David Leal's Library tagged conversion →  View Popular

Define a Clear Path

I like to think of the e-mail message as a starting point. Each landing page toward the end goal is a stepping stone. You need enough pages to make your case, but not so many that readers abandon the path before they reach the end. The more streamlined you can make it, the better. But be sure you have a route in mind. If you aren't clear on what readers should do, how can they be?

Use a Look and Feel That's Consistent With the E-Mail

Test this to see if it lifts response; sometimes it does, sometimes it doesn't. But consistency rarely depresses response and it creates a seamless experience

Match Your Landing Page to Your Call to Action

A good e-mail engages readers by telling them about something, then setting an expectation for what they'll find when they click through. If you're promoting a new product with a link to "learn more," readers expect to land on a page with more information.

Don't Be Redundant
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We've all seen landing pages that tell you exactly what the e-mail told you

Incorporate Live Chat into your persuasion scenarios as a flexible
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point of resolution
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and plan ahead for whatever customers may need next, AFTER the chat. If they are asking about bidding, explain it to them. Then, if you know the next step is signing up for an account, say, " If you'd like to bid on an item, first you'll need to sign up for an account. Can I help you with that?" If they ask about the authenticity of an item, you might say, "We have a 100% authenticity guarantee on all our items. Our experts make sure you're getting the real thing. Is there a particular item you are interested in?" If they answer yes, you can follow up with, "If you have any questions on our bidding process, please let me know. We have two ways to bid. I'd be happy to explain our process."
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Choose your wording carefully so you don't seem pushy. Your goal is to appear helpful and considerate should your customers wish to take the next step. Persuasive scenarios are all about anticipating their next need. But you need to acknowledge that the customer is in control the whole time and can choose whether to proceed.

• Repeat the customer's question in the customer's own words. There's nothing quite like knowing the person you are talking to is actually paying attention!

• Avoid technospeak.

• Make every reply relevant to the customer's question or explanation.

These are the factors that will determine the intricacy of your Web site’s persuasive process:

• Knowledge. How difficult is it for folks to understand the nature of your product or service, or the procedures for buying? What do they need to know? Your persuasive process must eliminate the friction generated by confusion or lack of knowledge. Knowledge dimensions for the buying decision can differ based on who is doing the buying: is the customer buying for herself (she will be the end user) or is she buying on behalf of another (as in the case of a purchasing agent)? The knowledge assumptions and language – especially jargon – that work for one may be totally inappropriate for the other.

• Need. How urgent is the need for your product or service? How fast are folks likely to make their decisions to buy? Will the need be satisfied by a one-time purchase (either impulsive or momentous) or is the need on-going? Folks might be willing to compromise their thoroughness for a casual one-time deal. But if that one-time deal is something like a house, or if they are choosing a long-term relationship to satisfy an on-going need, things get significantly more complicated.

• Risk. How risky, especially with respect to issues of finance, is the sale? While price may not be an ultimate decision factor in a purchase (for many, safety and trust trump price), increasing financial risk necessitates a more intricate persuasive structure. Risk may also be associated with compromises to health, as when individuals or medical professionals have to make treatment choices. Or even, for that matter, when someone simply evaluates the safety of an herbal remedy.

• Consensus. Just how many people do you have to persuade? An individual? An individual and her significant other? Several end-users and heads-of-department? Your ability to understand who is involved in the decision-making process allows you to provide copy and content that appropriately informs, reassures and persuades.

• Each business has an ultimate conversion goal

• Each business has a series of steps (each one of these a separate point of conversion) that ideally help folks achieve that ultimate conversion goal

• Each business has an audience made up of folks who have their own agendas and their own ways of satisfying their agendas

Once you’ve figured out what you’re trying to accomplish through your Web site – your business objective – you turn to understanding your persuasive process by answering these three questions:

• Who needs to be persuaded? When you know who you need to persuade, you can create personas that allow you to design meaningful navigation scenarios.

• What actions does this person need to take? Not all actions will be direct functions of your sales process; many will be actions your personas need to take to satisfy their buying decision process.

• How will you most effectively persuade that person? Knowing “who” and “what” helps you create persuasive copy and content.

Your business category is not the issue. The complexity of your sale is not the issue. Whether your sale is impulse or a considered purchase is not the issue. Buying into these notions as determining factors when it comes to your ability to design persuasively is thinking that will lead you down the garden path.

Understanding and managing your sale as a persuasive process is the only relevant issue.

Conversion Point

This is the point where we know with absolute certainty that a visitor has successfully completed a persuasion scenario. The conversion point is the entity that gets delivered so that both we and the visitor know conversion has taken place. This is usually some form of confirmation.

Conversion Beacon
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A conversion beacon signals the first (or next) step in a linear process through which a visitor must pass to reach the conversion point. Points of resolution and waypoints lead a visitor to the conversion beacon, the place where the visitor demonstrates the intention to convert.
> For example, if the persuasion scenario is designed to get visitors to subscribe to a newsletter, points of resolution and waypoints would build value for the newsletter while the sign-up button that begins the registration process would constitute the first conversion beacon. Each step in completing the registration process constitutes another conversion beacon - and the visitor must complete each step in order.

Points of Resolution

These are pages that contain information visitors may or may not need to answer questions associated with their individual buying processes. Each point of resolution page or entity must always link to either a waypoint or a conversion beacon (see below) to ensure the visitor never misses an opportunity to convert.

Waypoints

These are 'persuasive touch points' that marketers determine are integral to the seller's conversion goals, as well as important to the needs of a particular visitor segment. Waypoints support the sales process and the conversion goal.

Funnel Points

These are pages that are entrees to the conversion funnel

Driving Point

This is the prospecting point, outside the funnel, where a scenario technically begins. It might be a search engine result, a pay-per-click, a banner ad or a home page. It's the concretely identifiable place where the visitor shows a level of interest in entering the scenario.

A dynamic variable is a value that changes based on automated calculations, and is part of the code on the page.

You can track dynamic transaction values by inserting a dynamic variable in the Value field when setting up conversion tracking.

The objective is to increase and segment a business's ability to generate leads and close the transaction. When you examine your Page Rejection/Abandonment Rates, play close attention to your critical contact pages.

• Conversion Rates: the likelihood visitors will download white papers, sign up for mailings, subscribe to a newsletter

• Ratio of Leads to Close: the likelihood a lead will complete the transaction

• Percent New Visitors: the number of potential new customers landing on your site

• Length of Visit: the amount of time a visitor spends on your site in a given visit

• Ratio of New to Returning Visitors: the ratio of new to previously acquired visitors

• Page "Stickiness": the likelihood of successfully retaining a visitor who arrives at a key landing page

• Percent of Visits by Entry Page: efficacy of marketing messages at driving visitors to the site

Here the basic objective is to increase sales and decrease marketing expenses. KPI should include:

• Conversion Rate: the likelihood of successfully driving a visitor to purchase

• Cost Per Visitor: the cost of each site visitor to your business

• Average Order Value: changes in the overall audience makeup and the affect on the online revenue patterns

• Percent New Visitors: the number of potential new customers landing on your site

• Ratio of New to Returning Visitors: the ratio of new to previously acquired visitors

• Page "Stickiness": the likelihood of successfully retaining a visitor who arrives at a key landing page

Once you've got these under your belt, you'll want to take a more advanced examination: measure inventory mix, trend reporting, satisfaction, recency and frequency, and other predictive modeling techniques.