Virtually every business has a website these days, which reflects the reality that people shop - or at least look - online before they buy. The average website visitor may come back seven times before they buy - not the way you want it to be. Once your site is up, you want immediate results from it, as part of some sort of Field of Dreams mentality:If you built a website, they will come. In reality, you should be asking is What will make them come back? You add Google Analytics, you add forms to capture contacts, you sign up people for your newsletter or email list. As the months pass, you are often disappointed that you do not see the numbers reflecting website-to-sale conversions.
Though it is human nature to want instant results, websites do not function that way because consumers do not buy that way. Buying behavior is a process that starts with a casual inquiry and ends with a sale. If a first time visitor comes to your site and makes a purchase, he has probably shopped elsewhere and buys from you because your price was right or you offered something else he wanted - bonuses, favorable shipping or return policies, availability of other products, etc.
Studies that have been done on web buying behavior estimate that there are five to seven steps that take a visitor from looker to a buyer. For an expensive product, the potential buyer may be stuck at one step through several visits. For a more consumer-oriented product, he may put it in the cart on the first or second visit.
David Westfall of Dewpointe Ventures categorizes the seven steps like this. In a series of visits, a typical buyer...
- Visits the site
- Comes back and revisits certain pages, which he has perhaps bookmarked
- Is interested enough to respond to calls to action
- Responds to request for more information, such as name and phone
- Is willing to be further qualified by you or your sales team
- Wants a needs analysis
- Buy your product
Of 1,000 visitors to the site, about .33% will eventually buy. The more steps the visitors complete, the more likely he will be a successful "website conversion" statistic.
This analysis has many implications for website owners. To an extent, success is all about the numbers, but you must do a few things to make sure your website works for you. The seven visits a potential buy makes may be to various sites - not just yours. You are never sure how much shopping the visitors has done before arriving at your site. You want to make sure your site will bring them back.
Who is your ideal customer or client? If you exclusively sell luxury homes, or high-end coaching, you want to tailor your website message to your ideal prospect through both words and website design. Even if you sell $10 tee shirts, you still want a well designed site, but your message is different.
What will keep them coming back? Here the answer is simple: content, content, content. If you write the content in an SEO-friendly manner, Google will help you attract visitors. Of course, If your site has frequently updated content that is easy to access, you will pull back those who are interested (and Google too.)
Capture their information - in stages. Website visitors are not shy, but they may not want a million follow up calls and emails. You want to capture their basic information for your list without having them feel they are more committed than they want to be. If you get their name and email, perhaps by offering them a free report or other small gift, they will give you permission to keep in touch so you can gently remind them to visit your site again. When they are ready to buy, they will be more willing to offer more information.
Give it time. Your website needs time to be indexed on Google. Your industry has its own sales cycle. Buying and selling are processes. Make sure your website has good keyword-rich content and is easy to navigate, and then try to pull in visitors through your blog and social media. You may want quicker turn around but if buyers skip the investigation step, they might be impulse buyers who return the product or not a good match for you, which wastes your time as well as theirs.
Waiting for your website to produce results can be frustrating, but you have to realize that there is usually some ground to cover between arriving at your website and clicking the button to buy. The average visitor may stop by seven times or more before making a purchase. Your job is to make your website informative and interesting enough to merit a 2nd - and then a 3rd, 4rd, 4th, 5th, 6th, and 7th look.
Tracey Fieber invites you to her free webinar "WHERE are they?!" 5 No-Fail Steps to Finding the RIGHT Support Staff For Your Growing, High-Demand Business & How to Bring Out Their Very Best Day After Day!"
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