First, Shoot All The ESP’s…

9:04 pm by Amy Leave a Comment

Becky Tesh asks “I’m hoping you can help. E-mail is a huge part of our success online and this year our results are tanking. (We’re over thirty percent down on e-mails but up on SEO/SEM sales.) Our opens are down… our clickthroughs are down… and it keeps getting worse. What can I do? Our provider says that our deliverability is 98.5% and that it’s not their fault. He recommends we do a survey but my boss is not in favor of sending out additional e-mails that don’t make money at this point. We’ve tried every creative thing we can think of – there must be something else we can do… Otherwise, I am going to need to cut at least one person from my department.”

Look, I don’t care what your ESP says or how good they are, they don’t have 98.5% deliverability. It’s kind of like delivering mail to the ghetto. As Chris Rock says, “I’m sure the postmen do a phenomenal job but some sh*t gets lost and some sh*t gets stolen.”

If bills and Verizon rebate cards can vanish into thin air IRL just imagine what happens in cyberspace.

Yowza.

So, what do you do? If you’ve tried playing with timing, format, subject line, and all the other “creative stuff”, you should consider sending a percentage of your names to an ECOA (email change of address) provider like Fresh Address. I’m blown away by how much these type of services have improved over the past couple years (although Fresh Address has always been good.) If your file is huge, you don’t need to send it all, just the percentage of it that will give you an indication of what’s going on. (Please, I beg of you, start with the good names. Your 2010 buyers are way more important than 1972 inquiries.)

Second, and yes, I must say this, MONITOR DELIVERABILITY AND SEED YOUR FLIPPING LIST. Either use a service that helps you with this kind of stuff (Return Path is one of my favorites) or do it yourself. It shocks me how many companies do not do this. Catalogers and direct mailers are especially notorious for not seeding their lists, something they’d never NOT do in the real world. Again, you can buy a service or if you don’t have any money, set up one on your own.

Get addresses at Yahoo, Gmail, AOL, and anywhere else that’s appropriate for you.

Assign each box a read or not-read status. For example, if you are going to get eight boxes at Gmail, four of them you should never read (do NOT even open them) and four of them you should. This will give you a quick indication of what’s working. (Yes, this can make a VERY BIG difference.)

After you’ve set up the boxes, look carefully at trends. How long are your e-mails taking to arrive in the in-boxes? What do your e-mails look like? (In other words, are they being tagged with security warnings?) Is the mailing being “delivered” to the SPAM folders? (Sadly, that does count as delivered for most providers.) Some of the wackadoodle free services (especially the European ones) even deliver stuff directly to the trash can. As if that’s helpful.

I spoke with a client recently who has been having trouble with Yahoo for about a year and they just now found out that their provider was not assigning domain keys. (Yahoo requires them.) Sadly, this ESP also shows over 94% “deliverablity” on average.

Becky – in your case, you are mailing to a lot of schools – it’s easier to get a date with the Pope than to get e-mail delivered at some schools. Consider calling some of the biggest schools on your list (where you have the most names) and asking them how you can best communicate with them. A lot of times their tech guys will tell you EXACTLY what you need to do. (It often has to do with timing – meaning when you send them.) Yes, the process is time consuming but it’s worth it.

The #1 Proven Formula for Text Search that Nobody Ever Tells You About…

9:33 am by Amy Leave a Comment

Robert Foster “This isn’t a question but a comment. Your obsession with navigation is dated. EVERYONE uses text search. As an ecommerce “expert,” you, of all people, should know that. Maybe it’s time to retire to the golf course or the poker table. Just a thought.”

Robert dah-link, I retired to the poker table years ago. Didn’t you get the memo?

There isn’t a day that goes by that I don’t get this type of {idiotic} comment.

Yes, it’s 2010.

Yes, navigation still accounts for over half your success online. In fact, for many it’s a 75% determinant.

Let me repeat that, for a lot of companies, NAVIGATION ACCOUNTS FOR THREE QUARTERS OF YOUR SUCCESS ONLINE.

Many marketing executives, especially the lame-ass, lazy ones (like Robert Foster, and yes that is his real name) who should be shot, think text search will solve all their problems.

Sadly, text search just doesn’t work that way EVEN if you have a fancy-schmancy guided navigation package. Granted, they help…. A lot… but even the most expensive ones won’t solve all your site’s issues.

Why?

Because users don’t search well. Women search with all sorts of adjectives and qualifiers (example, pretty, size 6) and men search with extraneous punctuation, randomly shortened words/phrases, and all sorts of typos and misspellings. (Yes, this is stereotypical but the research supports it. Deal. With. It.)

The best thing you can do for your site is to develop it so that it will work WITHOUT a text search feature. Implement solid top navigation, lefthand navigation and bottom navigation. Build a strong, righthand “save” column. Use Problem/Solution drop-downs when you can (you can use two in the top action bar and two to three in the lefthand navigation, if spaced appropriately.)

Then, use your text search as a bonus.

What’s the top secret, 007 formula for text search that nobody ever tells you about?

The presentation is often more important than the finds you show.

Yeah, yeah, I know.

Almost everyone and their brother disagrees with this in theory — but test it for yourself and you’ll see – in practice, the presentation makes a world of difference.

First, if your search is better than ok (please don’t do this if your text search totally sucks), make your text search box bigger. Yes, bigger as in longer. Why? Because people screw up less when the box itself is bigger. Not only do they make fewer typing mistakes but they also use more words. People like to use three to five words when searching — small boxes mentally give them room for one. When users are limited to a teeny-tiny space, they tend to think. Unfortunately, thinking is bad for most online shoppers.

Test your text search in the middle column. After users hit the second page of your site, they spend the majority of their time in the middle column. They look to the left when they need help. They look to the right when they are about to leave. If you don’t think your mother could find anything using your text search, put it in the top lefthand column, below the e-mail sign-up box. And remember, the more you emphasize it (for example, if you place it in the upper righthand quad of your site), the more likely the user will try it. (Again, not always a good thing.)

Start the cursor in the text search box. Yes, it sounds like a little detail. But little details add up. (Same with a search icon — a little magnifying glass — should be used near the box itself.) And yes, little details — like BIG details — should ALL be tested. What works for someone else might not work for you at all and vice versa.

The key to a good search though is what you do AFTER the user types the words in the box and hits return or your BIG “go” button. Use a large headline to tell the user “Good news!” (or something equally cheery), how many you found (“we found 37”) and what they searched for (“bananas!”) You can play around with the wording but the key is to use a number and remind them of what they searched for USING EXACTLY WHAT THEY TYPED IN! (If you are autocorrecting you should list both — what they typed in (banannnaas) and what you found (bananas.)

Make sure the finds are in order of priority – meaning you put the stuff that’s most important first. (In other words, the bestsellers.)

Try NOT to list out of stock or coming soon items in the first six or so results. You can only “guarantee” that the user is going to look at the first three (if you are in a 3 columns, three rows format.) The second line is hopeful. After that, it’s touch and go. (Mostly just go.) By the way, if the #1 find happens to be out of stock and you want to list it, make sure to employ an “I wanted this!” button on the product page.

Make sure you have a VIEW ALL option. People don’t like to paginate on ecommerce sites. View All allows the user an “at a glance” way to look at things. It’s not recommended to force “view all” but just to give it as a prominent option.

Make sure your previous and next buttons are big. The way in which you allow the user to navigate from the top AND the bottom of the finds is critical to your success.

Allow the user to refine their options. This is the view by name/price/date type option. The key here is to not allow too many refinements (keep it under six choices if you can) and to make sure that you ONLY offer refinements that apply to the product. For example, if you are selling a book, you don’t need a sort by size option.

What are your best text search tips? If you’ve got something to add, please jot it below…

6 Tried & True Tactics for Improving Your Lead Generation

10:51 am by Amy 2 Comments

Jessie Lynn says “I work for a B2B service company. We don’t have any e-commerce products to sell so to speak, just our architectural consulting services. I am wondering what creative design tips you’d have for us. We spent almost $25,000 on our redesign last year (which was a lot of money for us) and we’re getting only half as many leads from our efforts. My boss hasn’t fired me (yet) but he doesn’t want to spend any more money on our site EVER (at least in 2010.) Bottom line: I need to improve what we’re doing without any budget. Please help.”

Hi Jessie, thanks for writing. I get this question a lot and it’s really difficult to answer without seeing your stats. With that said, there are two ways you can fix almost any situation online. One is to drive more traffic and the other is to improve your conversion. Online, everything is a funnel. To get the most stuff out of the bottom, you need to either dump more into the top or squeeze more from the middle and hope it trickles down.

You need to know where the rat is stuck in the snake.

I’d encourage you to really do a deep dive into your stats to figure out where the biggest opportunities are. (In other words, look for your screaming girls.)

However, since you specifically asked about creative design tips, here are a few of the biggest bang for the buck things you can do.

Ask for a lead more times. I don’t need to see your site (or anyone’s site for that matter) to know this one will work. The more you ask for leads, the more you’ll get ‘em — and NOBODY ever asks enough. It’s important that you ask for leads on every “page” of your site. Users see each view as a page (meaning every time they scroll, it’s a new page.) You also want to capture leads in each quad of your site. At a minimum, make sure you’re capturing leads at the left, at the top, and at the right.
Ask for a lead more ways. A lot of B2B companies dump “request a quote” on their site as their only lead generation method. This sucks. You need to offer several different ways for the user to connect with you – request a quote is fine (and recommended) but also consider offering a free newsletter, free tips, a free webinar or podcast, ask the expert, a poll/survey, contact us, and so on.
Work your lead forms. Only ask relevant questions and remember “relevancy” is determined in the user’s mind, not yours. What does this mean? Basically that you need to ask the MINIMUM you can to get the lead. Too many service companies ask for too much stuff – company size, purchasing authority, etc. can be answered AFTER you get the base information (which includes the user’s name, e-mail address and possibly phone number.)
Add a “perpetual lead form.” Yes, perpetual carts are for e-commerce sites but they also work incredibly well on sites that don’t have products as perpetual lead forms. Basically this is just a reminder to the user what they are supposed to do on your site. (On B2B sites, they work in the righthand column, either in the tippy top or at the righthand side just underneath the offer box. (The offer box should be the first thing you see after the top navigation. The perpetual lead form goes underneath that.)
Personalize your site. Even “Welcome Back Wally” in the upper middle column is a good start.
Add a deadline. Deadlines create urgency and they cause people to focus. They’re very effective in B2B because the AAUS (the active average user sessions or the length of time the user stays on your site in an active capacity) are usually low.

You’ll also want to include BIG action buttons all over your site; contact information (especially your phone number) on every page; and address security/privacy on every view. Forms should be simple to fill out; include a temperature bar if they are more than one page (just like an e-commerce cart would); and really consider online chat as a way to collect leads. (It works like gangbusters in a lot of B2B companies and very few folks use it.)

By the way, I mentioned looking at your stats above but I’d be remiss if I didn’t mention that in B2B, one of the easiest ways to see if you’re doing something wrong is to look at your SPV’s. Single Page Visits (aka SPV’s) are a good indication of your traffic quality and/or your ability to get your users to act.

If your number is higher than 20%, you’ll want to figure out if you are sending the right traffic to your site. Look at the words people are using to find you, maybe they’re right, maybe they’re not, you’ve got to find out. This is important because a lot of times B2B companies get a lot of traffic but it’s not the right traffic. For example, a company that does genetic mining used to get a ton of traffic to their site because they talked about the periodic table on one of their major pages – this traffic was mostly coming from high school kids doing their homework, not the researchers in their core market.

Got any more tips that have worked for you? Please add them in the comments below…

Are One-Page Checkouts THE Best Practice?

3:19 pm by Amy 1 Comment

Kyle Nelson says: “I attended your shopping cart webinar a couple weeks ago. During your presentation, you said that one-page checkouts are not for everyone. Our provider said you don’t know what you are talking about and that one-page checkouts are the new best practice. Which one of you is right? Oh, I forgot to mention, he wants to charge us $7,500 per site to develop ours (we have eight sites) so he has a vested interest.”

Hi Kyle. Thanks for writing. Here’s the thing. One-page checkouts will work extraordinarily well for certain users and for others, they will completely bomb. Some will fall right in the middle. You won’t know till you test it.

In other words, looking at one set of A/B split test results from a site that sells anabolic steroids to Jordanian bodybuilders (a similar case study to the one your provider is using in his collateral material) and making your assumptions from that is a terrible, horrible, no-good very bad idea. (And yes, as much as I think those sites that give you information on which test(s) performed best are sexy and fun to read, they are not a sure-fire recipe for success. Take it from someone who happily admits that she tests more things that fail than things that succeed.)

If you are interested in a one-page checkout, test it with the people who know you first – your registered users and past customers. Make sure you have enough statistical significance in your results – if your one-page checkout gets 21 orders and your old checkout gets 22, it’s not necessarily a winner. (Online you need the variances in checkout tests to be much higher – usually two or three times that of offline tests. If you want the results to stick that is. Oh, and always backtest the old control at least once with anything concerning forms and/or checkouts.)

If that is successful, you can start rolling it out with other segments. I would never globally implement a one-page checkout to all your folks. Some people do it. I don’t think it’s the best idea ESPECIALLY if you have catalog customers coming in from offline sources as they often need a completely separate checkout OR if you are doing a lot of work with PPC or affiliates OR…. Well. You get the idea. I’ve just seen too many examples of where it hasn’t worked to be completely enamored with it. (By the way, I want to be clear that I am a proponent of and do recommend one-page checkouts, I just think you need to be very disciplined in your offerings. Your users will tell you what is best for them. Don’t force what you think is best just because it’s the “in” thing.)

One of the points to keep in mind with one-page checkouts is that you really need to do server calls (or something similar) so that you can keep track of the information that you do get from the user. A lot of times companies will feel that their one-page checkouts are stellar until they realize that they have collected very little data to use for their abandoned cart e-mails and programs. If you are doing things right online (best practice or not), you are going to save 15 to 50% of your abandoned carts. (And no, you don’t need a discount or free offer to make an abandoned cart program work.)

P.S. As for your provider, I think you should tell him that charging you $7,500 for each site when he’s implementing the exact same checkout is highway robbery, which in fact, is NOT a best – or even good — practice if he wants to keep his clients, exactly 42% of which I have sent him, I might add.

Don’t Tap The Tank! You’ll Scare Away The Fish.

9:48 pm by Amy Leave a Comment

In the past month, I have encountered so many Nutter Butters that I’ve started checking wrists for “if lost, please return to the psychiatric ward” bracelets.

Not only have I met too many full-on wackadoodles to count, I have also come across several people where the only thing I can wonder about them is what planet they are from. (And I am not talking Mars and Venus here.)

Take the other day for example…. I was not-so-patiently waiting in my dentist’s office. As always, he was running late and if that wasn’t irritating enough, his big, fat liar assistant said that he was only twenty minutes behind. Twenty minutes times four was more like it.

Anyway, I had plopped myself in the only seat available, right next to the fish tank.

My dentist has a huge fish tank – and when I say huge, I mean Boston-Aquarium-scuba-divers-inside sized. (Since fish tanks are supposed to be relaxing, I personally think he’s compensating for being a dentist.)

Unlike a lot of fish tanks, his tank is impeccably clean and he has interesting fish, not just those bottom-sucking fish that refuse to die that most folks have. You know, the leftover fish.

Like moths to a flame.

As if it was some sort of rite of passage, every five to ten minutes, someone (an adult, not a child) would come to see the fish.

What did the MAJORITY of folks do when they got to the fish tank?

Yes, you guessed it.

They tapped the glass.

I repeat: THEY TAPPED THE GLASS.

What the hell?

You don’t have to be a poker player to know that if you tap the glass, you scare away the fish.

I won’t embellish the story to add that folks said “here fishy-fishy” when they tapped the tank, because they didn’t. Yet all but one of them acted as if the fish were cuddly creatures and they’d come running, er, swimming, to the front of the tank when called.

As if.

Tapping the tank scares away the fish in the SAME EXACT WAY that tapping-type behavior scares away users on your web site.

Here are a few examples of tapping the tank when it comes to your site… (Note: these are not best practices. They aren’t even mildly good practices. These are things to AVOID.)

Auto-starting sound (yes, it is sometimes effective but unless you’ve tested it, it’s NOT a good idea)
Scary errors – especially security warnings. (If you want an easy way to figure out how the “average person” (yes, even in B2B) sees your site, download the full version of AOL and look at your site from there.
“Nothing to do” on the entry page. Companies – ecommerce businesses, bloggers, almost everyone – underestimates this. Because of the way the brain works in conquer mode, the user will be most successful overall if they have a sense of purpose and then accomplishment. This is beyond the library and bookstore analogy – this is about getting the user to “act” or “do” as fast as you possibly can. Your web site is a VERY visual medium and the user has to get their “orders” (aka action directives) within thirty seconds (or less) of being there.
Poor navigation. Navigation accounts for over half your success online. You get what I give you. If I don’t give it to you, you don’t get it. It’s as plain and simple as that.
An abundance of white picket fences. Far too many sites still have no other choices but for me to marry you , have your babies, get a Golden Retriever and a house with a picket fence. If I don’t want to fully commit (for example: request a quote or order), there’s nothing else I can do. (Offering an e-mail sign-up, ask an expert, a poll/survey goes a long way.)
Too much SEO text. Yes, there is a balance. No, it’s not taking up the entire first view. Search engines “see” things in text. People see them in pictures.
Carousels and banners that are too speedy. Flow is important so just because you want to jam eight rotations into your space doesn’t mean it’s a good idea. Nor is it a wise tactic to have all sorts of competing rotation(s). (In other words, using a slammer and a carousel on the same page is typically a bad idea.)
Midis, catfishes, sidewinders, and pop-ups without purpose. Pop-ups (and similar tactics) really work. (And no, I don’t care how much everyone says they hate them) but they are COMPLETELY dependent on creative – ESPECIALLY graphics – and they need to have something for the user to do. Just asking them to close the box is not enough.

There are lots of other no-nos so what’s important to remember is that you can determine whether or not you are scaring away YOUR fish by looking at your “screaming girl” stats. Yes, screaming girls. Every site has ‘em.

Exit Pages: What You Need To Know

2:56 pm by Amy 7 Comments

Beth Kotowski asks: “Why are you so obsessed with exit pages? No other consultants ever talk about them. Are you behind the times or do you see value in them that others don’t?”

Good question. I know they are not sexy but exit pages are still one of the very first things I look at before I do a site critique. Why? Because they’re often one of the easiest ways you can identify what’s wrong with a site.

Here are 4 things you need to know:

1. What are your top ten exit pages? Top five? Top one? Those are the pages you need to look at and/or fix first. Every company needs to find it’s own conversion levels, but a good rule of thumb is that no single page (with the exception of confirmation pages) should account for more than 10% of your exit traffic.

That’s not a global rule (meaning that not everyone can follow it). However, you can easily determine benchmarks for your own site(s). If you have an extraordinary amount of people leaving from a particular page, chances are that page needs work. (You’re either getting the wrong traffic or giving the wrong sales pitch – there aren’t a lot of other choices.).

2. How many exits does your premier entry page (often referred to as a ‘home page’) have? How long are people spending there? If you are getting a lot of traffic that suddenly makes a hasty exit, chances are that traffic shouldn’t have been on that page in the first place. You need to check that.

On the flip side of the coin, if they’re coming to your home page and then spending oodles of time (meaning more than a minute) on that page, your navigation probably needs improvement. (The amount of time that a user spends on the first page they land on almost always tells the story of how they will act and what their propensity to buy (or do) will be.

3. Where does text search fall in your exits? Unfortunately, for most companies, it’s usually at the top and it’s, by far, the most difficult thing to fix. About half of the companies I’ve seen wouldn’t need text search if they had solid C-Navigation. (C-Navigation is top, bottom and left-hand navigation.) Those companies are usually service companies or businesses with just one or a couple products. If you fit in that category, ask yourself… What will happen if we get rid of text search altogether?

If you’re a company that needs text search, you need to figure out where people are exiting.

Is it on a no-find page? (where you don’t have any results.) Those are the best places to add “if you can’t find what you’re looking for, here are some products you may be interested in…” messages, along with your most popular products that EVERYONE needs.

Or is it on a successful search results page? It cracks me up when someone tells me that they have the perfect search. Even with my favorite search tools, there’s really no such thing as the perfect search. Users aren’t smart enough to make your search function look good.

But I digress. A lot of times users leave on “successful search” results pages meaning that your search probably wasn’t so successful. Explore your search and its direct relation to your exits in detail. It will be one of the best investments you make.

4. Do you REALLY need a particular page? I’ve found that often times, users leave from category-like pages – pages where they can’t do anything so I try to determine…. Do we really need that particular page? What will happen if we don’t have that page? If we got rid of it altogether? If we must have that page (and sometimes it’s a must), how can we make it better? Does it have Buy Now/Add To Cart buttons on it? If you’re not an ecommerce site, can you inquire or get a quote from it? (If your goal is to get people to raise their hands, you have to ask them several times per page. Best case scenario: at least once in every quad.)

The Forgotten Art of Holding Hands…

10:19 am by Amy 7 Comments

The other day, while I was debating whether or not to report father-to-be, DJ Waldow, to Child Protective Services for FUTURE neglect*, a funny thing happened.

I was standing in a very busy, noisy, 50-floor, city office building, impatiently waiting for one of the two (out of eight) elevators that were working. EVERYONE was on their phones (in fact, most of us had a phone in one hand and a BlackBerry/iPhone in the other) and nobody was paying much attention to anyone else. We were all grumpy; the one of us who couldn’t find the stairs to bypass this exercise in futility (that’d be me) the most cantankerous of all.

When my turn finally came, I was the last person to squeeze in. I pushed my button, the door closed, and then, and only then, I felt a tug on my leg.

Staring up at me — eyes rapidly filling with tears — was a boy who looked to be about 1.5 years old.

He did not belong to me.

Naturally, I ignored him. It’s always fun to try to tempt the Elevator Gods to see how many e-mails you can type before you lose service. Plus, his Mom or Dad must be in here somewhere, right?

Wrong.

Turns out that his Nutter Butter Mother didn’t hold the little terrorist’s hand (and yes, after spending OVER AN HOUR with him, I can tell you that the kid came directly from the clearance bin at Brats R Us) and he had snuck into the elevator right as the door closed.

I found this out on Floor 17 when a burly guy who was about to exit wished us all – specifically me — good luck.

I won’t bore you with the rest of the details of this story or that when the mother finally reunited with her child, she screamed at me for six minutes. She couldn’t care less that I had missed my appointment or that she should have stayed in one damn place instead of chasing us up and down the floors in a different carriage. Apparently, she just needed to lash out at someone for her lame-ass parenting skills.

I still believe that 99% of parents do the best job they can with the tools they have.

Unfortunately, many of them have very limited tools.

Kind of like a lot of web marketers these days, eh?

I know my opinion isn’t a popular one, but I believe that the chasm between good internet marketing and bad internet marketing has grown by leaps and bounds in the past six months. Catalogers and traditional direct marketers are not only falling behind but they’re dropping out of the race. They can’t – or won’t – seem to keep up.

What are some of the most critical tools you need for 2010?

VIDEO – YouTube is the second largest search engine but that’s not the only reason you need to look at video seriously. Video is, of course, visual. It works because the optic nerve plugs directly into your reptilian brain, which is where your “buy buttons” are located. You do NOT need a multi-million dollar studio. Start with a Flip camera and a VERY good, VERY aggressive script.

UGC/REVIEWS – Consultants have all sorts of myths why User Generated Content (UGC) and reviews work. Most of them are wrong. They work for two reasons. First, they create “evidence” that someone else just like you was already on the site you are looking at. Second, they are one of the most effective methods for forming contrast. Our buying brains like beginnings and ends and they best understand and function/act with contrast (dark versus light).

LIVE CHAT — Six years ago, I thought live chat was one of the worst things you could do on your site because, for the most part, it not only didn’t work but it actually hurt conversion. Today, I am one of its biggest proponents ESPECIALLY when it comes to instigated (aka proactive) chat. It’s great for carts, forms, search and all those other nasty places that people like to leave from.

MOBILE — A lot of the mobile consultants make mobile marketing seem extraordinarily complicated. Here’s a secret for you. It may be the easiest thing you’ve ever done. Start by optimizing your e-mails. Then, add a handheld CSS file. Take the mobile stuff in baby steps. It’s easy and it’s incredibly worthwhile (read: lucrative.)

DYNAMIC RELEVANCE — If I tell you that I don’t like pink shirts, you shouldn’t show me a pink shirt. Period. You don’t have to go all Amazon tomorrow but you need to start looking at what you can do to make your site personalized. Start with a Welcome Back message, if you must.

TRIGGER E-MAILS — Trigger e-mails are different than thrust e-mails because they are based on a user’s individual actions. They are more than just abandoned cart programs and EVERY site – B2B, B2C, B2G, needs them. Plain and simple as that.

Organics – Let’s face it. Most folks killed their organic SEO efforts the minute they heard about PPC. Paying for clicks was so much easier than working for them. Now Social Media is hot and PPC is not, right? Wrong. PPC still works and organics, if you build your program properly, still works even better.

LISTENING TOOLS — If you’ve spent 2.2 seconds with me you already know that I’m not the world’s biggest social media proponent. I truly believe that, in most cases, it’s massively over-rated. With that said, this is the year you need to have a presence, you need to listen and you need to respond to the users who are talking about you. Most social media “experts” don’t like it when I say this but for most companies, it’s truly a customer service thing and you need representation, just like you need a phone.

ANALYTICS — I’ve got to say, I’m over Google Analytics. Yes, I believe you should use it (even if it’s only to get accurate reads on your PPC) but only as PART of your arsenal. Analytics is the key to your online success and you’ve got to take it seriously. If you aren’t using a high-powered package, this is the year to look at one. Buy it. And then use it like crazy.

Additionally, consider analytical tools like Chartbeat (which is especially helpful for seeing what’s happening right this very minute on your bsite – for example, what happens after you deploy an e-mail); Clicky (good for real-time spying as well as social networking), Crazy Egg (one of my all-time favorites, great for visualization), ClickTale (also for heatmaps), TrafficSpaces (good for banner tracking) and so on.

What am I missing? Please add your thoughts in the comments or drop me a line at info@amyafrica.com.

*Look, DJ’s daughter, due in March, already has her own Twitter account. @babywaldow. This is obviously clear and blatant abuse.

**And yes, because if I don’t say it here, I’ll likely get questioned about it. I adore Papa Waldow (@djwaldow on Twitter.) That’s why I am teasing him. DJ’s smart, funny and very genuine and I am happy for him, his wife and their new bambino, even if her name will likely be something like Narcissa.

Do You Remember Your First Kiss?

1:57 pm by Amy 3 Comments

Do you remember the first time you kissed?

What about the last time?

Ok, now tell me about all the ones in the middle.

Yes, you heard me…. Talk to me about every kiss you’ve ever had.

Don’t remember them all? Hmmm…. Why?

In the past couple months, I have started several speeches and webinars with the “kiss” question. Everyone can tell me about their first and last kisses but after that, folks quickly start drawing blanks.

Is it because there are too many? If I asked you to only tell me about ALL the memorable “middle-kisses” – could you do it?

Probably not. Sure, you could name some but you’d leave others out and likely, you wouldn’t tell me them chronologically.

Interesting, huh?

Strangely enough the same brain that processes stuff like that is also the brain that makes your buying decisions.

Over the next few months, we’ll talk more about the different brains and how they work together as well as the buy buttons (yes, everyone has them.) In the meantime, let’s concentrate on the fact that the “brain that buys” likes the beginning, it likes the end, and it gets kinda-sorta mushy when it comes to the middle.

What does this mean when it comes to your web site?

The first 2 seconds (yes, two) are critical. Everyone knows that. What folks often underestimate are the last two. What are you doing to get the users to stay and/or come back quickly? If the secret formula to your web success is your first impression — and your last impression — what are you doing to make them special (read: aggressive?)
Deadlines work because they create urgency and they cause people to focus. They are especially effective on the web because they combine the user’s need for speed and the self-service aspect of doing anything online.
Use more action directives. Action directives (aka embedded commands) tell people what they are supposed to do on your site – click here now, proceed to checkout now, sign up for our FREE newsletter/webinar/podcast/white paper now, and so on. A lot of consultants will tell you that you do not need them – that users are so sophisticated now that they don’t have to be told what to do – that’s completely bogus (and only said by folks who clearly have no understanding how the brain works.)

Figuring out how to get your user to do what you want them to do isn’t rocket science, it’s neuroscience. There’s a very BIG difference.

P.S. Want to see another example of how good your brain is when it comes to beginnings and ends? Click here now.

How To Make Things “Right” On Your Site…

5:13 pm by Amy 11 Comments

Ann Kennedy says: “Please tell me, Oh Web Goddess Extraordinaire, why do sites like Craigslist do well? They’re butt ugly and that’s on a good day. I just don’t get it.”

First, I like the greeting. I’m hardly a goddess – more like a jester – but since it’s the nicest thing I’ve been called in days weeks months, I’ll take it. Thank you.

Second, I’m not sure that this is the best question to start the year off with. I am LOVING 2010 and getting a bunch of folks all hot and bothered about aesthetics may not be my smartest move.

With that said, I get this question at least twice a day so here’s the thing — and yes, it applies to every business — whether you sell penny knock-offs from Taiwan or luxury automobiles, your site will be MOST successful if it’s functional.

Functionality is in the user’s brains. (Yes, with an -s.)

Take the Fairmont Hotels, for example. Last week, I stayed in three. They are nice places and I enjoy a lot of their benefits (read: the Willow Stream Spas.) However, from a business traveler’s perspective, they suck. Yeah, yeah, I know. They say they have EVERYTHING that a business person needs but then when you get in the room, you find out things like there is only one outlet underneath the desk. Even more horrifying, one plug has already been taken for the light. So, you end up plugging the computer in one place and your cell phone, iPod, Kindle, and other stuff in multiple places, halfway across the damn room.

Compare that to the Hampton Inn. They have a boatload of plugs — and usually at least one extension outlet near the desk. Their internet is wireless (as opposed to a lot of the luxury hotels) and FREE (not $14.95 per day!)

Are Hampton Inns as pretty as Fairmonts? Not in this lifetime. But sometimes you don’t want pretty, you just want to get the job done….

Getting the job done is where sites like Craigslist come in.

Remember, you don’t always need to be first or the cheapest when it comes to web stuff, you just need to do it right. And “right”, like functionality, is determined by your users.

The first 4 tried-and-true steps to making your site functional…

Make sure you have action directives in every quad of every view. Action directives tell people what they are supposed to do on your site. They also make it clear as to whether your site is a library or a bookstore.
Add an e-mail sign-up to the top of the lefthand column. Everyone knows that capturing e-mail addresses has lots of benefits. What folks may not know is that when users give you their e-mail, their AAUS tends to increase and be more balanced. In other words, they drill the right number of times per minute.
Speed is a deciding factor for the majority of users. In fact, it’s one of the top three reasons why someone stays on your site. Make sure your load time is quick and easy. There are still far too many sites where you have to wait for the page to load. (Very 2001, not 2010.)
Personalize the site with as much information as you can. This includes not only “Welcome Charles”-type personalization but utilizing specialized landing pages, recently viewed items/articles, whip-its and catfishes, etc.

The Scary People Store…

3:15 pm by Amy 5 Comments

“I want to go to the Nuggies Store and NOT the scary people store.” Anonymous ordered, as if he had the one and only vote.
Anonymous is three and a half but he stirs up trouble like no boy — or man — I’ve ever met.

“And what store is that?” My brother asked.

“The store where Amy takes me.” The Diabolical One answered.

“Which store is that?” My brother repeated S-L-O-W-L-Y. His mind obviously spinning with the possibility that I’d taken his {evil demon} spawn to a tattoo parlor, a sex shop or perhaps the infamous erotic bakery. (They really do have the best cakes.)

“The one with the SCARY people.” He shouted, having NO patience for this discussion. (They look so innocent in their car seats. What a flipping illusion that is.)

As my thoughts raced to exactly where I had taken him with scary people (no, none of the three choices above), I realized where it was. Two can play this game, I realized. “Where the bunnies are?” I asked.

“Yes.” He whispered, likely knowing I was about to bust him.

You could see my brother’s brain race to the nearest casino with the cocktail waitresses sporting only the latest in Playmates uniforms.

“Relax” I said. “The poker isn’t good till well after Anonymous goes to bed.” I paused, purposely. There’s nothing like getting older and still being able to poke your brother as much as you did when you kidnapped all his G.I. Joes and sold them back to him for about ten times what they were worth.

“He’s talking about Whole Foods. The organic carrots are right when you walk in. He thinks a lot of bunnies eat there.” I explained.

My brother raised one eyebrow. Obviously, he wasn’t buying it so I continued. “I took him there on Halloween. All the cashiers were in costume. Remember, I made you osso bucco? I had to get wine for it and the wine guy scared the hell out of him. He was dressed like a zombie.”

Silence.

As my brother debated whether or not he should call the poker room to see if they have a Kid’s Klub (they do), I thought about first impressions and their impact.

I love Whole Foods so much that I want to marry it and have its babies. (As an aside, if you haven’t read I Love You More Than My Dog by Jeanne Bliss, you should do it now.*) However, I totally get why my nephew was traumatized. The wine guy is scary WITHOUT being dressed up. He knows way more than anyone should about wine AND on a good day, he looks like he just came out of a cave. (Think a milk-fed Osama Bin Laden.) Couple that with a ghoulish costume… you’d be terrified, ESPECIALLY if you believed in monsters.

Granted, my nephew would sell his thrice-mortgaged soul to the devil to eat at McDonald’s. (What the hell do they put in McNuggets?) But the truth is, even if he had never been to a McDonald’s in his life, that day at Whole Foods still would have had a lasting impression on him — an experience so traumatic that he’d never want to return.

Kind of like your web site, eh?

I find that most folks — especially the “experts” — don’t talk enough about repeat visitors and how they impact your business.

Our knickers get twisted about bounce rates but we don’t focus enough on the people who come back and more important, how long it takes them to come back.

Of the ten or so metrics you MUST know about your business, that’s absolutely one of the most critical. Knowing if and when your customers repeat.

When someone new comes to your site today — whether you have a blog, a robust e-commerce site, or something in between, the user decides, in less than ten seconds, whether or not they’ll EVER come back. Some folks look at a lot of pages. Others leave on the very first one. But all of them decide if your site is a place they’d like to revisit.

Your goal is to figure out how many people are visiting again and how long it takes them to come back. Chances are you can influence how long it takes them (thus shortening your Days To Sale/Action) with tighter deadlines, everchanging carousels/visuals, polls/surveys, and more.

It’s either that or figuring out what they put in those damn McNuggets.
*No, that was not an Amazon link or a sponsored anything. I avoid customer service/care books like the piggy flu. However, I happen to like Jeanne’s. It’s quick and worth a read. Plus, you’ve got to admit, the title alone makes it worth buying.

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