Firestarter

…now there’s a revolutionary idea.

That is, of course, the idea of any commercial website. Even a ‘brochure’ website without a shopping cart is there because you think people will refer to it before ringing to make the purchase, right? Even if you just want to direct people to your phone number or your shop, it’s still there to help sales. Maybe now’s the time to do a quick calculation…

• Cost of building your site $ ………..
• Cost of hosting $ ………..
• Annual Maintenance $………..

Total that figure up and multiply by 25%.

As a smart investor, that’s the minimum p.a. return you want on your money… I mean why spend money in business if it’s not going to make you money, right?

So, how do you get your website to work a little harder? Well, first up:

1. Don’t make your website look like an ad

Stay with me here… you see, the average consumer sees up to 5000 advertising messages a day. So don’t make your website look like yet another ad. It should provide solid information (not just brochure copy). It should have an editorial feel, free of hype. Why? Because you might be online to sell, but they’re online for information. And that’s what it’s all about – giving people the information they want, in a way that appeals to them.

2. Stop readers dead in their tracks

There are about 36 million websites (source google, 2005) clamouring for attention. (With 4.28 billion pages of content inside those websites!) You need breakthrough editorial-style headlines that grab the reader and stop them flicking to the other 63,000 pages his search words have come up with. I’ll digress here for a moment to slap Flash. (Flash is the software that makes all those ‘designer’ websites look so great, with things moving and bouncing and rolling and so on.)

In the time it takes the average browser with or without broadband to load a Flash site, a huge bunch of your potential customers has snorted with impatience and bailed to the next search page. Use Flash internally if you have to; but it is a dead-set no-no on your home page.

So, where were we? Oh yes, stop em dead with a benefit-laden headline that arrests attention. For example a vitamin company might say something like:

• Would you like one pill to combat cancer and aging at the same time?
  Or
• What ‘miracle’ herb helps you stave off memory loss while delivering energy to burn?

(I’ll go into how to write great headlines in later newsletters)

3. Capture email addresses, something, anything

The hardest job you have is getting someone to your website. With 36 million to choose from it’s a hard road… so for heaven’s sakes get them to do something once there. Pick up the phone, subscribe to your newsletter, buy the product, give their email address so you can keep them informed of ‘specials’ etc. Less than 1% of people return to bookmarked sites – so make them do an action now that initiates the relationship.

A typical sales site has a conversion rate of 2-5%. What about the other 95% of visitors? First timers rarely buy, so get people to opt in to receiving email info/newsletter/free report/something/anything. Then use that email address judiciously to build trust. Because that’s who people buy from… people they trust.

Well, that’s it for the moment. Next month I’ll be talking about the most important part of your website, how to write a great ‘drag em in’ headline and the one thing every website should have, but 95% don’t.

This article was contributed by Paul Lonergan paul@alwayswrite.com.au