Funeral home websites Typically when building search engine optimised websites GOOP Digital’s design and development process revolves around keywords specific to the products and services offered by a particular business or industry.

In the case of funeral home websites the keywords could be:

  • funeral homes
  • funeral directors
  • pre-planned funerals
  • prepaid funerals

Whilst these keywords are powerful when a user needs a funeral home for funeral arrangements, the search for a funeral home’s services should not be the key priority of the website’s SEO strategy.

Where a funeral home will benefit most is from traffic to its website’s obituaries and death and funeral notices section.

When people are looking for funeral details they do not go online searching for funeral homes, because it’s more than likely they have no idea which funeral home is arranging the funeral they’re searching for.

Instead, online searchers will typically go to Google and type in the deceased’s name and where he or she lived and include a general query phrase relating to a funeral, e.g. ‘John Doe Melbourne funeral’.

GOOP Digital’s goal when a person makes such a search is that our clients’ websites are first and foremost in the Google search results. In other words, we aim to have our funeral homes’ websites in position one on the home page of Google for the name and location of the deceased person.

Currently there is a proliferation of obituary services attempting to corner the online market and make money from the content funeral homes have created. Funeral homes are doing all the work but the obituary and tribute providers are reaping the rewards.

Just some of the the Victorian-based tribute pages:

  • heraldsun.com.au
  • standard.net.au
  • geelongadvertiser.com.au
  • thecourier.com.au
  • bendigoadvertiser.com.au

And some of the national and international contenders:

  • legacy.com/obituaries
  • skymorials.com.au
  • heavenaddress.com
  • displayclassifieds.fairfaxrural.com.au
  • oliverose.com.au/notice
  • lifelived.com.au
  • australia-obituaries.com
  • funeralzone.com.au

At GOOP Digital we believe funeral homes should be the direct beneficiaries of the marketing opportunities provided by online death and funeral notices, not providers who are plagiarising the content funeral directors have created on behalf of their clients.

You are creating advertising opportunities for your competitors

  • As soon as you provide death and funeral notice details to a print medium that information is on the newspaper’s website, helping generate advertising revenue. Newspapers might be ailing but they still understand the first-to-market principle. Ironically, you are creating the content and advertising revenue and opportunities for them.
  • Your competitors can then advertise against your content on the newspapers’ obituary websites.

You can and should be the sole beneficiary of marketing opportunities created by online notices and tributes.

GOOP Digital’s websites for funeral directors send searchers directly to the funeral home’s website by virtue of ranking in Google. This means:

  • An enormous boost in your business’s online presence.
  • An associated boost in community confidence and goodwill for your business through the provision of a free service to leave tributes to deceased family members, friends and colleagues.
  • No opportunity for competitors to advertise against you. Searchers are on your website and not the website of another obituary provider.
  • Free online advertising for your funeral home.
  • Substantially diminished traffic/audience numbers for online obituary providers. This means they must charge less for advertising services back to you as their audience is diminished. People are not going to the obituary sites looking for notices of recently deceased individuals. They are arriving at your website by virtue of search engines and in particular Google.
  • All advertising you do will only be targeting your competitors. If your audience is all going to your website for information then the odds are any paid advertising you do in an obituary section will target mostly your competitors
  • Obtrusive inappropriate advertising will no longer appear next to your notices, a critical issue.

If you own a funeral home, we ask you to perform this simple test: Type in the name of the deceased and location of your most recent funerals.  If your website’s notices or obituary section is not at the top of the search results then your website is not working for you.

At GOOP Digital our specialty is building websites that outrank other obituary providers in Google’s search engine results. It’s time to take back control from the major media players, both traditional and online.

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