It’s often the little things that make the difference between someone choosing to buy/enquire or bouncing off your website never to return. This is particularly significant in today’s world in which the customer is becoming ever more careful and critical in their choice of supplier. Customers are looking for increased value along with proof before they part with their money. In fact, going the extra mile is now the norm – to really excel we need to go an extra two miles. So, here are three more ideas to help you prove your value and win more online business.
Profit Fix # 4 – Implement a Call Me Back Form.
This is an incredibly effective mechanism to get your prospects to make contact. It’s a form you can put on your sales pages with at least two fields on it; First Name and Telephone. All your visitor has to do is fill in their details, click submit and an email is sent straight to your sales team for them to call your prospect back. (Plus sales people love to strike whilst the iron’s hot and this is the perfect vehicle to ensure that.)
We tested sites both with and without this form and found that there was a marked increase in enquiries when the form was visible. It’s a really useful feature to add and a quick marketing win which shouldn’t take your web designers more than an hour to put live.
Profit Fix # 5 – Get Some Testimonials.
Testimonials can be one of the most powerful features of your website. They do two very important things; first, they create a sense of confidence about what you do and second, in raising your visitor’s confidence they will naturally read your website with more care.
However, one of the drawbacks of a written testimonial is proving its authenticity. In other words, how do you prove to a sceptical audience that you didn’t just make it up? Well, there are a couple of techniques you can use that will flatten those concerns.
The first is adding an audio testimonial to the written one. So, not only can your visitor read it but they also get the chance to listen to your customer discussing it. The little ‘podcast’ of your customer could provide much more detail on how good they found your service to be – it could even be a full-scale interview or alternatively just the testimonial as it was written.
The second is to video your customer saying it. Admittedly this takes a little more preparation but the results are incredibly powerful as visual evidence from a customer of your company’s value offers the greatest social proof and can clinch the deal.
Profit Fix # 6 – Offer Your Customers Some Guarantees.
Along with testimonials guarantees are one of the most effective ways of increasing your conversion rate on your website. A guarantee in marketing language is known as a risk reversal. In other words, you are taking the risk away from your customer when they buy from you. Let’s face it, the customer takes the majority of the risk in most business transactions as they often have to part with their cash before receiving the goods. So, if you can reverse the risk you eliminate one of the major buying objections your potential customer may have.
You could offer a money back guarantee, a lifetime guarantee, a free trial and so on – there are lots of options. The key thing to remember is that by taking the risk out of the purchase your prospect is far more likely to become a customer.
So, be proud of your guarantee and make it obvious everywhere on your website. If you’re running an ecommerce site consider putting your guarantees on your basket page. This adds reassurance to your customer and can tip the balance between them continuing to the checkout or moving on to a competitor’s website.
And finally, take a quick look at your competition’s websites: If they are doing the things I’ve suggested then you definitely need to do them too and if they’re not then you’ve got a huge opportunity and still definitely need to do them!
Jed Wylie is the author of Make Your Website Sell and works for Morgan Wylie a web design and digital marketing agency in the Midlands.
