Subscribers: Pay A Fee or Get It Free

Why pay when visitors can get it free?

A lot of new website owners add subscriber revenues to their calculations when figuring their break-even date and potential for profit. Not a good idea. Subscriber sites are fast disappearing from the webscape and for good reason. Why pay when you can get it for free?

As a site owner with expertise for which others would pay to read, it’s hard not to think about subscription revenue but the plain fact is, online subscriptions have never really taken off the way we all thought they would. The New York Times went the subscription route with its Times Select but it wasn’t generating enough revenue to justify itself, so the critical features of the NYTs are now available free online.

Even Rupert Murdoch, the much-maligned media mogul, who just bought control of the Wall Street Journal is planning to give away fresh content on the WSJ website. Every day. And that’s one mogul who knows how to make money through advertising!

What happened?
Does anyone remember 2002? Seems so long ago. 2002 is antediluvian in web years. That was a long time ago. But back then, the web had grown substantially with the advent of the search engine in 1994 (along with numerous, subsequent refinements to search engine technology), and media outlets, big and small, saw dollar signs – a whole new revenue stream.

However, in 2002, in the wake of the dot.bomb debacle, online ad revenues took a major nose dive that digital marketers are still trying to overcome. The online subscription revenue model never really took off and, today, even the big players are leaving the field.

The reasons are pretty obvious. First, the web provides so much content from so many varied sources, you don’t have to pay a subscription for the latest in gold futures. Some site is giving it away. Second, add to this the development of RSS technology – the ability of individual web users to gather news and other content of interest with 100% customization, and it becomes pretty obvious why subscriber sites aren’t doing so well.

There are other reasons people give for staying clear of subscriber sites. They’ve been scammed before by another e-book download with nothing to say. They don’t want to give you their credit card number. You use a high-pressure sales approach making untested claims, predictions and guarantees. They figure you’ll sell their contact information and they’ll be bombarded with spam. An online subscription is a tough sell, so what’s the small, self-published guru to do about that $49-a-year online newsletter that subscribers delete without opening after a week or two?

What to do?
Change your revenue model. Change your website. Change your bottom line for the better.

It starts by changing your view of site content. Owners of subscriber-based websites depend on readers’ “need to know” – whether it’s a professional financial advisory, a “top secret” stock report, or the latest news on what’s happening in China’s shoe industry – somebody needs that information. And, if this information proves useful, subscribers will stick with you.

Useful information is information that works to the benefit of the reader. It could be a self-help website with a monthly affirmation newsletter, or a pet owner site that sends you weekly tips to keep your kitty happy and healthy. If the content is actually useful a subscriber site might survive – until some other visionary comes along and starts giving away the information you’re selling.

Change your view of content. Don’t think of content as something to be sold. Give it away. Use it to entice readers to visit your site often. Daily, perhaps. Now, no doubt, there are a lot of entrepreneurs shaking their heads as they read this. These are people who have spent years learning their industry, a new system to win at poker or how to use hedge funds to fast-track your retirement years. They have knowledge.

However, others have that knowledge, too. And if web users can find that information free, they sure enough aren’t going to pay you for the same thing. So, instead of thinking of content as something to sell, think of it as bait to attract regular readers and improve links popularity.

So how do I make money with this new revenue model of which you speak?
Indeed, web-based ad revenues did decrease for a short time in ’02. But since then, there’s been a marked increase in revenue growth, closing in on $2 billion in ’07 and projected to exceed $11 billion in just five years. The web has become one of the most potent marketing tools available to advertisers.

You can pick up some of that ad revenue using the content you once sold to draw in the traffic and keep your PR high, with ad revenues to match. You can also develop affiliate partnerships with companies that want to reach your target market.

Here’s how the numbers break out. In the summer of ’06, survey respondents were asked if they would rather receive free content with advertising or paid content with no advertising. More than 70% of those surveyed opted for free with advertising. And that’s why you see ads for Coke before a music video download on AOL. AOL is giving away the content and making its money on that 15 second Coke ad. Even so, 78% of Millenials (ages 13 – 24) found web ads more intrusive. Clearly, they want the content free – free of cost and free of advertising.

e-Marketer analyst, Lisa Phillips, recently stated, “Advertisers pay up to three times more to reach print readers than online users. They’re not convinced online readers browse a news web site the way they believe print readers still browse through an entire section of a newspaper.”

Excellent point and one that clearly demonstrates why print media is so heavy on advertising and light on content. All you have to do is check today’s newspaper if you want proof.

Time for a change
If you have a successful, subscriber site – congratulations. You must have something very interesting or useful to say to your subscribers. However, if you’ve seen your subscriber list dwindle and re-ups shrink, it’s time to change your business model and use that subscriber content as the lure.

Use the online ad revenues as your reward.

SpyFu: Improve Site Performance NOW!

Thinking about building a commercial web site? Who isn’t? Everybody has dreams of becoming the next Jeff Bezos, Amazon’s founder and rich guy. But the fact is, 6,000 new sites are launched each day. So what are the chances your little “hand-knit sweater emporium” is going to be discovered?

Your web site is an atom in the W3 universe, and unless you advertise, creating signposts pointing visitors to your URL, no on is going to find you. There are plenty of ways to advertise – hosted content, paid advertising, guerrilla marketing, employing social media to drive traffic to your microscopic spec of digital real estate. All used with varying degrees of success.

However, one of the most effective ways to drive traffic to your site is pay-per-click advertising, like Google’s AdWords program. You see “Ads by Google” cubes on Google’s SERPs and web pages. You probably see them in your sleep! Why? Because PPC works. AdWords works. But where do you start?

SpyFu: Making the Most of AdWords
Site owners bid for placement using AdWords. The higher the bid, the better the placement on SERPs. Highest bidder appears at the top of the pile. Lower bidders on the same keywords may appear on page two or three of SERPs, therefore seen by fewer search engine users.

So, what are the advantages of PPC click programs like AdWords? There are plenty:

• you only pay when your cube is clicked (pay for play)

• you determine where your ads will appear – on sites that are visited by the very people you’re trying to reach

• you can define where you DON”T want AdWords to appear, like competitor sites

• you determine the cost per click

• you set the budget

• you schedule when your AdWords appear so you don’t keep getting the same eyeballs eyeballing your AdWords. New readers = new visitors

SpyFu: AdWords POW!
You’re going to be spending money every time a web user clicks on one of your PPC ads. So, naturally, you want to place those cubes where they’ll do the most good and be seen by your target market – the sweet spot of your demographic.

Applications, like SpyFu, deliver empirical data based on keywords, ideal for niche sites like that sweater emporium. SpyFu tells you what your competitors are paying for their AdWords, giving you a bidding range that makes budget sense for your e-biz..

Monitoring the effectiveness of certain keywords in terms of cost per acquisition (CPA) helps you refine a keyword list that delivers more highly-qualified buyers rather than browsers who just cost you $1.80 for a five-second glimpse of your home page.

Using AdWords, you set a daily spending limit. Good idea. SpyFu will develop metrics to determine if you should up your PPC budget and by how much. Just look at what successful competitors are doing using SpyFu and emulate their successful strategies. Life gets easier.

Track AdWords performance by keywords, site placement, sales, time spent on site, repeat visitors and other key metrics that identify hot prospects. SpyFu shows you exactly what’s working and what isn’t for your competition. Who you going to follow?

Placement on Google’s SERPs is essential to delivering quality results. The higher up the skyscraper your AdWords appears the better. And, of course, getting placement on page one of SERPs is better than page two or three. SpyFu tells you exactly what it’ll cost for placement on SERPs.

Contextual placement on sites is also critical to improving traffic through your digital doors. If you know which sites are delivering the most traffic, naturally you’ll want to place your AdWords on those sites with greater frequency, right? Conversely, if a site isn’t pulling, then you pull it from your campaign and reconsider the use of that keyword.

Intelligence Collection Intelligently
Sure, you could spend a few months dong multi-variant AdWords testing and in the process lose a lot of money and those few months. Here’s the deal.

Building and managing an on-line business is 100% front-loaded on costs. It’s all outgo with no income as you write a check to the site designer, the copywriter, the SEO pro and AdWords guru. Your window of opportunity shrinks quickly in the on-line realm.

But you can hit the ground running and start seeing income faster, and growing at a faster rate, simply by gathering market intelligence intelligently, and then using that mined data to your advantage.

Web success isn’t rocket science, but it does require precision when it comes to marketing. PPC is one of the most effective tools an established site in a competitive slot has, and for start-ups, PPC offers the biggest bang-buck return.

It starts with good intelligence and astute analysis. Hire your own covert op. That’s what you get with SpyFu.

What About Conversion Ratios: Why Aren’t They Buying?

What converts web site visitors to buyers?

If you own a commercial site and you’ve performed all of your search engine optimization (SEO) chores, you should be listed with the major search engines and visitors should be finding their way to your on-line boutique.

Driving traffic to a commercial site is difficult in the first place. So, once that traffic starts showing up, the last thing you want those potential buyers to do is to leave before making a purchase, especially true if they found you via PPC because that visitor is going to cost you money for that unfruitful click through.

The question becomes: once you have a visitor on site, how do you induce that person to make a purchase?

The Trust Factor

Most on-line purchases are made using a visitor’s credit card and those names and card numbers are hacked all of the time. So, before you ask a buyer to make a purchase using a credit card, you must first create trust between you and the potential buyer.

Get SSL Certified
Use SSL encryption to secure the on-line transaction. You’ll need an SSL certificate to transmit encrypted data. Sometimes, a web host will let you use its SSL certification but regardless, any savvy on-line buyer is going to avoid making a purchase unless s/he sees that little padlock in the lower right hand corner and an https in the address box. The “s” stands for secure.

Another trust building factor is the VeriSign logo. VeriSign provides SSL encrypted solutions for on-line businesses. They have an excellent reputation for security and regular on-line buyers and retailers know this. So, use the VeriSign logo throughout your site to build consumer trust.

Subscribe to the On-Line BBB
You can also build visitor trust by becoming a member of the on-line Better Business Bureau which indicates a commitment to service and honesty. The BBB logo displayed on your site’s home page and checkout pages is a comfort to new buyers.

Provide Assurances
Many visitors are reluctant to buy because they’re afraid of being inundated with spam – from you and other companies to which you sell your buyers list. Place a prominent notice on all zone pages and especially on the checkout page assuring buyers that you don’t sell sensitive, personal information. If you do use direct e-mail as a marketing tool (it’s a good one) let buyers decide whether to receive or not receive future offerings, newsletters and other digital clutter. If they click the ‘OK’ box, e-mail them. If they don’t, put them on the “Do Not Bother” list. And respect their wishes.

The Buying Process

Buying anything on-line (or off) is a process. The visitor arrives, searches for the item, reads the product description and so on. At any point during the buying process, you risk losing a potential buyer. And again, once you’ve got them there you want that sale.

Ease of Navigation
It may be clear to you. You designed it. But, if your visitors arrive on a home or zone page without a clue about how to find what they’re looking for, they’re gone. Easy and unambiguous navigation is critical to making that sale.

If you sell a variety of products, provide a product menu that takes visitors directly to the product they’re looking for. That product category menu should be available from any page on the site. Most commercial sites make it a part of the navigation bar at the top of the page.

Product Descriptions
They should provide information. Buyers want to know whether this is a product worth buying. Are batteries included? How big is it? How much power does it have?

If your product descriptions read like sales hype and you don’t provide essential information required for making a buying decision, those visitors will look elsewhere.

Product Pix
It’s always a good idea to include a picture of the product. It’s a good selling device because people like to see what they’re buying. Now, this may not be necessary if the buyer is purchasing 10 tons of cold-rolled steel, but it’s essential to the customer buying jewelry, clothing – in fact any personal or home products.

If you provide a thumbnail product picture, enable the visitor to enlarge the image by clicking on it. Again, the more information you provide a potential buyer the more likely you are to make a sale.

Offer Incentives
“20% Off Your First Purchase” or “Free Shipping” get buyers’ attention and make it more likely that they’ll (1) place the item in their shopping carts and (2) actually go through the checkout. And speaking of the checkout….

The Checkout
In a recent Market Live report called “The Perfect Shopping Cart,” researchers reported that 57% of visitors never complete the process of buying. More than half of those who put items in shopping carts fail to make it through the checkout.

Shipping Costs
One reason for this, according to the report, is shipping costs. The buyer has found the item, added it to his or her shopping cart, clicked on “Go to Checkout” and then abandons the sale when s/he sees the total cost of the item with shipping costs added.

You can do a couple of things, here. First, if you’re trying to improve your margins using profitable shipping costs, you’re losing more in sales than you’re making on shipping and handling. If you keep your shipping and handling costs down, you’ll generate more sales.

Second, offer “Free Shipping.” Of course, nothing is free. Shipping costs are built into the retail price of the item but it makes buyers feel better when they get something “free.” Keep shipping costs as low as possible and offer incentives to make one more purchase, i.e. “Free Shipping on Orders Over $50.” You’ll be surprised at the number of visitors who add that one more item to their carts to avoid paying shipping. (For a great example of how this works visit Amazon’s checkout.)

Payment Gateways
Provide as many different ways as possible to pay for an item – credit card, PayPal, check or money order – there are dozens of money transfer sites that charge a fee but it’s a convenience your visitors will appreciate.

Terms of Sale and Returns
Make your purchase and return policies crystal clear. If you charge a restocking fee of 20% you better believe buyers will want to know that, and you can save yourself a lot of headaches and time by letting buyers know how you handle returns and other terms of sale.

Follow Through
Once the sale is made, follow up ASAP. Your site should be set up to generate an automated e-mail receipt providing all details – including order number – as soon as the sale is finalized.

Indicate in this e-mail when the buyer can expect to receive the purchase. You can even indicate how it will be shipped.

Include all contact information in this important informational e-mail as well in case questions come up.

Use a CMS (content management system) or d-base to keep track of orders. And, if you realize an order is going to be late, notify the buyer. In many states there are laws that require notification if the product is going to be more than 30 days late.

Ship promptly and work to resolve customer complaints. That’s how you build repeat business – the best business you can have.

Once you’ve optimized your site for search engines, you’re only part way there. Now comes the hard part – optimizing your site to convert visitors to buyers. It takes some time and effort, but if you intend to be an on-line success, that time and effort will more than pay for itself.

Need some helpboosting your site’s conversion rate? Give me a call. Often, it’s something real simple.

Webwordslinger.com

How To Hire A Search Engine Marketer

The Right SE Marketer WILL Boost Sales

If you’ve seen a modicum and encouraging amount of commercial site success, you might consider hiring an SEO or SEM professional to take your site to the next level. (You can finally quit your day job!!)

But here’s the thing. Your Aunt Tilly could call herself an SEM or SEO professional. There are no credentials, no certifications or letters after the name, i.e., Dr. Jon Smith, PhD in SEM. So how do you know which of the thousands of SEO/SEM gurus is for real? Here are six things to look for.

1. On first contact, does the expert take the time to bring up your site on his or her screen and discuss it, maybe even providing a few free tips and suggestions? S/he should. As you describe your site and its perceived limitations, you want a potential expert to “be on the same page” as you are.

Conversely, if the “so-called” expert starts to bombard you with insider jargon “Well, Bob, I’ve developed interesting analytics that show your hit ratio increases when we spice up your meta data and add an opt-in.” Huh?

2. Find an SEM who walks the walk but doesn’t necessarily talk the talk.
Forget the jargon. Who cares? The fact is, experts in any field use jargon as a code language to exclude outsiders and SEM pros love to toss around terms like “keyword stuffing,” and content architecture.

Speak English! Search engine marketing is an on-going process but it’s, by no means, a difficult subject to master. It ain’t brain surgery. So, if your prospective SEM starts throwing insider gibberish in your direction, ask to have the information put in terms you can understand, whether you’re a first time e-vendor or own a hundred sites.

It’s like doctors. They tell you stuff only they understand. But, if you pin them down and ask for an explanation you understand (even if you have to resort to Crayola crayons), you finally understand options and consequences. Same with an SEO. You want to make the decisions.

That means you have to understand proposals, marketing campaigns and other SEM deliverables in terms that allow you to (1) turn the information into action and (2) contest the information if you think the SEM has missed a key demographic or some other oversight.

Otherwise, it’s all just a pile of numbers.

3. Can the SEM guru provide references you will contact?
A reference based on experience is the best reference you can get so, is there an SEM client willing to discuss the services provided by your prospect?

Now, don’t be surprised if the answer is ‘no.’ There’s a unspoken (okay spoken, here) understanding that client information is privileged and must be protected. However, many site owners give their SEMs permission to send visitors to the site to use as an example of the pro’s proficiency, Which gets us to:

4. Does the SEM provide reference sites?
This shouldn’t be a problem for any web pro with any kind of track record. Ask the SEO to provide sites that s/he has worked on. Then, go Alexa on each site’s assets.

Alexa.com delivers stats and graphs to show how the performance of a site has improved or deteriorated over time. Look for an increase in site traffic and lots of links. (See Connectivity in the post below). Look for improvements in page views and, by all means, employ Alexa’s Time Machine, a feature that enables you to see the evolution of the site and, especially how the site looked before and after the re-do by the SEM.

If you don’t see significant increases in the SEM’s reference sites, you are talking to the wrong SEM! Take your time, here. You’re about to sign a big check (SEM pros are pricey because of their highly-specialized knowledge) and you want to see quantifiable results that occur after the SEO/SEM optimizes the site.

5. Please don’t try this at home.
If your sites are performing well, you might think you can take yourself to the next level without the expense of a web marketing pro. Not recommended in the bang/buck equation.

You might pay $200 for a once-over lightly site review, or $20K on a tear-down and website rebuild, and still actually lose ground. Fewer site visitors, lower Alexa ranking, lower links popularity and so on. It happens thousands of times a day. The gnomes who inhabit Castle Google tweak the search algo and all of a sudden, a site that was on page one of Google’s SERPs has slipped to page 106.

So, if this is your money-maker, don’t shake it. Hire an SEM with a track record and see what s/he can do to boost your bottom line.

6. If you don’t like the results, jettison the web guru.
Do NOT sign a contract with an SEO/SEM agency. You don’t have to in the competitive consultation market, so go with a company that let’s you pay as you go or pay for play. You want results and you’re willing to pay for them. No positive results. “You are so outta here.”

It’s reasonable to ask a prospective guru to develop a plan for site growth. It doesn’t have to be long, but it must be informative, and once again, written in terms that make the gibberish understandable to you – the guy or gal with the checkbook. Hey, that makes you the boss even if you don’ t know an HTML title tag from a dog tag!

It isn’t recommended that you make major changes to your site – including migrating to another web host – without expert opinion and technical know-how behind you. Major changes can produce voodoo numbers in your site’s performance.

Evolution in site design makes it easier for search engines and clients, visitors or other site stakeholders, to access content and, in the case of customers or clients, place an order.

That’s why you built the site. You run the show. But let a good SEM help you grow to real profitability. If you find a professional who isn’t blowing smoke and provides a few dozen sites you can check out, you’ll see improvement in rankings and, more importantly, in site traffic.

Conversely, if you hire the first snake oil salesperson you come across in a webmaster chat room, you may be out a few grand as you watch site performance deteriorate right before your eyes.

Spend time finding the right fit and pay for quality consultation and services rendered. Consider it an investment. Just make sure you’re investing in a blue chip SEM not a penny stock loser.

Need to drive some traffic to your digital turf. Drop me aline or give me a call. It ain’t rocket science.

Webwordslinger.

Customer Relationship Software (CRM): Who, What, Where and When?

Each Client Or Customer Is Unique

As a webmaster, you know what’s involved in designing, constructing and administrating an online business – everything from paying the bills to syndicating content, a well-run e-biz is a multi-faceted operation. And you run the show.

However, if you try this, then re-do that, test such-and such and hire people who don’t “get it,” your online business won’t be the dream come true you’ve been planning. The key is to integrate all of your business activities into a single strategy called CRM – customer relationship management. CRM is at the heart of any growing business. The principles are simple, you don’t need an MBA and it doesn’t cost a lot of money (much of CRM doesn’t cost any money).

CRM is an important consideration for corporations, NFPs, NGOs and public sites, all of which seek to implement the basics to manage relationships with customers, clients and stakeholders (upper management, shareholders, etc.).

It’s all about the acquisition and analysis of customer data, vendor information and the in-house procedures you design to connect satisfied customer to eager vendor. Think of your website as the intermediary between buyer and seller – your customers and your wholesalers.

What Purpose Does CRM Serve?
Customer relationship management weaves together a variety of business functions to deliver the best product and retain the customer or client. Client retention is the ultimate purpose of CRM but, in the process of developing a CRM strategy, you’ll be required to consider all facets of your business including: professional development (for you and any staff you have, paid or otherwise), customer service (this specifically includes training customer service representatives, if you outsource this task), sales, marketing and promotion and, finally, compensation – who gets what.

If you’re the only participant, this won’t be a difficult decision to make. Any compensation comes back to you as either salary or operating capital to expand the business further.

The Building Blocks of a Solid CRM Strategy
In addition to your learning curve (assuming you’re a sole proprietor), which takes time and costs money in lowered productivity, you’ll need several tools to develop a workable and effective CRM strategy.

Your Database
Your business database contains all customer/client information along with inventory data, shipping dates and other order processing and marketing data. It is the focus of any CRM. In fact, without this information, there is no CRM.

This means, when designing your first website, you install a reliable, simple, automated database (MySQL, for example) to track all business activities. These activities fall into four distinct categories: (1) analytical CRM, (2) operational CRM, (3) interactive CRM (interactive with site visitors) and finally, (4) integrated client support and customer service throughout the business itself.

Analytical CRM
To undertake these CRM-based activities you’ll need some tools and some time. Analytic CRM requires software that can deliver useable stats. If the software delivers reams of indecipherable numbers, the data won’t be as useful to other members of the business team. The CFO may understand what that 250-page financial report shows, but the CEO may not.

Employ analytical software that delivers data in graphic formats – heat maps, pie charts and other visual representations. This equips your whole team (even if you’re the only player) to understand, assimilate and use site metrics with greater effectiveness.

Operational CRM
Where’s what?

The daily administration of your site is greatly simplified through the use of CRM tracking software. Using this software, you’re able to automate many routine functions such as auto-responder emails when orders are placed and news updates sent during an email blast to those customers and opt-ins stored in your database.

However, operational CRM also enables you to make the best use of the data you maintain in the system. If the bank account number of a key vendor in Korea is written on the back of a scrap of paper, you’ll spend more time looking for that information than if you were able to bring up all of that vendor’s information on a single screen via the CRM software loaded on your work station.

Tracking data – sales data, order data, site metrics, order status and other critical information – becomes much simpler when (1) it’s easily accessible in one place and (2) you’re able to automate routine functions, giving you more time to focus on more “human-oriented” tasks like developing your next marketing campaign.

Interactive CRM
A relatively new digital phenomenon but one web users have quickly adopted and now expect from sites selling goods or services.

Interactive CRM enables the visitor to customize a product search using a site search feature that delivers the desired content whether the visitor enters a product name, brand or even part number. Fast. The visitor is in and out – and hopefully you’ve made a sale and a new customer.

Forms are another use of CRM interactivity. More and more sites collect data on their visitors who don’t seem to mind providing it, especially if they’re tempted with a free eBook download.

This information provides opt-ins (pure gold) and marketing data to better define your demographic and its needs. And again, the automation of the data acquisition and generation of the download key code integrates operational and interactive CRM, creating a business synergy.

Interactive CRM also delivers the ability to the client to ask a question via email. The “Contact Us” page of a site is where you’ll usually find this feature. It’s another channel to keep your clientele happy and to collect opt-in email addresses for future messages and updates.

Integrated CRM
CRM should be the focus of all your site design, marketing, ordering and management of customer objections. Instead of dealing with sales as a separate aspect of your operation, it’s built into the master plan employing operational, interactive and analytic CRM data drawn from an up-to-date data base.

When a CRM program is designed, it should look like a flow chart with automated decision points, QC statements, data collation and other business activities functioning as a unified whole. This is the ultimate goal of developing your site’s plan for customer relationship management.

In a cosmically competitive marketplace like the web, every advantage you gain over a competitor makes your business stronger. If you can deliver an order a day faster than the competition, you win. The relationship with those happy buyers is strong and they will be back to buy again.

Using CRM software to chart the course your online business may take a day or two to figure out, if marketing and customer care aren’t a part of your professional background. But that learning curve will pay off many times over by providing data that drives solutions to online retail problems.

Looking for synergies between marketing and order taking? Trying to figure out your percentage of repeat buyers over the past 12 months? Trying to resolve a customer complaint? You want (no you need) CRM tools just to keep up.

Need some helpt tracking your clients? Drop me aline or give me a call. I’ll show you how to treat a customer right. Webwordslinger.

Accessibility: It’s What A Web Site Is All About

KEEP IT SIMPLE TO GET THE MDA

Accessibility, when discussing web sites, includes a number of factors: easy navigation, understandable site text, no dead ends requiring a browser back click to escape (lots of users don’t even know browsers HAVE a back click).

Let’s start with the bottom line- yours: the easier it is for a site visitor to perform the most desired action (MDA), the more times that MDA will be performed.

Let’s Start With Navigation
Whether you go with a navigation bar at the top of the screen or a menu list in the first column far left, your navigation must be:

• simple
• unambiguous
• truthful
• always available
• always in the same location

Avoid numerous tabs, drop-down or flyout menus. Keep it simple. If visitors are faced with too many choices too soon on arriving at the site, chances are they’ll bounce.

Keep the navigation unambiguous. It’s routine to have a “Contact Us” page on a web site. If you label the contact link “Company Authority,” visitors are going to be totally confused. And again, bounce.

Truthful is just what it says. If the link says “Product Descriptions,” don’t make the visitor read through another landing page of sell copy. Deliver what the link says and go directly to the products.

Always available is an aspect of keeping visitors on site longer, and the longer they stick around, the more likely they are to perform the MDA. So, the navigation bar or menu should be available from every page so the visitor can surf at will, unencumbered by what YOU think the visitor wants to know.

Finally, keep the nav tabs in the same place. Don’t move them from bar to menu and back to bar. The last thing you want is a visitor trying to figure out how to return to the contact page to make contact.

Keep it simple. The fewer clicks required to get the visitor to perform the MDA, the better. So, go through the process and eliminate every unnecessary side road, dead end and yet another landing page.

Accessible Content
If your client site is for a professional medical dispenser, you can assume that the visitors have some knowledge of the subject, i.e. you don’t have to start from square one. But you still have to stay on target pointing out the benefits of buying the client’s medical products.

On the other hand, if you’re writing text for a hearing aid retail outlet, accessible text is understandable by the reader. So first, toss the thesaurus. Find the simplest, shortest way to say what needs to be said about products and services.

Be helpful and supportive to the new visitor. Make things simple to find, simple to learn and simple to bookmark. Returning visitors are gold. Eventually they buy something so earning a bookmark is a very good thing.

Skip the hype. Educate the visitor using simple terms, no jargon and listing benefits rather than features. This is the stuff site visitors want to know.

Finally, lay out the text so it can be scanned rather than read. No big, long paragraphs. Visitors scan from upper left to lower right so put your most important info upper left on the screen.

The easier it is to buy something, opt-in for a newsletter, or to complete a form, the more often those MDAs are performed. So make it as simple as possible (why do you think Amazon offers a one-click checkout? How easy can it be?).

Accessibility benefits both site owner and site visitor – a win-win. Also a no brainer.

Need to make your site more accessible? Dropme a line and give me a call. Let’s have a look at what ya got. Webwordslinger

Remote Site Syndication (RSS): Use It Or Lose It

 

Use RSS to Get Out The Word

Really Simple Syndication (or Remote Site Syndication, your choice) has been around for quite a few years, though web site owners are just beginning to recognize the potential RSS has to increase site traffic and to spread their site news from one end of the web to the other.

 

RSS feeds are simply the means of getting out the content to sites with visitors interested in what you have to say. And vice-versa: it’s a great way to deliver daily, fresh content to your visitors, increasing your site’s “stickiness” or ability to keep visitors returning regularly. Right now, all the big news outlets deploy RSS feeds to any site that wants to pick them up. Disney, CNN, Forbes, the BBC and other information outlets are distributing their content across the web via RSS feeds. Why? It’s easy, it spreads the costs of content development, and it works. It’s an effective marketing tool that can draw traffic from sites a far distance from your own.

Why Add RSS to Your Site?
Okay, first, it keeps your customer base up to date on sales, special promos and other news from your site. That’s how your site becomes sticky. You broadcast to your customers and, because they’ve had a good experience with you previously, they check out the new merchandise. It’s a great way to keep in touch with previous buyers – the best buyers any retailer could ask for.

In addition, RSS feeds are based on a streamlined XML. This enables your RSS broadcast to be picked up by just about anything digital – cell phones, PDAs, voicemail, e-mail accounts and so on. (No, not the microwave.)

Outgoing RSS
By syndicating (broadcasting) content from your site, you disperse your web presence to sites many times removed from your own. In fact, it may be picked up by site owners you would never have considered and read by a readership you hadn’t even thought about. An on-line store selling horse tack and other equestrian gear found one of its RSS feeds on a site for Therapeutic Horseback Riding – a whole new market for the source of that RSS feed.

Your RSS feed broadcast can be picked up by any site with visitors who might be interested in the latest news in your area of expertise or commerce.

Let’s just say that broadcasting information from your site, and allowing it to be picked up by any site owner, can only help generate more revenue because some readers of your contain, regardless of where they found your latest article, will visit your site to learn more about you, your opinions, services and products.

Incoming RSS
It’s not a one way street. Using an RSS aggregator, which collects feeds from other sites, is a great service you can deliver to increase site stickiness. Let’s say you publish a financial advice newsletter each day. You can collect (aggregate) RSS feeds from other investment sites, large and small, and deliver all of the financial news in one place for your now-daily visitors. So, the web user who once had to visit 10 sites can now get all the news of the day in one place – yours. It’s a time saver for visitors and it keeps them coming back for more.

What Do You Need to Start RSS?
There are three elements in the process, all available as OSS – open source software, as in free. It doesn’t cost you anything except some time.

The RSS Aggregator
This software is used to collect appropriate RSS feeds from other sites and it’s as easy as a mouse click to add a feed. Start by visiting competitor sites and look for the RSS logo (a small red box) or look for the site’s RSS hook up page.

When you find information that you believe your readers would enjoy, just click the “add” button and that feed is now hooked directly into your site. Simply move from site to site locating information that you think your visitors would enjoy.

A note of caution: when gathering RSS feeds for your site visitors, you’re, in fact, the editor. You decide which feeds to add and which to skip. Don’t add every feed just because you can. Be selective. Look for quality writing, solid research and topics that will really be of interest to your visitors. If you throw anything and everything at visitors, they’ll have a tougher time sorting out what’s useful and what isn’t, so collect the best and leave the rest.

The RSS Syndicator
Your web broadcasting antenna. The syndicator (also OSS) makes your feeds easily available for other site owners to grab and display on their sites. Keep your broadcasts short and use a lot of headlines to grab attention. Remember, your feed may be going to someone’s cell phone at a place where reading a 1000-word treatise on the importance of adjusting foot-pounds in running shoes won’t be possible. Broadcasts should be headline rich and employ lots of short paragraphs.

Keep the most important information in headers and in the first few paragraphs. If you haven’t captured their attention by then, you never will.

The RSS Reader
Another piece of OSS. This is the software site visitors need to sort through and read RSS broadcasts. Google offers a pretty spiffy RSS reader. All you have to do is download it and you’re ready to start enjoying the convenience that RSS delivers to visitors looking for a lot of information (good info) from many sources and on the same topic.

If you’re sending out feeds, offer an RSS reader free to your visitors to ensure they get the message.

Use it or lose it.

 

Looking to boost site performance? It ain’t rocket surgery. Drop by Webwordslinger’s place and give me a call. Let’s get some traffic moving on your site.

Wireless Application Protocol: Get Mobilized

Can Buyers Access Your Site By Cell Phone?

If you think that your website can only be accessed by way of computer (desktop or laptop) you aren’t going to be as profitable as you could be because you’re missing new customers and site exposure because your site lacks WAP.

WAP: What is it?

It stands for Wireless Application Protocol and it enables you to broadcast your website, and virtually any other digital data, via any wireless application – today, primarily the cell phone. Now, the cell phone you remember from your teen years is long gone. Today, users can watch entire movies on their cells, though you gotta think that Gone With The Wind might lose something on a two-inch cell phone screen. However, most cell phones are WAP-enabled right out of the box so it’s the norm, not the dream of the future.

Let Your Site Go Live

First recognize that it’s pretty easy to WAP if you’ve got an up-to-date web host. The cell phone user simply selects the WAP option on her handset. That provides instant, mobile access to the world wide web.

Next, enter the URL you want to see – anything from the latest from Eddie Bauer to unusual piercings for the biker crowd. If it’s on the web (and it is) you can access the site from your Blackberry, cell phone – any mobile communication device.

The fact is, WAP delivers live information. Sometimes it’s service information like a tornado warning and sometimes it’s news on the latest sales at the mall. It’s a lot cheaper and much more effective than text messaging your client base, though its true that a lot of
WAPPERS will skip right over your message if it smells like spam.

Think of it this way – it’s another means to get you site in front of your market – young, tech savvy folks who WAP daily and text message friends about interesting sites (yours?). It’s a mini-marketing network but it’s growing as fast as the cell phone industry and we all know how that’s done in the past 10 years. Five-year-olds have their own cell phones today.

What technology do I need?

Depends what your plans are. There are lots of online companies that will deliver feeds to your WAP line. The content is free, a good web host won’t fuss about it because it stays green for 60 seconds and is dumped before moving on to the next big thing. You’ll gain WAP creds as your site is bookmarked by more cell phones users. Most wireless networks support WAP including DataTAC, CDPD, iDEN, FLEX and others. And, WAP is supported by all operating systems which means you can broadcast content from any platform to any platform as long as both use a common wireless network.

As most readers know, web sites are built using HTML (hyper text markup language) or XML (extensible markup language) and while most wireless devices support these most popular on-line formats, smart phones and other wireless devices also uses WML which has been created specifically for wireless applications. Because cells have very little memory capacity and low-bandwidth, WML removes a lot of the W3 protocols used for site building. Make sure your web host is WAPable before signing a two-year contract.

There’s no additional equipment to buy. If you can post it on your web site, you can post it on any smart phone, handheld wireless device (Blackberry), pagers and other wireless communications devices such as two-way radios.

How Can I Use It To Help My Site?

There are plenty of sites that provide content that’s WAP-ready on a variety of topics including top stories of the moment, entertainment news, financial news, technology, sports, business and more.

Other, more site-specific capabilities? OK, how about broadcasting your site’s blog. This is especially useful if you have an active blogging community with long threads. Your wireless users won’t feel left out away from their desktops.

If your site is topic specific, add WAP-ready, RSS (remote site syndication or really simple syndication) feeds for broadcast to smart phones and wireless networks. This means that, using an RSS aggregator (free download) to collect feeds of interest to your customer base, you can collect all the news related to the topic for distribution via wireless devices. For example, if your site is based on exercise and good health, you can deliver recipes, exercises, personal safety tips and other information that will keep your customers in touch – with you.

WAP at Work

It’s not all fun and games, funny ringbones and dancing, happy feet. Many large companies have also discovered the value of WAP apps for both general broadcast and in-house use. Just to get an idea of companies using WAP tech to advertise to customers or to keep staff up-to-date on company happenings, visit moreover.com for a listing of general WAP categories as well as categories that focus on the news out of a single company.

On this day, moreover.com was offering health topics on everything from cancer to genetics in the science category. In sports, content is divided by game: basketball, football, cricket (that’s right, cricket), cycling and more. In the lifestyles section, you can target your perfect buyer with incredible specificity using WAP-ready content. Parenting, health, men’s health, senior citizens, homeopathy – you name it and you’ll find feeds for it.

Just a Passing Fancy?

Hardly. Mobile technology is growing exponentially with a tech savvy consumer base demanding more and more from their wireless products.

To this end, both wireless hardware and software continue to integrate WAP into the technology matrix that has become such a part of our daily lives. Currently available, you’ll find cells that are Java-enabled, eliminating the need to translate web data to WAP data so cell phone users get news faster.

Flash Lite is making strides in delivering Flash animations, videos and other Flash content to that 2-inch cell screen. Even entire new operating systems (Symbian OS) are being installed into the latest cell phones. And there are even entire wireless networks of content including My Yahoo, Windows Live Alerts, Newsburst, Pluck and My AOL. And more of these networks are coming to market all the time so that cell phone users can have more expansive coverage of topics of interest to them.

What’s It All Mean to the Success of Your Site?

If you’re not broadcasting WAP content, you aren’t making full use of your site as a marketing or informational resource. Being able to shop your site while riding the bus to work will boost sales. And finding the one piece of information just before that important meeting will cause that user to bookmark your site’s RSS feeds.

Bottom line? WAP just provides one more, low-cost way to keep your company and its products or services before the eyes of your client base, regardless of where those clients are. Just a few years ago, your customers had to be sitting at a desktop or lap top to access data from your site. Now all they need are smart phones, which are getting smarter all of the time.

You extend the reach of your site beyond the limits of a 17-inch monitor in the spare room and go global with your products, services, company message and, yes, funny ringbones and dancing, cartoon feet.

Look at it this way. Chances are your main competitors are already using WAP technology to their advantage, leaving you coughing in the dust. If your site and web host aren’t WAP ready, if you aren’t delivering RSS feeds from your site and, subsequently, to WAP-ready mobile devices, you’re missing one of the greatest marketing and community building opportunities to come along since some brainiac thought a world wide web might be a good idea.

You’ve got the content already on your site so it’s not like you have to start over from scratch. Whatever you want to say is already on-line. With a bit of technology (not PhD technology) you can broadcast everything on your site to your loyal customer base using WAP technology and hardware.

It’s there. And it’s growing. And if you don’t get on board now, you’re going to be running double-time to catch up with the competition. So, if you don’t know WAP from Whoop-de-do, call a techie and get yourself out there where your customers are. And if you do know about RSS aggregators and publishers, WAP-based protocols and other tech talk, what in the world are you waiting for?

Your customers are hungry for news from your site and WAP will deliver it so that you can actually take orders over cell phones, expanding your selling opportunities well beyond land-based technology.

So go wireless and watch your sales grow. It’s low cost and low tech. Any site owner can use it and upgrade content regularly. Check out Wireless Application Protocol for yourself to see what you and your best customers have been missing.

You’re going to wonder how you ever got along without it.

Before You Hire a Search Engine Marketeer…

 

If you’ve seen a modicum and encouraging amount of commercial site success, you might consider hiring an SEO or SEM professional to take your site to the next level. (You can finally quit your day job!!)

But here’s the thing. Your Aunt Tilly could call herself an SEM or SEO professional. There are no credentials, no certifications or letters after the name, i.e., Dr. Jon Smith, PhD in SEM. So how do you know which of the thousands of SEO/SEM gurus is for real? Here are six things to look for.

1. On first contact, does the expert take the time to bring up your site on his or her screen and discuss it, maybe even providing a few free tips and suggestions? S/he should. As you describe your site and its perceived limitations, you want a potential expert to “be on the same page” as you are.

Conversely, if the “so-called” expert starts to bombard you with insider jargon “Well, Bob, I’ve developed interesting analytics that show your hit ratio increases when we spice up your meta data and add an opt-in.” Huh?

2. Find an SEM who walks the walk but doesn’t necessarily talk the talk.
Forget the jargon. Who cares? The fact is, experts in any field use jargon as a code language to exclude outsiders and SEM pros love to toss around terms like “keyword stuffing,” and content architecture.

Speak English! Search engine marketing is an on-going process but it’s, by no means, a difficult subject to master. It ain’t brain surgery. So, if your prospective SEM starts throwing insider gibberish in your direction, ask to have the information put in terms you can understand, whether you’re a first time e-vendor or own a hundred sites.

It’s like doctors. They tell you stuff only they understand. But, if you pin them down and ask for an explanation you understand (even if you have to resort to Crayola crayons), you finally understand options and consequences. Same with an SEO. You want to make the decisions.

That means you have to understand proposals, marketing campaigns and other SEM deliverables in terms that allow you to (1) turn the information into action and (2) contest the information if you think the SEM has missed a key demographic or some other oversight.

Otherwise, it’s all just a pile of numbers.

3. Can the SEM guru provide references you will contact?
A reference based on experience is the best reference you can get so, is there an SEM client willing to discuss the services provided by your prospect?

Now, don’t be surprised if the answer is ‘no.’ There’s a unspoken (okay spoken, here) understanding that client information is privileged and must be protected. However, many site owners give their SEMs permission to send visitors to the site to use as an example of the pro’s proficiency, Which gets us to:

4. Does the SEM provide reference sites?
This shouldn’t be a problem for any web pro with any kind of track record. Ask the SEO to provide sites that s/he has worked on. Then, go Alexa on each site’s assets.

Alexa.com delivers stats and graphs to show how the performance of a site has improved or deteriorated over time. Look for an increase in site traffic and lots of links. (See Connectivity in the post below). Look for improvements in page views and, by all means, employ Alexa’s Time Machine, a feature that enables you to see the evolution of the site and, especially how the site looked before and after the re-do by the SEM.

If you don’t see significant increases in the SEM’s reference sites, you are talking to the wrong SEM! Take your time, here. You’re about to sign a big check (SEM pros are pricey because of their highly-specialized knowledge) and you want to see quantifiable results that occur after the SEO/SEM optimizes the site.

5. Please don’t try this at home.
If your sites are performing well, you might think you can take yourself to the next level without the expense of a web marketing pro. Not recommended in the bang/buck equation.

You might pay $200 for a once-over lightly site review, or $20K on a tear-down and website rebuild, and still actually lose ground. Fewer site visitors, lower Alexa ranking, lower links popularity and so on. It happens thousands of times a day. The gnomes who inhabit Castle Google tweak the search algo and all of a sudden, a site that was on page one of Google’s SERPs has slipped to page 106.

So, if this is your money-maker, don’t shake it. Hire an SEM with a track record and see what s/he can do to boost your bottom line.

6. If you don’t like the results, jettison the web guru.
Do NOT sign a contract with an SEO/SEM agency. You don’t have to in the competitive consultation market, so go with a company that let’s you pay as you go or pay for play. You want results and you’re willing to pay for them. No positive results. “You are so outta here.”

It’s reasonable to ask a prospective guru to develop a plan for site growth. It doesn’t have to be long, but it must be informative, and once again, written in terms that make the gibberish understandable to you – the guy or gal with the checkbook. Hey, that makes you the boss even if you don’ t know an HTML title tag from a dog tag!

It isn’t recommended that you make major changes to your site – including migrating to another web host – without expert opinion and technical know-how behind you. Major changes can produce voodoo numbers in your site’s performance.

Evolution in site design makes it easier for search engines and clients, visitors or other site stakeholders, to access content and, in the case of customers or clients, place an order.

That’s why you built the site. You run the show. But let a good SEM help you grow to real profitability. If you find a professional who isn’t blowing smoke and provides a few dozen sites you can check out, you’ll see improvement in rankings and, more importantly, in site traffic.

Conversely, if you hire the first snake oil salesperson you come across in a webmaster chat room, you may be out a few grand as you watch site performance deteriorate right before your eyes.

Spend time finding the right fit and pay for quality consultation and services rendered. Consider it an investment. Just make sure you’re investing in a blue chip SEM not a penny stock loser.

Follow the Money Trail to Turn a Web Site Profit

FOLLOW THE MONEY TRAIL

If you own a website, you own much more than some sell pages and a check-out. You own digital content in the form of articles, news forums, graphics, pictures, your logo – virtually every piece of your web site is digitized and programmed for display on a variety of browsers, from IE to Chrome.

You paid a lot of money for those digital assets but are they paying you back? Are you seeing a nice return on your marketing development dollars? Probably not, but given time…

Digital Advertising
Tom Wheeler, managing Director at Core Capital Partners, recently forecast that by the year 2011, digital, mobile advertising will hit $14.4 billion dollars. Currently. $1.5 billion is being spent on advertising via mobile computers, PDAs, cell phones, iPods, iPhones – and the list of gadgets just keeps on growing.

So, if your site marketing plan is limited to traditional promotional activities, i.e. PPC, paid links, hosted content and other marketing tactics that worked well last year, chances are you won’t be in business next year.

The Changing Paradigm
Paradigm is an odious word. People toss it around without a clue what it means. It’s one of those buzzwords that every SEO and CEO throws around like verbal confetti. But in the case of digital advertising, we have actually found a legitimate use for the words “changing paradigm.”

A paradigm is nothing more than an “outstandingly clear example,” what, in the day, was called an archetype. So you start researching how digital advertising is going to change things for web-based businesses and you keep running into “changing paradigm,” which doesn’t mean anything more than a changing example. Now, indeed, if we’re spending 1.4 billion on digital advertising today and the projected figure just a few years hence is $14.4, there is clearly something afoot. But it ain’t no paradigm.

The content will be the same. The messages won’t change and the human emotional buttons will still be there. In fact, the only thing that’ll change is the way this content is delivered to the listener or viewer.

Digital Content is Digital Content.
Once a document, a song, a picture or an image of the accountant’s butt is digitized on the copier at the office party, it can be used in lots of ways – ways that you can use to expand your site’s reach (except the accountant butt image. Toss it, PLEASE!) Even more importantly, you can reach that sweet, care-free-money-in-the-pocket-demographic of 15-25 year olds who have lots discretionary income and a cell or PDA.

If your future advertising is land-locked (as in you don’t plan on using digitized content for other promotional uses), you might as well be working in Mesopotamia with a mud table and a stylus. You are sooooo four millennia ago.

Once digitized, content can be quickly, easily and inexpensively adapted to other formats that are picked up by other communications devices. For example, let’s say you put together a weekly podcast for the illumination of your audience. If that podcast is only available on your website, do you have any idea how many opportunities you’re missing?

That same podcast can be formatted to XML scripting and sent via RSS feed to thousands, millions of sites. Or, it could be reformatted for pick up by cell or PDA. This way, even if your number one fan is on the bus, he can still hear your podcast through his cell – if you’re set up to do that. Even hearing aid technology has gone wireless, enabling those with hearing loss to take advantage of all these digital goings-on.

With ad revenues from traditional media dropping (thanks to the inventor of the remote control and the fine art of channel surfing, among other reasons), advertisers are scrambling to find new ways to keep the product or service in front of the buying public. You can’t see a movie without strategic product placement. The main character is eating Fruit Loops for a reason. Kellogg’s paid for that product placement.

What other avenues are growing – fast, especially for smaller online businesses? Cell phone downloads are coming on strong. You often get a 15-second ad for acne cream before your actually content appears on screen. Just cost a few pennies, but you saw it. And the more you see it the more likely you are to buy it.

Spreading Content Development Costs
Good copywriters don’t come cheap. And the ones who also understand SEM can be downright expensive. So, if you’ve paid pesos grandé for content development, you want to use that content in as many ways as you can. It’s an asset, but if it’s parked on your website and not making the digital rounds, you’ve paid more than you have to for a single piece of site text.

Use that expensive (but beautifully written) copy, your own song, your own pictures – whatever digital content you have to create a more expansive presence on the web. It won’t cost you more in development costs and, at least at this time, the costs of digital advertising outlets aren’t enough to break the bank – even if you’re fishing your marketing budget from between the car seats, i.e. it’s cost effective.

So amortize your content development costs and prepare yourself for a 10-fold increase in digital ad revenues. Do you want a piece of that pie?

Start now to stay ahead of the curve.