Enticing Potential Visitors to Buy From You
According to a previously written blog (Communicating with Customers is a Must for E-commerce Sites, January 2007) I cited a few statistics about the state of American e-commerce, including its amazing 25.2 percent growth but only making 2 percent of total GDP. I expect e-commerce to grow as potential buyers get used to conducting business transactions online. The gist of that article was that we—retailers and customers—have a responsibility to ourselves and our customers (current and potential) to take the necessary security measures to ensure that people’s privacy is protected. However, the aim of this particular piece is to expand on the idea of attracting potential customers to your web site and enticing them to buy from you. Assuming that you have taken all necessary security measures and have disclosed policies and other relevant information, what then?
Beyond security is to look at the products or services that you offer. Do you have competitors? If you do, how many are there online? Have you taken the time to visit those web sites to see what they offer? An effective way to assess the quality of your products and/or services is to do a “best practices†assessment of your competitors and unrelated companies. Best practices assessments are not complicated and can be done with very little money but it does require that you invest some quality time to visit web sites. Compare your prices with those of your competitors: are they underselling you or are you competitively priced? Read their return policies, privacy notices, sales, specials, and promotions and compare them with yours; are there areas where you can improve? Visit unrelated web sites for “best practices†that you might be able to adapt for your own web site without infringing on copyrights, or “borrowing†images or text. Rather you can look for models that might inspire you to create or adjust your current or unwritten policies to develop original work and thus making them your own.
Conduct a “best look†assessment of your web site comparing it with your competitors and non-competitors. Does your web site look sophomoric, cartoonish, and unappealing? Do you have pop-ups, flashy banners, and/or animated cartoons dancing across your front page? Ask yourself if you want to portray the serious side of your business or the silly side. If you choose the serious side then you are on the right track to attract visitors. If you chose the silly side, then expect a lonely online existence. I may be wrong but the biggest turn-off for me is to visit web sites that are so visually busy with flashing banners, Google AdSence banners, and other annoyances, that the last thing I want is to spend longer than a second at that site. Again, look for models that you or your webmaster might use as guideposts for creating original content and consider cleaning up your web site from clutter and make it appealing.
The final issue is to develop an action plan. Lofty goals are usually unrealistic. For example, a lofty goal such as “I want to lose weight†is likely not to be realized. However, if you develop goals that are short-term, realistic, and achievable, then success will follow. Thus, if you propose to lose weight and develop a daily, weekly, and quarterly exercise and nutrition plan then you are likely to lose weight. The same applies for developing business goals: make short term goals that are realistic and achievable and only then can you develop a “lofty, but achievable†goal. For additional details about appealing to potential customers read my first article (To Template or Not to Template: It’s a Matter of Survival, October 2006).
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on Tuesday, January 16th, 2007 at 8:11 pm and is filed under E-Commerce Business.
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