Conversion Rate Web Marketing Blog 

I received this email today promoting guaranteed listings in Google and Yahoo in 48 hours. I think it’s unfortunate that many people in the search engine marketing industry feel it’s okay to prey on people’s ignorance.

I say this because what “getting listed” in Google and Yahoo means in this email is very different to what most people think it means.

You need to understand the difference between paid search engine advertising and free organic search engine rankings.

What these ads actually offer is placement in the paid search engine advertisements. Paid search engine advertising literally takes 15 minutes to have up and running, so why is 48 hours a big deal? Well, what most people think ”getting listed” means relates to organic search results, which usually take weeks and months to get. So whats the difference?

For the purpose of this explanation we’ll use Google to explain. Click on the image to the right for an overlay of the Paid vs Unpaid areas of Google search results.

Search Engine Ads (also known as Pay Per Click, PPC, Sponsored Links, Google Adwords):

• May appear across the top of a search, but always on a light yellow background
• Usually appear on the right hand side of your search
• Are noted by the text “sponsored links”
• Are limited to 35 characters of text per line
• Are paid for when someone clicks on the link in the ad
• Run when and where the advertiser wants you to see them
• Are not necessarily relevant to your search
• Can be set up and running in about 15 minutes
• Get about 1/7th of the clicks that organic listings get.

Organic search listings:

• Always appear on the left hand side of Google, and always on a white background
• Are based on the pages and text of your website
• Cannot be bought (you can pay a company like ours to “optimise” your site to help you get them, but you cannot pay Google for them)
• Are based on a computer algorithm that determines whether the site is relevant to your search
• Usually take at least a couple of weeks or months to get (The fastest we’ve ever got to number one in Google is 24 hours for this page about “cool flash websites“)
• Are 7 times more effective than paid search ads.

Now if you read the fine print of this ad, it does state that the offer relates to “sponsored links.” You’ll have to look hard to see it and you’d really need to know what sponsored links are to be able to discern what this ad was all about.

If you’re looking to get listed in Google and Yahoo, then first understand the difference between what’s paid and what’s not.

From the author: If you regularly advertise for leads in the Yellow Pages®, in the newspaper or on the radio, then there’s a good chance that your website could be generating more leads for you than it is. The key is in your website’s conversion rates.

We know that to achieve high conversion rates and sales from your web marketing you need a team that includes seasoned marketers, web designers, web programmers, copywriters, editors, bloggers and search engine gurus. That’s why we created Bitemark.

And yes, we can get your website to number one in Google too!

Contact us on 1300 248 362 for a free conversion rate review of your website.

Yellow Pages® is an Australian registered trade mark of Telstra Corporation Ltd. This company has requested and has been granted permission from Telstra Corporation Ltd to use the Yellow Pages® trade mark. This company is not otherwise associated with Telstra Corporation or any of it’s subsidiaries.

Most people who have worked with us know that we’re not a big fan of “cool flash websites” for businesses.

Well, we don’t apply this rule to everyone. There are some professions where being cool really is everything. For instance, you’re probably too cool for school (i.e. you need a cool flash website) if you’re a:

1. Rock band or popular musician
2. Fashion designer or fashion photographer
3. Company that has a brand the size of,  say, Coke or McDonald’s.

Here’s a couple of flash website examples that are just so cool:

• Angus and Julia Stone – http://www.angusandjuliastone.com - Brilliant illustration, simple execution, really impressive.
• Freedom Furniture’s Online Catalogue – http://www.freedom.com.au/catalogue/spring07/index.html - A very easy to use catalogue metaphor.

Now, before that you make the mistake of thinking that this is what you need for your company, consider these questions:

• What do I really want from my website visitors?
• What actions do I want them to take by visiting my website?
• Will impressing them with design and coolness really influence them to do business with me?

Websites like the examples above exist purely to impress. If you are looking for an outcome like an online purchase or a lead generated from your website, then a cool flash website is probably not for you. Why?

Well, in flash lots of things just don’t work like you would expect in a normal website (such as text boxes, navigation, right click, back/forward buttons, etc). When something doesn’t work like you expect it to, it breaks your intent. You end up thinking more about the website than what you were there for in the first place.

Being too slick will probably do more faours for your designer than it does for you. You don’t want your website visitors to be distracted from doing business with you by the coolness of your website.

From the author: If you regularly advertise for leads in the Yellow Pages®, in the newspaper or on the radio, then there’s a good chance that your website could be generating more leads for you than it is. The key is in your website’s conversion rates.

We know that to achieve high conversion rates and sales from your web marketing you need a team that includes seasoned marketers, web designers, web programmers, copywriters, editors, bloggers and search engine gurus. That’s why we created Bitemark.

And yes, we can get your website to number one in Google too !

Contact us on 1300 248 362 for a free conversion rate review of your website.

Yellow Pages® is an Australian registered trade mark of Telstra Corporation Ltd. This company has requested and has been granted permission from Telstra Corporation Ltd to use the Yellow Pages® trade mark. This company is not otherwise associated with Telstra Corporation or any of it’s subsidiaries.

Much of the focus of Australian website owners is still on search engine optimisation and getting into Google. Because we haven’t moved past this, Australian businesses risk lagging behind on creating websites that really satisfy their customers.

Because our website is well ranked in Google for terms like “web traffic”, we regularly get calls and emails from people who want us to get their website into Google. We always need to explain that:

Being number one in Google is not the end goal for lead generation and eCommerce websites!

Converting a visitor into a customer is … 

Strangely, this explanation is usually a revelation. Why is this fundamental understanding so lacking in Australia? I think it’s because of the guidance that we are receiving from our advisors:

• Web designers tell you that the coolest design will make your website
• Web programmers insist that you need a content management system
• Search Engine Optimisation firms want you to think that being number one in Google is everything
• Marketing consultants keep telling you that the brand is all important.

So who is thinking about the customer?

Before deciding how important any one of these things is, ask yourself these questions: 

• Does your customer really care that you’ve got the coolest looking website on the face of the planet?
• Does she* care that you can update your website easily (even if you never do it)?
• Does it matter to her that you are number one in Google?
• Can she have loyalty to your brand if she’s never experienced your service?

Now, I’m not saying that any one of these things is more important than the next, but the real answers to those questions lie with your customers.

So what does your customer really want from your website?

The information that she needs to feel comfortable to make a decision and take action.

That could involve any one or all of the above elements, but above all the key is information . . . a.k.a. Content! If you don’t fulfill this need you are frustrating your potential customers.

From the author: If you regularly advertise for leads in the Yellow Pages®, in the newspaper or on the radio, then there’s a good chance that your website could be generating more leads for you than it is. The key is in your website’s conversion rates.

We know that to achieve high conversion rates and sales from your web marketing you need a team that includes seasoned marketers, web designers, web programmers, copywriters, editors, bloggers and search engine gurus. That’s why we created Bitemark.

And yes, we can get your website to number one in Google too !

Contact us on 1300 248 362 for a free conversion rate review of your website.

Yellow Pages® is an Australian registered trade mark of Telstra Corporation Ltd. This company has requested
and has been granted permission from Telstra Corporation Ltd to use the Yellow Pages® trade mark. This company is not otherwise associated with Telstra
Corporation or any of it’s subsidiaries.

* Also applies to “he”, but I’m saying “she” because it seems to be cool to blog that way .

I met with John Tellis of www.tailor.com.au last week to talk about his website. Since John’s company has recently been running a highly succesful radio advertising campaign on SEN (Melbourne AM Radio Station 1116), we were interested to see how the website had been performing to support the campaign.

John takes web marketing seriously, but what we found was that his website was not supplying critical information about the leads that came through to him. To follow up his website prospects he had practically wrestle with his content management system for the information (like their phone number).

This might seem like a small thing, but the last thing you want to do with your sales people is have them logging into your website’s content management system to find the information they need!

When a lead comes through from your website, make sure that it

1. Comes through by email to your sales team and / or
2. Goes automatically into your CRM
3. Contains all of the information that your sales people need to take action immediately
4. Is responded to as soon possible.

Ensuring that your lead information is actionable will give you the best chance of running a succesful radio campaign. Before your next radio campaign starts, make sure that you have these four steps under control!

From the author: If you regularly advertise for leads in the Yellow Pages®, in the newspaper or on the radio, then there’s a good chance that your website could be generating more leads for you than it is. The key is in your website’s conversion rates.

We know that to achieve high conversion rates and sales from your web marketing you need a team that includes seasoned marketers, web designers, web programmers, copywriters, editors, bloggers and search engine gurus. That’s why we created Bitemark.

And yes, we can get your website to number one in Google too !

Contact us on 1300 248 362 for a free conversion rate review of your website.

Yellow Pages® is an Australian registered trade mark of Telstra Corporation Ltd. This company has requested and has been granted permission from Telstra Corporation Ltd to use the Yellow Pages® trade mark. This company is not otherwise associated with Telstra Corporation or any of it’s subsidiaries.

I had a number of people call me this week to say, “Have you heard this radio ad for ‘Website Rescue’?”  Well, I hadn’t heard the ad, so while I was still on the phone I said, “I’ll go to Google and type in Website Rescue and see what comes up.”

I was surprised. There was no scent… nothing!

After a bit of digging, I found websiterescue.com.au, but that website did not show up on the first page of Google.

It turns out that the Radio Ad was run by Darius Mikolajewski and his company Allwelt. The advertising campaign was running on the Melbourne Radio station SEN (AM 1116). I’d met Darius previously at a networking event here in Melbourne and we’ve had a number of discussions about web marketing (Good move with the radio ad Darius, I hope it’s doing well for you!).

The exercise reminded me of the importance of thinking about how your prospects will interact with your advertising campaigns. Here’s a few examples of how they might respond:

• Calling your phone number
• Typing your web address into their web browser
• Entering keywords into Google.

Remember that radio ad listeners are likely to be hearing your ad in inconvenient places like in the car.

The people that called me could not remember the web address (even though it was a good address, pretty simple to remember), but they did remember the key theme of the ad, “Website Rescue.” 

Radio Advertising and Web Marketing – Rule 1:

When you are running a radio advertising campaign, make sure that you are number one in Google for the words that form the key theme of your Ad!

Remember that radio ads are volatile, lasting only seconds. Your prospects and listeners will only remember a single key theme from your ad. It is likely that they will “Google” the keywords that they remember from your ads. Make sure you are found there!

The good thing that Darius and company have done with their website is including a banner promoting the ad on their home page. This is important since a great number of their website visitors are going to be looking for content that is relevant to the “website rescue” ad.

The banner links through to a simple pop up contact form with seven fields to fill out. It’s a good short form, but the site lacks any content to support the “website rescue” message presented in the radio ad. For this reason alone, the campaign will not be converting to its maximum potential.

Radio campaigns can be very effective, however, relative to web marketing they are expensive. Make sure that you use your website effectively with your radio advertising campaigns.

On a side point, it was interesting for us to note that a number of our customers listen to SEN…

From the author: If you regularly advertise for leads in the Yellow Pages®, in the newspaper or on the radio, then there’s a good chance that your website could be generating more leads for you than it is. The key is in your website’s conversion rates.

We know that to achieve high conversion rates and sales from your web marketing you need a team that includes seasoned marketers, web designers, web programmers, copywriters, editors, bloggers and search engine gurus. That’s why we created Bitemark.

And yes, we can get your website to number one in Google too !

Contact us on 1300 248 362 for a free conversion rate review of your website.

Yellow Pages® is an Australian registered trade mark of Telstra Corporation Ltd. This company has requested and has been granted permission from Telstra Corporation Ltd to use the Yellow Pages® trade mark. This company is not otherwise associated with Telstra Corporation or any of it’s subsidiaries.

A simple way to boost your eCommerce website’s conversion rate is to make sure your visitors can actually find what they’re looking for. It’s highly likely that a visitor to your site will use your website’s search tool to do that.

Seems simple right? Well, in researching this topic we found that the simple things sometimes slip through the cracks. A review of our own eCommerce System’s search tool revealed a number of improvements that we needed to make.

Since up to 80% of visitors to your eCommerce website will search within your site, these 10 simple rules to improving your search results are well worth focusing on. Continue reading eCommerce website search >>.

From the author: If you run an eCommerce website then you might wonder, “How do I know if I’m getting as many orders as I could be through my website?” The answer to that question is in your website’s conversion rates.

We know that to achieve high conversion rates and sales from your eCommerce website you need a team that includes seasoned marketers, web designers, web programmers, copywriters, editors, bloggers and search engine gurus. That’s why we created Bitemark.

And yes, we can get your website to number one in Google too !

Contact us on 1300 248 362 to find out how you could boost the conversion rates of your eCommerce website.