If you are a newcomer to the world of Internet business, you may have
already learned that it's just not that easy to make
a sale........
11 Reasons Why More website Traffic Isn't Always Equal
To More Sales!
If you are a newcomer to the world of Internet business,
you may have already learned that it's just not that
easy to make a sale, regardless of how many visitors
land at your site. Even with the best search engine
marketing and professional online and print advertising
you might be confounded by the fact that your sales
are not getting anywhere, and for some reason you just
can't seem to get your feet off the ground.
Well, you're not alone. There are thousands of websites
and businesses on the net, some getting thousands of
visits to their websites every month and many of them
have yet to
sell a product or service. Vendors of both physical
and digital products face this problem on a daily basis.
The cause of the problem can be attributed to several
possible reasons-all of which you have to consider when
analyzing your own situation and before launching your
next marketing/advertising campaign or before blaming
the company that sold you that million guaranteed visits.
Any item or combination of items below might be affecting
your chance of sales success.
Here are my top 11 reasons:
1. Your website can't be found in more ways than
one:
It is imperative that you market and promote your
website both on and off the Internet. Try every ethical
technique available to you: Search engine promotion,
banner advertising, pop-under advertising, newsletters,
print and online magazine ads, word of mouth, etc. Just
don't resort to using SP*AM (unsolicited email). And
be sure that your pages work. It really hurts to spend
money on advertising only to find out that your site
was down or your pages were dead during an important
campaign.
2. Your website looks unprofessional and detracts
from your credibility: Ask yourself, the question.
"Would I buy from a site that looks like mine?" If you
hear the words "liar, liar" continually echoed in your
head as you answer "sure I would!" then it's time to
get a second or third opinion. website visitors will
often flee from a site selling great products, simply
because of the way it looks. If you don't want to spend
money on web design, try looking up "website templates"
using search engines and see what you can find. These
templates will allow you to plug in your content and
basically get a professional looking website for a
lot less than you might imagine.
3. Your product/service has little appeal: If
visitors are not interested in what you're selling,
you can pump hundreds or even thousands of dollars and
countless hours into advertising and it won't make any
difference. In other words, maybe that glow in the dark
camouflage suit wasn't
such a great idea.
4. You're targeting the wrong audience: If your
product/service is ideal for a certain type of person,
region or interest group, don't ignore this fact and
waste time and money promoting outside of this focus
area. In other words, try focusing your advertising
on a targeted audience. If you're selling automotive
products, don't advertise to computer enthusiasts unless
you're selling a car computer. Instead figure out where
automotive customers shop and what sites they like to
visit and then try to focus your advertising on those
destinations instead.
5. Your product/service is too expensive for your
target audience: If visitors can't afford or don't
want to afford what your selling, maybe you need to
target a different
audience. Don't try to sell expensive perfumes (Eau
DeMortgage) to an audience looking for discount 99 cent
store products.
6. Your product service is too cheap: Some products/services
don't cost enough. Think "perceived value" and price
your products/services for what they are worth. A great
product can be scarred for life, if visitors perceive
it as too cheap to be of quality. Try raising your prices/fees
and see what happens, you might be pleasantly surprised.
7. Your product is free so why should anyone pay
for it: Many great downloadable products have been
created as free trial versions with just one problem,
they are full working versions with no real incentive
to upgrade. Most people ignore the so called "nag screens"
and continue to use these products for years without
ever realizing that they are violating the developers
license. Give the user a reason to upgrade. Maybe by
disabling features that are critical to the operation
of your product, but won't prevent the user from experiencing
your products value. When they upgrade (pay) they get
all the features turned on.
8. Visitors can't figure out how to place an order:
It is surprising as to how many websites are-not order
friendly. Some web masters spend time and money developing
fancy websites with flashy graphics and animation only
to forget the most important reason for their site's
existence. They forget to invite and make it easy for
visitors to place orders. I recently visited a site
with great enthusiasm after getting an email announcement.
It was the "must have product" for Internet Marketing.
Problem is that there was no order button!
9. Your order buttons, links or contact forms don't
work: Test your order pages and contact forms. Be
sure that they are not broken links and be sure that
your contact forms work by sending yourself a test message
and by placing a test order or two. Believe me, even
seasoned marketers make this mistake.
10. Your order process is too painful: Try to
place an order yourself. Click on one of your order
buttons/links and experience the process. If they (order
pages) load too slowly or the process is too painful,
you will lose potential customers. This sales losing
process is called "abandonment" by the industry and
affects many online businesses where visitors wanting
to become customers suddenly abandon their order in
mid-process to do something else.
11. You have unrealistic expectations and need to
take a scientific approach to advertising: Don't
buy a 100,000 website visitors package and then expect
100,000 sales. It won't happen unless there was no oxygen
left on earth and you just so happen to be selling Oxygen.
There are proven formulas that can help you estimate
(at best) the amount of sales that can be achieved by
driving a certain amount of traffic to your site.
Use this simple formula to estimate how many visitors
you need to meet your sales/sign-up goals.
A). Figure out your conversion rate: A conversion is
= to a visitor that becomes a customer or a sign-up.
A conversion rate is defined as the number of actual
sales or sign-ups divided by the number of site visitors
in a given period.
For example two
sales per 100 visitors = 2% or a .02 conversion rate
per 100 visitors.
So take a good look at your recent sales and number
of visits to your product/service web page. This can
be done by taking a look at your website's statistics.
If you make one sale per 100 visitors to your site then
you have a conversion rate of 1%. This number, by the
way, is considered by many average marketers to be difficult
to achieve and rightly so. Many websites, lacking million
dollar budgets, are happy to get a tenth (.001) of a
percent. Still, anything is possible. We are using 1%
in this calculation to make the example easier to understand
(the industry average is said to be 1% to 2%)
B). Figure out how many sales/sign-ups you want (quantity--not
dollar value)
C). once you have this info, plug your numbers into
the equation below.
Number of Visitors = Desired Number of Sales / Conversion
Rate (in decimal)
So as an example: To sell 200 items at a conversion
rate of 1%
Number of visitors = 200/.01 (200 divided by .01)
The minimum number of visitors required = 20,000
Therefore, you would need at least 20,000 visitors (minimum)
to get 200 sales, assuming that you can convert your
visitors with a hot offer! The "right words" can convert
the "right visitors" into paid customers. Just as easily
as the wrong words can turn them away. Sometimes a single
word can make a difference. If you can raise your conversion
rate by applying the ideas in this article, you can
also reduce your cost of Customer Acquisition.
The information above is certainly not exhaustive, I'm
sure that there are other reasons that I did not list
in this article. Regardless, if taken seriously, the
information contained herein will help boost your sales
and sign-ups.
Just remember this final thought. "Sales are never guaranteed.
no one can guarantee that a customer will put funds
into your bank account" You can, however, increase your
probability of success by becoming informed and then
taking positive action.
By:
Hamoon Arbabi
Source: http://homebusiness.nexuswebs.net/ |
