Website-ROI-Guy.com

1 Thing Small Business Owners Should Do Today Online: Re-Assess Goals

Following up on my previous post, 5 Things Small Business Owners Should Do Today Online, here is the first of five (actually 6) posts where we'll focus more on my previous recommendations.

I've said for a long time that failing to set specific measurable goals is the biggest mistake most companies make with their website. "If you fail to plan, you plan to fail."

All too often I hear executives say that their goal is to "sell product."  But they usually don't qualify that by defining, "How many?" or "To whom?"  Whether you have one product or many, you need to determine how many you need to sell to make your online efforts worthwhile - to earn an ROI.

And even if you only have one product or service, consider ALL the potential customers who may have a need.  Don't just think about selling to "them."  The tactics you use and the messages you project may be different to different target audiences.

Also, consider that you may have more success by setting a series of interim goals that lead to your prime objective of "selling product."  The ultimate goal of a football team is to win the game.  Interim goals are to score touchdowns, get within field goal range, protect the quarterback or prevent the opponent from scoring. 

Your online sales funnel may include a number of steps that begin with your prospect's initial interest and include requests for more information, e-mail opt-in, marketing support, a needs analysis or survey, participation in on an on or offline demonstration or some specific followup or sequence of followups. 

Your goals can then be adjusted based on an ongoing analysis. If you achieve more of your ultimate goal when your prospects engage in a specific activity, then you may want to promote that.  If something else isn't working, you'll likely improve ROI by ending the initiative and focusing on productive activities.

I consult with many small business owners and often say that they will usually see a consistent ratio of the total number of people who visit the website to the number of people who ultimately buy.  It is even more illuminating to see the ratios of visitors to each of the interim goals leading up to the sale.

Then, work to improve each step along the way!

You can and should also break it down to target audiences.  You may have many more than one target audience.  What are each of their needs?  How can you customize or enhance their experience?  Testing and revising your website strategy and message will likely lead to more sales and ROI.

Do your goals end with selling something?  What about the future? Is there an opportunity to cross-sell, up-sell, support the sale, get a referral or maintain a profitable relationship that will lead to future sales?

All goals are not sales related.  Your goals may have to do with operating more efficiently, building a network of influencers, promoting a cause, getting volunteers or donors, hiring, distributing news, teaching/training, working with partners or building a community.  Some of these goals may be part of an effort to build sales and they all may benefit from or require interim goals to succeed.

So, TODAY, list ALL the goals for your website and the specific interim steps to achieve them with your target audiences.

-- Kurt Scholle

Follow me on Twitter! @KurtScholle

5 Things Small Business Owners Should Do Today Online

Chris Brogan had a great blog post earlier this week titled, "5 Things Small Business Owners Should Do Today Online."  As usual, pretty good information! Great ideas for small business owners who are interested in using social media to promote their company.  He asks his readers to pass it on and offer to help.  I have and I will - just call me! (630) 482-9323.

Here is my list of 5 Things Small Business Owners Should Do Online Today to Improve Website ROI.

1. Re-assess your goals.  If you set specific measurable goals, your plan for ROI success comes together easily.  It helps you plot a course of action, including intermediate steps, that achieve your objectives.  Be honest. Don't set of goal of selling 5,000 of something when you haven't sold 5 all year.  Set intermediate goals - "Sell 50 between now and...) THEN plot to sell 500, then 5,000.
2. Review your website content to make sure that you're talking to your visitor's needs, not what you want to feature.  Always ask the question, "What's in it for them?" Sonia Simone had a great post this week on the Copyblogger blog.  Check it out!  And watch for a link to an ultra-advanced sales technique that we're trying to keep secret. :-)
3. Update your site content periodically.  Make sure your offer resonates with visitors, and you can split test this.  Another reason to update content is that search engines will rank you higher the more dynamic your site.  While you're at it, fix any broken links, both internal and external.
4. Make sure you have a call to action, prominently placed and above the fold of as many pages as possible.  What action do you want your visitors to take on your website? Examples include: dialing your phone number, emailing you, filling out a form/needs analysis/survey, downloading an e-book (or coupons, customized calendar, support info, etc), opting in to a newsletter or other information delivered by an autoresponder, opting in to view premium content (web pages, videos, podcasts), referring you to others, making a comment.....
5. Test your systems. It's amazing how many websites fail when it comes to online sales, forms, opt-ins and delivering videos, to name a few.  Make it a habit to go thru your ecommerce from beginning to delivery to your door on a regular basis.  Test your opt-in email to make sure you're registered and emails are delivered.  Do these test regularly, especially if you haven't gotten an order recently or received some expected interaction.
6. Do a better job of marketing your site. I could write a whole book on this, but think about and do something to market your website every day: optimizing for search engines, pay-per-click (Adwords, etc), traditional marketing, guerrilla marketing and social media marketing, which gets us back to this...

If you haven't picked up Chris Brogan's book, "Trust Agents,"
that he wrote with Julien Smith, you're missing a terrific read!

I've passed out several copies to clients and friends.

I've posted, "The 5 Biggest Mistakes Most People Make With Their Websites."  Maybe that will give you additional insight and ideas!

If you know of anyone who could benefit from this post, please pass it on and offer to help.

-- Kurt Scholle

How Not to Do Twitter

I was coaching a client in the hospitality industry on how to find people to follow on Twitter and the tactical opportunities you can gain by selectively looking at who your competitors, vendors and associations are following or being followed by.

We had done some Google searches related to meeting and event planners and stumbled on to the Twitter account of an association she was familiar with.

As we looked at who they were following, there was hardly a meeting planner, destination or industry resource on the list.

However, Mrs Ashton Kutcher was. So was Wil Wheaton (loved him in Star Trek), Eddie Izzard (love him in anything-even a dress!), Al Gore, a college basketball coach, an 80's hair band, another actor, a style magazine and a sports blogger.

My client has a whole new impression of the association.

We both had a good laugh and I got a case study to teach other clients How Not to Do Twitter. Thought I would share it with you.

Fail, fail, fail, fail, fail!

-- Kurt Scholle, Website ROI and eBusiness Strategy

Bing vs. Google, a side-by-side comparison

Want to see how searches on Bing and Google compare side-by-side?  Check out Bing-vs-Google.com.  Type is a keyword or phrase and compare the results of the 2 SERPs side-by-side.

Something I learned while looking up something else!

-- Kurt

Dirty Campaign Tricks or Stupid Search Engine Optimization?

There has been some chatter online about a bunch of hidden text discovered on Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison's website StandbyKay.com, which promotes her bid for Goverrnor of Texas.

The Austin American Statesman newspaper broke the story and is reporting that a vendor put the phrases there.  Supposedly there is a program that puts the phrases in on an hourly basis, all of which revolve around 3 phrases; “Rick Perry,” “Kay Bailey Hutchison” and “Texas.”  The are apparently 2,200 phrases (My Word count says 6,591 words)

I noticed a bunch of Texas counties listed in the background code and the names of state and national politicians.  There appear to be references to Republican events, both past and present, and issues important to both of the major political parties.

There were phrases containing the words "Rick Perry gay," "texas grape growers" and "african americans in texas."

With all the references to Mrs. Hutchison alone, I would think the site would get banned or penalized for keyword stuffing.  But the use of non-visible keywords may be problematic too.

So, is it dirty campaign tricks or stupid search engine optimization?

We'll need a referee for this one, I think.

Cool Web 2.0 Website Recommendations

Here are some Web 2.0 websites you may find interesting. I found them while looking up other things.

Collecta monitors the update streams of news sites, popular blogs and social media.

SocialMention is like Google Alerts, but for social media.

Twitority bills itself as "Authority based Twitter search."

TweetBeep is also like Google Alerts, but for Twitter AND they email hourly.

Twitcam allows you to stream live on Twitter.

Who Follows Whom allows you to see who collectively follows up to 5 Twitterers.

Neat applications! Give them all a try!

-- Kurt Scholle, the WebsiteROIGuy

Twitter 101

I love Twitter.  I began using it in April 2008 just to see what the buzz was all about.  There are dozens of reasons to embrace Twitter.  Maybe I should blog about that sometime?

I have referred clients and friends to Twitter.  Many have heard of it.  Many do not understand it.  I have an email that I send to people who are interested in Twitter with some recommendations and insights to it's use.  Maybe I should blog about that sometime?

Or maybe I don't have to.

Twitter has just released Twitter 101, a special guide for business, saying;

"Every day, millions of people use Twitter to create, discover and share ideas with others. Now, people are turning to Twitter as an effective way to reach out to businesses, too. From local stores to big brands, and from brick-and-mortar to internet-based or service sector, people are finding great value in the connections they make with businesses on Twitter."

If you're interested in social media, Web 2.0, low-cost marketing, interesting ways to learn, making friends or networking, supporting a cause, conversations, building your brand, improving customer service or any number of things, try Twitter!

Start with Twitter 101.

-- Kurt Scholle, the Website ROI Guy.

Website Strategy: About the About Us Page

I received an email from someone who wanted to know what to say on the About Us page of his website.  Here is my response:

The About Us page is not usually the most visited page on a website, but it's important for several reasons.  One is that visitors who are considering your products or services need to believe that they will like working with or buying from you.  Many search engines are also thought to penalize websites that do not have an About Us or Contact Us pages.

The About Us page might be viewed as an extension of what you might be tempted to say on a Home page. In fact, much of what you currently say on your Home page is a good start.  Consider shortening that text and promote more of your company's benefits and unique selling position.

If you were to promote yourself in a chamber of commerce event or cocktail party, what would you say?  Something to the effect of:

"We’re Acme Widgets.  We provide a very high level of <fill in the blank>.  We do this by <fill in the blank> which benefits our customers by <fill in the blank>. 

We <list a benefit>.  We <list another benefit>.  We are conveniently located...."

I would try and link text to other pages of your site which should help search optimization.

I wouldn’t make it too long.  Visitors will sometimes visit these pages before making a final decision.  This page strategy is to explain in a broad sense what you do (rather than on the Home page) and build likability and trust. Use the Home page more to get people to take the actions you want them to take, including navigation to interior sections.

Dedicated to your website ROI.

-- Kurt Scholle

Search Engine Submission Pages

One simple way to boost website traffic is to get listed in search engines.  When people search for terms related to your site, hopefully they'll find your site listed in the first Search Engine Results Page (SERP) or two.

Many sites are found by the 'spiders' the search engines use to travel from site-to-site and page-to-page.  The odds of them finding your site increase with the number of inbound links you have to your site.  (That's a whole chapter or course that we can address some other time.)

It can be difficult to get inbound links for the spiders to follow to your site, especially if it's new.  But you can submit your site to most search engines so they know that you exist and will begin the process of evaluating your site.

This is especially important for the new Bing search engine from Microsoft.  If you were indexed on previous iterations of Microsoft's search engines, you'll likely show up on Bing.  But it's always a good idea to make sure the major search engines know about your site as well as any boutique, vertical market or niche search engines that would be appropriate for your site.

Keep in mind that you can often test to see if your site is indexed by a particular search engine by going to it and typing, "site:mydomain.com" where mydomain.com is your website address. (No spaces between "site:" and your domain.)

Google Webmaster Tools also has an application for checking the status of your site.

If your site does not appear to be indexed, you'll want to submit your URL to the search engines.

Google: http://www.google.com/addurl/?continue=/addurl

Yahoo: https://siteexplorer.search.yahoo.com/submit

Bing: http://www.bing.com/docs/submit.aspx

These 3 search engines account for roughly 90% of all Internet searches and many of them feed their information to smaller search engines.

Just because you've submitted your site to search engines is no guarantee that you will be indexed or that you'll receive a favorable ranking.  There are other factors that will affect your rankings.  Find what I've written on that subject by searching through the 'Search Engine Optimization' category on my blog.

Understand that it may take some time for the search engines to crawl your site once you've submitted it, and it may take additional work to get your pages indexed for coveted keywords.  We recommend that you have a sitemap on every site.  But by submitting your sites to the search engines, you've made a pretty good start on getting a return on your investment!

Kurt Scholle, the Website ROI Guy

What is your most pressing issue, obstacle or concern regarding creating your effective web presence?

One of my coaching clients counsels others of effective website development, social meda and online marketing.  I am subscribed to her email list.  She recently sent out an email to her followers asking:"What is your most pressing issue, obstacle or concern regarding creating your effective web presence?"

I'll be interested in the responses.  But I thought I would share the answers I've gotten from our customers:

"Speaking from experience, our customers are most challenged by developing the content for their site, especially page content that is benefit rich and has clear calls to action.

But the key that is sorely lacking on most websites is a plan.  Most websites fail because the owner fails to set specific measureable goals and create a plan to achieve them."

If you have a website that needs to be fixed, or you are building one from the ground up, you should develop a plan that lists your objectives and then create tactics and strategies to achieve them.  That's easier said than done, but if you do it, you'll be ahead of at least 90% of other sites, including your direct competitors.

Developing site content that immediately defines you and engages your visitor will lead to conversion of the goals you set when you began your plan.

You'll need to monitor your success and adjust accordingly, but you'll be better off.

These two tips are part of my "5 Biggest Mistakes Most People Make With Their Website" tutorial, a free course delivered by email.

I'd be interested in your feedback on the course, but also your answewrs tothe question, "What is your most pressing issue, obstacle or concern

regarding creating your effective web presence?"

-- Kurt Scholle