Forums: Discussions for entrepreneurs and small business.

 I made my first 2 sales recently.  Very exciting.  My site traffic has had about 500 people this month.  I now need to figure out how to turn those lookers into buyers.  Any suggestions on that?

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-Michael B. Thompson-

Signature Style.NET

Mike, we`ve talked about this on SuN on a regular basis. It`s a big puzzlement, but over the months of discussion, I`m starting to see various drivers.

I don`t think there`s a cut-and-dried solution to converting lookers to buyers. Lots of variables enter the equation. But of all the ideas, there do seem to be a few that tend to make sense.

It`s not enough to sell a product. Anyone can do that. But if the product is really unusual and interesting, more people will tend to buy. If the product really serves an immediate need, or serves that need on a repeating basis, people will tend to buy.

Above all, in my own opinion, is "the show." Look at many of the infommercials. They don`t just sell a product, they make a show out of it. The acting is overdone, the situations are exaggerated, but they`re fun! They get you into it, moving along, building emotions, and looking closely.

Too many people take a passive approach to selling. They put out their wares, and wait for people to decide on their own if they want to buy. But good sales people create a dynamic situation, with things to "do" during the process.

"Here, feel this coat! Doesn`t the leather feel amazing? You`d expect to pay a lot, right? Go ahead...try it on. Wow, does THAT look great! How much you figger a coat like this would cost? Well, right now you can get this coat for half the cost of an ordinary one."

What can you put on your site to get people involved? Things to click, push, watch, explore...like that?

What do you think about my adsense location?  Do you think it is a deal breaker?  Maybe its not worth the extra few dollars a month?  Ill probably let it run for a while and see what happens.

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-Michael B. Thompson-

Signature Style.NET

I don`t know much about adsense...we don`t use it. Perhaps someone else can answer this. :-)

I took a sales course once and the main theme from the instructor was, "make them want the pen!" The idea was that in order to get someone to sign the contract you had to have an attractive pen that people want to touch and write with. Sounds crazy but it worked. We all went out and bought expensive pens the next day. On your site you should start with pens and end with pens, maybe some examples of great penmanship such as John Hancock but first and foremost pictures of great pens.

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Get Out of Debt

Adsense ads are for content sites. If I go to your site and see ads for products other than what you`re selling then I think you really don`t believe in your products or you`re doing so poorly that you have to supplement with ads. Ecommerce and ads don`t mix.

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Get Out of Debt

Good pionts.  Thank you.  The asdsence are gone.    Now Ill spend the next week straightening up since I just learned how to remove the blue borders from the images.

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-Michael B. Thompson-

Signature Style.NET

I`m no graphics artist but here`s my two cents:

1.  I`d move the search box from the top of the page (because I think it looks strange there) to the right side of the page on the same line as your navigation links

2.  I would add links to products you carry on the home page as opposed to listing them on the Pens page

3.  If you keep the Pens page, I would make the images of the pens links to the respective pages

4.  On the Contact Us page, the form is too wide

5.  I don`t care for the Suggested Websites page - they don`t seem to add any value to your site and you`re giving customers a way to leave your site.  Also there should be a unified font

6.  Each of your pages seems to have a different layout theme.  I`d try to make the pages look more consistent

7.  On the related Articles page, I`d get rid of the Office Live link (adds no value)

8.  I`m using Firefox on a mac and your telephone # is chopped and I can`t see the last 2 digits

Good luck with your site!

Thank you. I do need to work on those points.  I use office live and some things I just cant change.  Office live also doesnt work very well with firefox.  I had to redo my pages to be real simple for them to look somewhat ok in firefox.

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-Michael B. Thompson-

Signature Style.NET

LOL! Funny....but I`ve had exactly the same gripe in reverse. I use Nvu to create pages that work just fine in all sorts of way, except with Internet Explorer. IE screws up everything because it fails completely to accept standard, Web-standard coding.

I wonder if Microsoft actually tries to be different from the entire rest of the world. Ya think?