Converting website traffic into sales

This is a good problem to have though, and the challenge really starts when you have substantial amount of traffic to your website or your website is ranking quite well on search engines for certain keywords / keyword phrases and you now want to convert that traffic into leads or sales.

The trick is to build loyalty, credibility, and be a trustworthy source. This seems easy enough, but over 90% of websites don't have good conversion rates and don't have a strategy to improve their numbers.

How would you build in all these qualities on arrival? Simple. You don't! You have to take the patient route and first build customer loyalty ie:

• The visitor must like what you offer (be it your products, services, tips, guidelines, giveaways etc.),
  
• You need to then draw the visitor to your website quite frequently. This can be done via various online marketing strategies such as email marketing campaigns, competitions on your website, viral marketing strategies, social networking etc.
  
• Knowing what appeals or doesn't appeal to your visitor is crucial. To do this, analyse your website stats and the online marketing campaign stats to get a feel for exactly what your subscribers like or dislike. By knowing this you can then make changes accordingly.

How do you make your website credible?

• Your website should have a clean design, with basic SEO techniques implemented
  
• You need to get your website out there - this can be achieved by implementing other online strategies - article marketing, social media marketing etc.
  
• Website needs to be appealing eg: having black text against a white background (eye-pleasing colours)
  
• Little or no obvious advertising
  
• No unnecessary pop ups
  
• A clear message on the homepage as to what your value proposition is
  
• Clear navigation

Once your visitor is on your website, he/she will have about 10 seconds to be impressed or they will leave, generally by clicking on the 'back button' on the browser or closing the page / tab entirely.

Once the visitor is convinced that they have landed on a credible website and they have found the product or service that they are looking for, what next? Well, you now have to come across as being trustworthy.

How do you build trust into your website?

• Put a video of the owner / employee on the website - instantly build trust and credibility. Visitors must see real people behind the website.
  
• Have your telephone / office numbers on the Contact Us page. Explain to them why they should contact you, and give them an indication of when they can expect a response from you.
  
• Add a picture of your premises or building on your About Us page
  
• Have a privacy policy clearly displayed. Even though it's been shown that most people don't read it, they do notice if it is on the website or not.
  
• Have all your member affiliations and logos. Do you belong to the local Chamber of Commerce etc, show that you have real world connections.
  
• Display customer testimonials and spread them across your website on the relevant pages. Have a link if possible to the testimonial(s).
  
• Show visitors when your website was last updated
  
• Don't use overly promotional words in the writing style of your website. Try to be clear, direct and sincere.
  
• And finally, one big thing, ask your customers what element(s) they found as adding credibility to your website and emphasise this element.

These techniques have been tried and tested by myself, and I'm quite confident it will work just as well for your business. Good luck!