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Website Fundamentals - How to Achieve Amazing Results Online

Written by: David Kelly

Article Overview: Websites are an important part of any organisation's marketing mix. But most websites do not deliver a result – they don’t deliver sales! This article unlocks the fundamentals behind every successful website and explores the techniques that can be used to increase the overall performance of any website on the planet!

Website Fundamentals - How to Achieve Amazing Results Online

Introduction

I am sure you will agree with me - websites are now an important part of any organisation's marketing mix!

But here’s the big problem:

Most business owners don’t understand how to make a website successful. They don’t understand how a website works! In this article we are going to unlock the fundamentals of a website and look at how we can drive amazing amounts of new business online!


Why Go Online?

Before you even consider getting a new website or revamping an old website you need to know exactly what you want to achieve by going online. So – why do organisations go online with a website?

There are five common reasons why an organisation will establish a website.

• Generate Enquiries & Leads

Many websites are focused on generating enquiries and leads. The website is designed to present the organisation's products or services and get the website visitor to lodge an enquiry with the organisation.

• Generate Sales Revenue

More and more businesses are setting up ‘e-commerce’ websites. E-commerce websites automate the complete buying process online by allowing customers to purchase products and services using the website. The e-commerce website provides the business owner with a tool that they can use to directly drive sales.

• Generate Advertising Revenue

Some organisations are now starting to make money by selling online advertising space. Take, for example, the New Zealand Herald website (www.nzherald.co.nz). The NZ Herald provides its entire paper online for free.

How do they do this? How do they make money?

The NZ Herald website generates revenue by selling online advertising space - very similar to how they generate the majority of their revenue in the physical world.

• Generate Referral Revenue

Some websites also make money by referring (or linking through) to products and services contained on other websites. Every visitor that is referred is tracked by the website receiving the referral. A commission is then paid back to the referring website.

This is a powerful form of online marketing called an ‘affiliate program’.

• Present Information

Finally, every website is about presenting information! The website may exist simply to support the organisation's brand. Or, it may exist to automate the process of distributing information to prospects and customers.

Different organisations will have different website objectives, and most business websites have a number of objectives. But, it is absolutely vital that you are completely clear on exactly what ‘business result’ you are trying to achieve from your website before you venture into the online world.


Website – Think ‘Branch Office’

So what determines a website's results?

The best way of getting insight into the workings of a website is to think of it as an ‘online branch office’.

Using this principle, let’s first take a look at what drives a normal branch office’s turnover. This should give us a few clues as to how to drive the success of a website.

The revenue of any organisation is determined by four key metrics:

• Leads
The number of people who enquire about the products or services of the organisation.

• Conversion Rate
The percentage of ‘leads’ that purchased products or services from the organisation. (A 20% conversion rate means that for every 10 leads, the organisation made two sales).

• Transactions
The number of times a customer purchases from the organisation over their lifetime as a customer.

• Average Sale
The amount of money that the customer spends on average with the organisation each time they purchase.

One of the golden rules in business is this - if you can increase any one of the key metrics outlined above then your ‘normal branch office’ will increase its turnover.

Following a similar pattern, the performance of a website is determined by a very similar set of metrics:

• New Visitors
The number of new visitors to the website.

• Conversion Rate (New Visitors)
The percentage of new visitors that make an enquiry, make a purchase, click on an advertisement, sign up to the organisation's mailing list or do whatever else is part of the overall objective of the website.

• Returning Visitors
The number of visitors that return to visit the website.

• Conversion Rate (Returning Visitors)
Once again - the percentage of returning visitors that make an enquiry, make a purchase, click on an advertisement, sign up to the organisation's mailing list or do whatever else is part of the overall objective of the website.

• Average Sale
The amount of money that each customer spends on average at the website (this metric is only applicable for websites that sell product or services online).

As with a normal branch office – the same golden rule applies:

If you can increase ANY ONE of the above website success metrics then your website will achieve more results!!

It is as simple as that!


Automatic Measurement!

This means that it is very important that you measure every aspect of your websites performance.

And this is where it gets really exciting!

One of the most powerful aspects of any good website is this:
Your website runs on a computer so you should be able to automatically measure every one of the key success metrics. These figures should be available to you at the click of a button!

When you really wrap your head around this – it will dawn on you that this is unbelievably powerful! Gone is the ‘gut-feel’ about whether something is working or not because now it is presented in black and white, right in front of you. The success of your website now becomes an equation!


Improving the Success Metrics

So how do you increase the success metrics of a website? How can you ‘tune’ a website and increase the performance of each and every one of the success metrics?

There are literally hundreds of strategies and the most optimal strategy depends on many factors; the business, the target customer, the market environment and so on. But – a summary of some of the strategies that you might use to increase your success metrics is presented below.

• New Visitors
• Promotion of website on business cards, brochures, letterheads, etc
• Search engine optimisation (SEO)
• Search engine advertising (SEA)
• Affiliate programs
• Online banner advertising
• Online Directory listings, e.g., Yahoo Directory, Yellow Pages, UBD

• Returning Visitors
• Email marketing
• Regular promotions
• ‘Next purchase’ offers
• ‘What’s New’ webpage
• VIP programs
• Reminder systems

• Conversion Rate
• Fast-loading website
• User-friendly website layout
• Professional, personalised website design
• Compelling website copy
• Clear sales process and pathway
• Great testimonials and references

• Average Sale
• Cross-sells
• Up-sells
• Specials and promotions
• Wish-lists
• Volume pricing
• Gift vouchers


Get the Order Right!

Which website success metric should you focus on first?

In order to maximise your return, it is absolutely vital that you work on your success metrics in the correct order:

1. Conversion Rate
Start by producing a website with a great conversion rate! This is absolutely vital and forms the basis of everything that follows;

2. Returning Visitors
Focus on maximizing the number of visitors that continually return to your website;

3. Average Sale
Now work on the average sale to make sure you are making the most of every opportunity (e-commerce websites only);

4. New Visitors
Then and only then, look to increase the amount of new visitors to your website.

Remember – just as the success of a business is governed by a number of key metrics, so is a website. Understand your website's success metrics and the keys to improving each of the success metrics and you will have learnt the secrets to developing a website that generates amazing returns at a fraction of the cost of the more traditional forms of sales and marketing!

All the best in your online endeavours!!

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