Articles in The 'lead generation' Tag

Keep Your Visitors On Your Site!

by Marni Weinberg

With the Online Marketing Arena growing every single day, it had become increasingly important to not only market your website efficiently and effectively, but also to keep your visitors as engaged as possible once they have reached your site. Amidst a tough economic climate, every dollar counts and competition is fierce. This is true for all types of sites: Lead Generation, E-Commerce, etc. Whether you are doing SEM in the main search engines: Google, Yahoo, MSN, and/or SEO, where you have spent the time, money and energy to garner a coveted organic piece of real estate, you ought to do everything in your power to keep your visitor long enough to see what you’re about. Even better, to complete an action item (i.e. request a brochure, fill out a form, make a purchase, etc).
 
You might be asking yourself the question, “Well, how do I get them to stay on my site???” Here are a few helpful tips:
 
Offer clear action items at no cost or commitment: Newsletter Signups, Whitepaper Downloads, Brochure Requests, Online Forms to receive coupons, discounts, special offers, etc.
 
Have fresh and unique content. Visitors will be more likely to remain on your site if they are reading verbiage they have never read before. A blog is a great tool to deliver updated, relevant content on your website. Press Releases are extremely beneficial, as well.
 
SEO, SEO and yes, more SEO. Search Engine Optimization is a critical piece of the puzzle for any website. If you optimize your site correctly for the keywords and phrases you are seeking positions on, you have a much better chance of generating organic traction in the engines. It will not happen overnight, but the sooner you get started, the sooner you will reap the benefits.
 
KISS. Keep it simple stupid. 🙂 Make it seamless for your visitors to navigate and enjoy their experience. I cannot tell you how many sites take forever to load, have broken images, it’s virtually impossible to request a brochure; the phone number might as well be invisible, etc.

Get Social! By this, I am referring to Social Media. If you are not utilizing Social Media, you should be. Organically, the internet is a social platform, which is just one of the many reasons why online marketing is so effective. Encouraging participation on your site will allow your visitors to stay longer and also help boost your organic results.

Having Site Analytics is not an option; it is a must. Implementing analytics will afford you the ability to see what your visitors are doing once they reach your site. Are they staying long enough to download a whitepaper or request more information? Or, are they bouncing off the site without even seeing more than one page?

Being seen is not enough. Your website must “speak” to your audience; give them a reason to stay AND more importantly, COME BACK.

Does your website speak correctly to your audience?

by Marni Weinberg

So you have a beautiful website. It’s aesthetically appealing; the color scheme is bright and attractive, the images stimulating and the navigation easy to use. It seems to have all the right ingredients, however, is your (beautiful) website getting the right message across to your visitors?

As part of my role as a Client Strategist at MoreVisibility, I work with a variety of clients from large corporations to small businesses, from Ecommerce to Lead Generation. I often look at their sites from a user’s perspective to provide tips to help them achieve better results. There are many sites I see on a daily basis that are quite amazing to look at, but lack the necessary components to get the visitor to the desired end result. Whether that end result is a completed transaction, online form, or request for more information, it is critical that your site speak correctly to your audience. What does that mean exactly? Here are a few examples:

If your site has Ecommerce functionality, more than likely your goal is for your visitors to make a purchase. You will want to ensure that it is almost effortless to find exactly what your customers are looking for and efficiently go through your shopping cart process; the less clicks to get there, the better. If someone is searching for a specific pair of shoes, send them to that page, rather than having to search around. Don’t make it mandatory to create an account; make it an option.

If your site is designed to generate leads, you should be looking to capture as much information from your searchers in an effort you are obtaining valuable leads. Having a clear call to action form on your site is the first step. The form page should be clean and concise with only the necessary information required. The form should be followed with a confirmation or Thank You page to signify that the form was filled out, information is on the way and/or a representative from your company will be in touch (it is helpful to notate the timeframe here. i.e. within 24 hours, etc)

Keep in mind that your website is a representation of you and your company! While it should obviously look beautiful, it is imperative that you get your correct message across simultaneously!

Tracking Phone Leads

by MoreVisibility

As an SEM client strategist of several lead generation clients, I often get caught up in the hustle and bustle of trying to generate as many leads as possible and finding the best method of tracking those leads. Tools such as Google Analytics have made the process a lot easier by embedding a tracking code in the source code of every page. The code tracks the user throughout the site and allows the marketer to see: the user’s activity, how long they spent on the site, how many pages of the site they viewed before exiting, what geographic location the visitor is in, and of course who converts by completing a “goal” on the site. Typically, the main “goal” for lead generation sites, is getting the visitor to fill out some sort of “Contact Us” or “Request More Information” form. This is an easy method to track because we can code the form and set up the confirmation page as a “goal” within the Google Analytics interface.

That being said, a lot of people visit sites to get a phone number because they would prefer to talk to someone directly. As you can imagine, tracking a phone call is not as easy as tracking an online form, but it is doable. Here are some methods to consider if tracking your phone calls would be of value to you.

1. Unique Phone Numbers – If you are participating in CPC campaigns, send the traffic to a landing page that has a unique phone number. If you have access to several unique phone numbers, a step further would be to allocate one unique phone number per search engine that you are running traffic in. This will allow you to effectively track phone calls that are coming from Google, Yahoo, MSN, etc.
2. Pay For Call – There are several vendors that offer a Pay for Call Service. Superpages & Ingenio are two in particular that will give you a unique phone number to use for your ad/listing.
3. Test Unique Phone Number in Ad Copy- If you have a unique phone number, you can test it within the ad copy displayed on a search engine results page. It might slow down the number of clicks, but would be a good way to see who chooses to call instead of going to the site for more information.

Phone calls can be a valid source of leads, and often the most qualified. Most companies are very proud and confident in the product and/or service that they are offering. Therefore, most feel that if someone is interested enough to call about the product and/or service, they can definitely be sold from speaking with someone directly. The main obstacle from receiving phone leads, is the ability to track where the leads came from. Many companies participate in multi-media marketing plans such as: television, radio, print, direct mail, online, etc. Therefore, unless the sales rep specifically asks the individual where they “heard about the company”, there is no way of knowing where the lead truly came from. That being said, if you test one of the three methods mentioned above, you will potentially gain some insight into the source of your phone leads.