Conversion is that magic moment when a bride who finds your website fills in your inquiry form or picks up the phone and calls you. With almost 70% of the country connecting via broadband (cable or DSL), it's not unlikely that a bride will just pick up the phone while viewing your website.
But conversion is a problem at most websites. You can tell quickly if you have a conversion problem if you have lots of traffic but no inquiries.
Poor quality traffic has an impact on conversion.
Poor design probably is a bigger factor.
Most designers have no clue when it comes to conversion.
80% of the people reading this today haven't heard the word before.
Ouch!
If you want more inquiries and more phone calls make it easier to find your inquiry form or phone number at your website. That's basic online Marketing to Brides 101 if you ask me.
Is your phone number at the top of all your pages (that's where I look for it).
Is your inquiry form on your home page?
Will I also find it on the three most visited pages at your website, according to your Google Analytics?
Chris Jaeger
Book More Weddings
Thursday, August 23, 2007
Conversion: Where The Rubber Hits The Road
Saturday, June 30, 2007
Putting Music On Your Website
I don't know who came up with the idea of adding music to the background of a website when the home page loads, but if you're doing it I'm taking high-ground here to tell you it's a BIG MISTAKE.
First, music isn't used in marketing unless you're in the movie or music industry.
Second, the Internet is NOT TV. You can't and shouldn't "force" things on the brides who visit your website. I promise you, if you do, THEY WILL LEAVE.
OK, OK, I hear a few of you already: "But brides tell me they love my website..."
For every bride who tells you they like or love your website I'll bet 20 left without telling you anything.
5 Reasons You Should NOT Use Music
1) RESPECT
Respect thy bride/groom visitor: don't force things on them when they visit your website.
2) YOU'RE FIRED
A lot of brides planning a wedding will at work when they visit your website. "No..." you say, they wouldn't be doing that? Music is a great way to get someone fired. I'm guessing you won't get the inquiry if her boss is yelling at her for planning her wedding on company time again!
3) LOAD AND CRASH
No one wants to wait around for your music file to load. Music creates longer loading times and slow websites are the number one reason a bride will leave your website. Chances are it (your music file) will load about 2 minutes after they found your home page, BLAST on, and scare the cr*p out of her. There's a 50-50 chance you'll crash her browser too. Great first impression, hey?
4) IT'S THE INTERNET - NOT TV
Users should be in control at your website. Don't force things on people. It creates a bad first impression. You'll get better results from your website if you give people the information they came looking for FAST and let them choose the pages and features they want to use. You shouldn't do it for them.
5) NO VALUE
Music adds no value to your website experience. Absolutely NO VALUE. If you have things at your website that do NOT ADD VALUE to the user experience you are wasting your visitors time, testing their patience, and you will get fewer inquiries and lousy results from your website.
In very, very, very, very, VERY few instances can I justify using background music. Some DJs can get away with it, but that's about it.
Monday, June 18, 2007
Conversion Tip: Turning The Brides Who Visit Your Website Into Inquiries
You can have a website but BRIDES CAN'T FIND IT. You have a traffic problem.
WORSE (OUCH!)
You have good traffic, quality traffic (not quantity), you're even PAYING to advertise your website (http://www.weddingplanninglinks.com/), but the brides who find you aren't making inquiries. You have a CONVERSION problem.
There is no one-answer-solution to conversion problems but here's one way I used a rather simple techique to effectively turn more website visitors into inquiries. Yes, it works very well.
http://www.bookmoreweddings.com/members/278.cfm
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