. For example, all Frazerpowered websites come with an easy-to-use blog feature. You also should share your posts on your funeral home’s social media pages to get more traffic back to your website. You can’t just rely on people organically coming across it on your website, so you need to have an established marketing strategy for it to be successful. T O R E A D M O R E , V I S I T:
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F R A Z E R M A R K E T I N G PA C K A G E S
Are you ready to reach even more families? We’re excited to offer a variety of search engine optimization (SEO) and social media marketing packages that will help families notice and connect with your funeral home. Our social media packages help you connect with families in your community, and our SEO packages help families find your funeral home’s website more easily. Whether you’re looking for a one-time service or more in-depth account management, our marketing packages are designed to fit your funeral home’s needs.
C O N TA C T U S T O L E A R N M O R E !
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RESPONSIVE OBITUARIES
Honoring lives on every device. Making our social Tribute Walls more mobile-focused allows families to honor their loved ones no matter where they are — with photos, messages, virtual candles, flower orders, crowdfunding donations, and so much more. C A L L T O D AY F O R M O R E I N F O R M AT I O N !