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These Website Mistakes Are Expensive!

Guest post by: Gerry Black

Article Overview: As a professional copywriter and marketing consultant, I continually see two huge mistakes business owners make when creating their marketing materials. First, they seem willing to plunk down a ton of dough for a website that isn’t going to generate sales leads. Second, they use a brochure copy style instead of a prospect-focused, direct response copywriting approach. This article will help you avoid these profit-killing mistakes.

These Website Mistakes Are Expensive!

As a professional copywriter and marketing consultant, I continually see two huge mistakes business owners make when creating their marketing materials.

First, they seem willing to plunk down a ton of dough for a website that isn'tgenerate sales leads. Second, they use a brochure copy style instead of a prospect-focused, direct response copywriting approach.

The number of business owners who have told me about spending anywhere from $5,000 to $30,000 on a website that gets them virtually no response is staggering.

No leads. No customers. No sales.

As soon as I visit their site, it's easy to see why. The website is usually attractive. Has tons of colour. Often has a flash intro. Way too many different sized, multi-coloured fonts. And the words "we, our and us" are plastered all over the home page.

Now let me ask you this: When is the last time you bought something from someone who askyou to wait before letting you through the door (flash), then jumped out at you wearing loud clothing (overdesign), spent five minutes talking about him or herself (we/our/us) and made it hard to follow what they were saying (multiple, multi-coloured fonts) How 'bout...a long time ago or never!

A website is simply a virtual salesperson. The only significant difference between a face-to-face selling opportunity and a virtual sales interaction is that you - the salesperson - aren't there.

Most of us would never greet a potential qualified sales prospect by saying something like, "Hey Mr. Prospect, slow down. Before you can buy anything from me I want you to watch this little dog and pony show. Once you're done, come on in and see how great I look. Once we're done there, I'll bend your ear about me. And if you're still interested, try and find something that will help you solve your problem. But do it fast. I don't have much time to explain things."

Nobody would intentionally steer potential customers into the clutches of their competitors.

And yet that's exactly the effect this approach creates - costing business owners sales that should have been theirs!

That's where direct response copywriting makes all the difference when it comes to converting a web visitor (or any reader of any of your promotional material) into a sales lead.

I have people wonder out loud whether or not longer copy actually converts prospects intocustomers. Countless studies have proven it does beyond all doubt. But let's pretend no such studies were readily available.

Here's a little common sense example that easily demonstrates the point.

Suppose you had $40,000 to buy a new car. Someone puts 10 new cars in front of you and they all look the same. Sleek. Shiny. Powerful. Blah Blah. And, they are all priced at $40K. How are you going to figure out which one is the best buy?

Answer: By getting enough information about each car that allows you to make the best buying decision. If 7 of the cars come with a bit of information, 2 come with more information and 1 comes with lots of information, who is likely to have a chance to seal the deal?

Would you spend 40 grand without knowing what you were getting? Of course not.

And that's what we, as marketers, must always remember. Our offering is constantly being compared to the offerings of others.

So why do some business owners fear using longer copy? (by the way, copy is what many marketers spend the least amount of money on because they don't understand the critical role it plays in converting a prospect into a customer - at least that won't happen to you again!)

In my opinion, here's why: They have it ingrained in their minds that most people won't take the time read long copy. They're too busy. They have short attention spans. They like their printed information in sound bite form.

All true - for most of the people who come to our websites. Or read our emails.

But it's important to remember: we aren't trying to sell everybody. The thing many marketers fail to understand is that many of the visitors to their site or on the receiving end of their email marketing campaigns aren't qualified prospects. They aren't going to buy anyway.

No real need. No money. No authority. Just tire kicking. Whatever.

The copy and information on our web site is for the qualfied prospect who has an immediate or future need, has the authority to buy, has the money to pay and is looking for reasons why he/she should buy from us.

They will read longer copy because they have to make an educated buying decision. But not just a bunch of words stuck on a page. No, to convert qualified prospects into buyers, you need to use the same balance of emotion and logic and selling structure you would use if you were standing there talking to your potential customer.

Go back to the face-to-face selling situation. Non-prospects display "I'm not interested" (or, "you suck, as a professional salesperson") signals very early on in their buying process.

What do the interested prospects do? They ask questions. They want information.

That's exactly what your qualified prospect wants when he or she visits your site.

If you are getting traffic but few sales results, take a look at your site from this new perspective. You should be able to see the issues in fairly short order.

Next time, I will outline five simple things you can do to create direct response website copy so you can start generating more sales leads.

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Article Tags: poor conversion rates, website errors, webste mistakes



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