E-Commerce Success Checklist - Part 2
May 9, 2008 – 4:48 pmIn the first part of this series I discussed getting started and briefly covered identifying your search terms, considering your customers, the page and various things that need to be in order before your pull the trigger on driving traffic to your site.
** For those of you being Zenned (Zen Cart users) I would really appreciate feed back on the Zen Cart modules I’ve mentioned and any others that effect the way customers interact with your site. See the Top ten customer facing Zen Cart modules post to submit your feed back.
So, you have a search term list, you’ve gone through the checkout process, identified problem areas and done everything in your power to make the entire process as smooth and stress free and non-work-like as possible.
A word of warning!
Underestimating the importance of this step is very easy, especially for folks that are new to e-commerce. Your products do not speak for themselves on-line. Make sure you turn your landing page into a compelling engaging experience about your product. Most of your customers will leave your site after they decide the page is not going to give them what they’re after. From there, the ones that decide to stay, will start converting but most will probably bail out and abandon the checkout process. Some only wanted to compare cart prices. Some stopped to think about what your were asking of them and lost sight of the original intent and left either to buy later, not at all, or somewhere else.
By speaking to only the folks that are most likely to convert, you’ll keep your conversion rate and profit margins high with less money dumped into buying traffic.
Now is probably a good time for me to mention that visitors to your site are generally broken in to two groups, hunters and browsers.
- Hunters are folks that are after something that you may or may not have. They’re the customers that want to convert and the ones I’ve been talking about. For them you need to provide them with answers to their questions and the ability to get more information should they decide to stick around. They want to know that they’re in the right place first and second that your site is the best place to get what they want. If they came to you looking for pancake batter then tell them that the page they’re on will give them pancake batter. Don’t tell them that you make the best or that you’ve been in business for 140 years and grandma Mothballs made the the original recipe until they want to know those things. People tend to gravitate to those that give them what they want. Leave the junk about your company out of the picture but accessible.
- Browsers are folks that are interested in what you have but may not be ready to buy. Moreover, they may not know what they want. For them, make the site compelling to navigate with easy to read and understand navigation and helpful but, again, easy to follow navigation and interlinking from one page to the next. Give them reason to stay, click your images, read your content and, when ready, return and buy. Things like free shipping, return policy, etc will sink in while they browse but will probably not compel them to stick around and develop a relationship with your site.
Now that you’re clear on what a hunter is I’ll explain more about how to appeal to them and how to make them leave. Hunters are not any particular personality type or age or color. They’re folks that have already decided what they want and are now looking for the best place to get it. It’s that simple. Don’t waste there time making them decipher a product page or home page with mixed information about your company, categories, founders, etc.
** Always send hunters to a landing page designed for hunters. DO NOT send a hunter to your home page. Don’t mix goals and don’t try to up sell or cross sell a hunter abruptly with out assuring them that your page is the place to be first. The funny thing about cross selling and up selling is that it can increase your sales but, it can also interrupt the process and confuse folks. Having categories and banners on your product page does the same thing. That’s why I always use a landing page that has a specific purpose. I don’t include anything in my landing pages that doesn’t address the needs of my hunter. There’s is no category navigation and invitation of any kind to go off in a different direction. I’m not trying to prevent them from checking out the rest of my site. I just don’t want them to get distracted. I usually put a more info link in the landing page that directs them back to the product page for more information. This appeals to the hunters need for more critical decision making data without pushing it down their throat. I give them a choice, but it keeps them focused. Have you noticed the theme here? I’m giving the hunter what she wants not what I want them to have or do. You have to respect and trust the hunter to know what she wants and simply place yourself in the path.
ZenCart Tip: Use the product name and short description to address the hunters basic first question. Let them know that they’re in the right place for the exact thing they’re looking for.
You may be wondering… “how the heck do I create a landing page in Zen Cart or <insert your cart here>“. The answer, for Zen Cart anyway, is you can’t! But, that shouldn’t stop you. If you can already design and code a page, just whip up a very nice page that focuses exclusively on a single product or conversion goal, theme similar to your main site and just publish it on its own. Hell, it doesn’t even need to be on the same host as your cart. In your landing page, put a link to the product page for more information. If you’re a more sophisticated designer, put an add-to-cart button right there on the landing page and put all the critical decision making data on the landing page with a more info link as well for really hungry hunters.
Here are some examples of landing pages:
The USB Turntable page converts exceptionally well for the search terms it’s intended for. By “exceptionally well” I mean greater then 20% of visitors actually buy. I could not achieve that with a product page that is not designed to appeal to a certain group of hunters looking for a USB Turntable.
None of these pages is terribly complex and you can probably achieve something similar with practice or help. Landing page design is not expensive and the returns are huge. What would happen to your profit if you had a 50% jump in conversion rate? What if you went from a 1% to 3% conversion rate? That’s potentially a 300% increase in your sales with no additional traffic.
So, do you see the point in spending lots of time and brain power on the landing page and conversion process?
After you’ve convinced the hunter to proceed, show them that it’s safe to buy and the price is right. This is where shipping promotions, hacker safe logos, etc are important. I don’t use more then three “seals” to influence trust. Actually, I use two or one typically. I can’t find the research at the moment, but I’ve read studies where more then that decreased conversion rate. Presumably this is due to the distraction they cause.
For most of you I recommend doing some competitive research. Just go search Live.com, Yahoo and Google for your search terms. Checkout your competitors sites. What do they lack? Can you compete with them on price? Sometimes competitors will give you an easy way to show the hunter and the browser how you provide a greater value. Perhaps it’s price; perhaps it’s just because they have no idea how to appeal to the hunter and you can easily spot ways to improve.
Zen Cart merchant observation: I’ve seen many Zen Cart sites over the years and the common theme in nearly all of them is this: they’re almost always too text dependent with to many options and no clear path for the customer to follow aside from the “add to cart” button. The product pages are trying to appeal to everyone at once. Some of them have huge headers that distract from the actual product on the page and some have hard to read navigation that confuses product information with navigation. Most have neglected product images. Don’t be surprised when you don’t make a sale using a stock template with a few color changes and a new header while you ignore what I’m saying here. Respect your visitors ability to spot an amateur and respect their time. You must compete in the real world and put your brain into learning and creative mode.
Page layout tip
There’s an analogy I like to use to describe page layout for e-commerce…
A product page should be like a clear shallow pool. The product or primary conversion goal/object should sit on top of the water while everything else should be submereged but still visible. When your customer visits the page, important text and graphics/images that distract from answering the primary questions should be available but not grap attention. Anything else should go away! A landing page is more like a clear puddle. That is smaller and more more localized. I accomplish this submerged effect with font color and size changes, gradients and subtle textures and drop shadow or color and space. www.apple.com designers likes to use images, space and contrast to accomplish this. Anything on the surface of the water is key information for the hunter and should be above the fold (visible without scrolling).
Do you think you’re ready to start throwing traffic at your pages ? …perhaps, read it again and digest more! Leave a comment and ask a question.
In part three of this series I’ll discuss testing the water with Pay par click and some search optimization basics for e-commerce with tips for ZenCart users both new and old.
One Response to “E-Commerce Success Checklist - Part 2”
Some good points. TY
By Milo Bloom on May 13, 2008