Event Marketing Articles and Event Promotion

Online Coupons and Discounts

Have You Considered Using a Coupon or Discount lately?

No discussion on internet marketing would be complete if you didn't bring up the topic of Coupons and Discounts. Coupons and discounts are a great way to get users to take action online.  The action could be anything from signing up to an ezine subscriber list to giving additional incentive to buy a product or service. In spite of a coupon’s versatility few businesses choose to make use of them. Almost anyone can use coupons to drive sales, track marketing effectiveness, and create lifetime value customers.

Coupons are a Waste, Right?
A few years ago I tried to convince a client to provide coupons to his customers.  The client is involved in the restaurant business. Up until that point in time he considered any type of coupon a bad.  I still remember his response to my original coupon suggestion, “what happens when people make copies and there are thousands of coupons floating around?!?!?”  I would argue that’s a great problem for any business.

Correct Pricing
A number of business owners think coupons and discounts are a money losing proposition.  If you’re loosing money on coupons or discounts, you’re doing something wrong.  The proper pricing of the product or service needs to be done with discounting in mind from the beginning.  If you set your price point intentionally high, you can avoid dipping into your profits.

Tracking Marketing Effectiveness
Coupons can also be used to track individual marketing efforts.  Have you ever checked out of an online store and entered a promotional code or discount coupon?  That is most likely tied back to a well thought out marketing campaign.  Consider using a free consultation (coupon) as a way to lure perspective leads.

Creating Lifetime Value Customers
You can’t look at the single transaction as the ultimate indication of success.  Too many business owners think in terms of “If I could just get each person to buy X.” The question that needs to be asked is what is the value of your customer over time?  The value of a one time sale is minimal, the value of a lifetime customer is massive. Coupons can be used to assist you in creating lifetime value customers.

Use coupons to drive sales beyond just one transaction. Coupons should be part of your long term strategy.

Others Do the Work, You Save Money

In the Think Big, Start Small post I suggested the idea of an online field trip to find web site concepts that might be applicable to your own web site. Some of the most successful web sites borrowed their ideas from some other site. For whatever reason, people have a pressing need to reinvent the wheel on the Internet.  It costs money to reinvent the wheel.  In many cases you can find a web site that is doing reasonably well, borrow some of their ideas and do even better.  The process allows almost anyone to save time and money on their web project. 

Looking At The Competition
A few years ago I headed up a usability study for a local private school that services the deaf and hard of hearing.  Part of the usability study focused on looking at the client’s competition and similar topical web sites.  The information derived from analyzing other web sites was tremendously helpful.  It allowed the client and the developer to integrate user approved concepts thereby reducing project time and cost.

Direct Marketing Methodology
The same methodology is used in the direct marketing field on a regular basis.  Most of the great copywriters encourage their students to collect junk mail.  Companies pay top dollar to create advertising campaigns that most people classify as junk mail.  If you can clue into the successful campaigns (those that run often) you might be able to integrate some of the ideas.  It takes time but is well worth the effort.   

Where to Start
The process is very straightforward. Find web sites that offer a similar product or service to your own.  Those will be the sites that you’ll look to gather information from. Take into consideration the factors such as user demographics and the size of a site as it relates to your site. 

You can conduct the testing on your own or make use of family or friends.  Consider looking to users outside your organization to conduct testing. People outside the organization traditionally have less bias as it related to your company or product.

Likes and Dislikes
Ask people to identify their likes and dislikes on the competing or similar web sites.  Make a list of your findings. Are there any ideas or concepts that you might be able to improve upon?

It is important to emulate as opposed to creating an exact copy. There are still copyright laws that need to be observed.

You can save a significant amount of money and time on development costs by emulating others.  There is nothing wrong with taking someone's idea and expanding it or modifying it.  It is the essence of the Internet.  Almost everyone is a copy cat.

Start Small, Think Big

“I want a better looking web site!”  That is one of top comments I hear when companies look to rebuild or redesign their web site. Far too many companies waste a ridiculous amount of money on web sites that fail to bring a return on investment.  At the same time, companies and individuals with far less money for their web site make the mistake of investing in their wants versus their needs. You’re better off concentrating on your needs first.  You can save a significant amount of money and time by investing a few hours to think through what your web site needs to accomplish before starting any work.  There is no need to build the biggest and best web site right from the beginning. Below are some simple questions and suggestions.

Beyond Visual Design
Don’t make the mistake of over focusing on a web site’s visual appearance.  This isn’t to suggest a web site should be devoid of design.  There needs to be a consistent look and feel that’s easy to navigate.  Too many companies overemphasize a web site’s visual design.  There are individual with simple one and two page web sites that do six and seven figures in revenue annually.  Their web sites are visually bland and they have no programming skills.

All the Eggs In One Basket
A number of companies insist on vesting themselves heavily in web sites.  Web sites offer just one marketing channel.  Yes, web sites are great at automating some tasks but they aren’t a magic bullet.  Do you have an offline process for marketing and doing business?  If all your eggs are on the Internet, you are limit yourself.

Take an Online Field Trip
What does your web site need to accomplish? Get a piece of paper and start to jot down some notes.  Do you have any competitors in your market place?  Visit their web sites and write down your likes and dislikes.  Are they doing something particularly well that you could “re-purpose” on your web site. You can modify something that an existing company is already successfully utilizing. Most web sites build off what others have already done.

Interaction and Conversion Is Key
At a minimum a web site should give your users the ability to interact with you.  Make sure that you can drive traffic to your site and that it has some sort of conversion process in place.  Remember, most people come to a web site never to return.  Is your web site Sticky?

What Is Your Web Site Worth?
A web site’s worth comes down to a number of factors beyond just cost.  In what ways can you use your web site to reduce costs, increase revenue, and save time? With some simple math you can approximate cost and time savings, plus forecast additional revenue.

There are a plethora of additional factors.  Hopefully what’s listed above will get you at least thinking beyond “something that looks better” when you are rebuilding or starting a new web site.

Keeping Email Marketing in Perspective

In a previous post, “A Simple Way To Sell More,” I explored the importance of delivering value in every email you send.  Delivering value is a critical element in any sort of email marketing campaign.  Today I’ll look a little more into email list performance, tracking, and some other simple suggestions. 

Delivery Tracking
Make sure if you are sending emails you employ some type of delivery tracking.  Most people would be surprised how many companies DON’T utilize some sort of tracking for their email campaigns.  Many companies assume that just because they send an email that users open everything they receive.  It is critical from a marketing perspective to employ some sort of performance tracking on your emails

Email Open Rates
Recently I looked at open rates for all my clients who do email marketing and asked friends to submit their data.  Of almost 70 separate emails broadcasts sent to permission based opt-in lists the approximate average open rate was around 40%.  The data isn’t to discourage people from email marketing, but to give perspective.  One of the biggest shocks to clients is seeing how few people are opening emails. It is important to keep expectation grounded in the reality.  Nobody gets 100% of their subscriber list to open an email.

Home Grown
The best email list is the one you grow yourself.  There are lists that you can purchase, but you are better served building your own.  Always think in terms of the user’s perspective. Users won’t sign up to an email list that isn’t of at least some interest to them.  Focus on your target market and giving them a good reason to sign up.  Also make sure you properly advise your list subscribers on how to setup their SPAM filters.  You wouldn’t want them unintentionally blocking your email.

List Size - Quality Versus Quantity
You need to keep the highest quality list possible. Too many list owners focus on the size of their list compared to the quality of their list. You’re better off with a smaller list of interested readers who are excited to dive into your offers.

The Copy Factor
The more I read, learn, and experience, the more credence I give to good copy writing.  I would argue that the single most important factor to any email marketing campaign is the ability to create compelling copy.  Regardless of how nice the pictures, users need words to give perspective and incentive.  Headline, benefits, and a call to action are just a few things to keep in mine.  The importance of copy is a lesson few ad agencies and graphic designs truly understand.

Email Marketing is an important step for keeping in contact with customers and clients.  But it is only one facet of an overall marketing campaign.  Make sure you diversify your marketing both online and off.

Two Click Usability and SEO

A number of web sites unintentionally bury their best content.  In some cases users might completely miss the most important content a web site has to offer. This usability challenge can also have a significant impact on e-commerce web sites. Companies and web site owners need to ask themselves: “Is the content on my web site easy for users to access?” Less clicks can also help you with your search engine optimization efforts.

Below are some simple suggestions for making sure you best content is getting to the user:

The Two Click Suggestion
One usability suggestion is making sure important content is no more than two clicks away.  Users should be able to access most of your pages without having to click more than two times.  The ‘two click’ suggestion is also applicable for search engine optimization purposes.  Most spiders will only crawl web sites so deep before they stop.

Let the User Decide
Another helpful way to determine what content is most important to the user is by looking at your log files. Think of your log files as an informal voting system.  In many cases the users choose pages or article that a web site owner wouldn’t have considered important. Use the log files to your advantage.

Questions to Ask:

• Are there individual pages or article that get a comparatively large proportion of requests?
  
  
• Are there pages or article you believe to be important that are being missed by users? 

Using Anchor Links in Each Page
You can use HTML anchor links within each page to point related pages on your web site.  If a user is interested in the related information they might be apt to click on the link.  Keyword targeted HTML anchor links also help search engines to better index your web site.  If you can't integrate HTML anchor links into your body content, consider placing them at the bottom of each page.

Getting Big With Blogs
One web site format that offers a surprising amount of versatility and usability is a Blog.  A Blog's hierarchy is a great way of organizing web sites that have a large number of individual pages. Blogs are usually categorize by topic area and in most cases archived by date.  A Blog format isn’t for every web site, but that doesn’t mean you can adopt some of the information architecture related to categorizing content.

Blogs also have Search Engine spiders have a much easier time crawling Blogs because HTML links.  If you choose the right keywords and topic areas, you stand to get better indexing in the search engines.

It is in the best interest of almost every web site to keep content as easy to access as possible.  When good content becomes difficult to reach it makes it tremendously difficult to create a sticky web site. It is not only good for the usability of your web site, but it is also good for your bottom line.

A Simple Way To Sell More

Over the past few years I’ve been doing a decent number of electronic newsletters (ezines) for clients. One of the hardest things to get any client to understand and incorporate is the concept of delivering value before asking for a sale.  The concept isn’t just limited to electronic newsletters.  It can be anything from the sales process used by a company to a sales letter or email. 

A History Lesson
Last year I worked on an electronic newsletter project that was visually spectacular. The ezine contained a number of articles that were loosely related to their company’s areas of expertise. There were two offers displayed within the ezine for services the company provides.  Much to the client's dismay the ezine failed to provide any leads or sale.  The client sent the ezine once and has yet to send another almost a year later.  This is a typical scenario for many companies.

Those Who Win
At the same time there are people who generate thousands of dollars each month via their electronic newsletter or sending a sales letter via snail mail.  One of the big differences is that those who are successful with their newsletters place an emphasis on delivering value first and asking for a sale later.  In some cases the successful people ask for the sale much later.

An Abundance of Value
Dr. Joe “Mr. Fire” Vitale has a great standard that he uses when it comes to delivering value to your user base.  He suggests providing your user base with 95% information and 5% sales pitch.  I completely agree with his statement.  The concept of delivering value also plays into trust and credibility.  Regardless of how compelling the offer, perspective consumers buy from you if there isn’t a high level of trust and credibility.  When you provide value you raise the level of trust and credibility.

Whom to Buy From
Who would you rather buy from?  Someone who pushes an offer in front of you every opportunity they get, or someone who your trust and they go out of their way to provide you value first? Always provide the client with value several times over, before asking for the sale.  It can be a difficult concept to integrate, but eventually leads to a great return on investment.

Additional Resource:

• The Value of Free Information
• What is the Perceived Value?

 

Finer Typography Points

As a follow up to last week’s post Watch Your Typography, I came across an article getting into research around the use of typefaces and readability. The article points to research conducted by the Wichita State University Software Usability Research Laboratory.  The research provided given some scientific insight into user interaction with type. 

Marketing Sherpa Article Excerpt …

"Web surfers like Times New Roman and read it roughly as quickly as a sans serif font. So the "sans serif is better online because people read it more quickly" argument many Web designers have tried out on me isn't true all the time.

Researchers almost invariably used type in 10 or 12 point size for the reading comprehension tests. Few seem to have tested much smaller fonts, such as 8 or 9, mainly because they assumed that small wouldn’t be a good idea (i.e., no one will be dumb enough to put type that small, so why test it?).

Researchers also didn’t test color type such as pale gray vs black on white. Again, I assume because they knew from offline type tests anything that's not black on white is harder to read, so what Web designer would think putting body copy in other colors is a good idea?"

Source: Typefaces that Work Best Online - Marketing Sherpa

The most important thing to remember is to design and test for a specific web site’s demographic. It's easy to forget your demographic when something looks cool.

Always Under Construction

How can a web site annoy a user in 5 seconds or less?  By presenting the user with a page that contains the words “under construction.” During the pioneering days of the Internet it was almost impossible to run across a page on a daily basis that didn’t say “under construction.  Thankfully most companies have abandoned the practice of tagging their incomplete pages with the “under construction.” Yet there are enough sites that contain those infamous words to dedicate a post to the issue. 

One area where the under construction plague runs rampant is on personal web sites. If you do a search for “under construction” in Google and you get 52 million results.  There are a few steps any web site can take to overcome the usability issues created by always being under construction.

Users Seek Immediate Content
The problem with most under construction pages is they don’t present the user with any compelling content.  There might be the occasional “stop back soon for updates,” but users rarely go back to the site.  Remember the user’s mindset when they surf the Internet.  If you can’t provide users with information they’ll find it elsewhere.  User attention span is measured in seconds.

What Can Be Done
In many cases you don't need to use an under construction page. Any changes on a web site should be done near instantaneously or in the background. Depending on the versatility of your navigation consider disabling individual web pages or sections that don’t contain any content.  Consider posting a temporary page with some content.

Try not to leave pages blank. From an SEO standpoint pages with little or no content have almost no search value.    As opposed to presenting the user with an “under construction” page, present a temporary page with some relevant content.  Some content is far better than no content. Give the user a sneak peak of what is coming or use the page to build some anticipation.  Just make sure the anticipation isn’t carried out for too long.

Be sure to include good contact information if you’re using temporary home page. What a page lacks in content can be made up with an offer to communicate. Encourage users to contact you if they have any questions.  Keep the emphasis on customer service.

The Internet is always under construction.  Posting a sign to point out the obvious doesn’t help users. Keep the emphasis on presenting the user with some content or the ability to assist them in some fashion.

Additional Resource:

• Starting on the Internet, Slowly

Money Saving Advertising Question

Last week I had an interesting business experience.  Someone tried selling me advertising in a local print publication.  As part of their sales pitch they gave me a number compelling reasons to consider in an attempt to get me to advertise with them. After they finished their presentation I asked a very fair question which quickly resulted in the salesperson getting upset with me and abandoning me as a prospect.  Over the years I found the question to be a simple yet effective way for staying clear of advertising that might not fit your product or service.

Guaranteed Success?
To be fair, no form of advertising can provide you with guaranteed ROI.  One of the most difficult tasks is being able to effectively track the ROI performance of traditional advertising.  The percentage of “keyed” ads for traditional marketing like radio or print is fairly low.  The ultimate responsibility of effective advertising falls on the company or person actually producing the ad.  If an ad doesn’t contain critical elements including a well thought out USP and call to action it is going to be difficult to be successful. It doesn’t matter how many impressions a media channel can guarantee.

The Question To Ask . . .
You can ask the question for almost any type of advertising: television, radio, print, billboards, online, etc. Direct the question to the person trying to sell you advertising.  Ask them “Can you give me a few references of companies who advertise (or have advertised) with you selling similar products or services to my own?  I would like to ask them some questions related to their ROI.” It’s a fair and honest question.  If a company can’t provide you with a few advertising references why buy advertising from them?  The question isn't meant to discourage businesses from advertising.  It's to discourage people from getting into the wrong advertising.

Watch Your Typography

Have you ever misinterpreted something that should have been completely obvious?  Earlier today I was out for a meal with my friend Mike.  When it comes to typography Mike, the graphic designer, is always one to take notice of the finer details.  Graphic designers have a unique perspective when it comes to anything involving design. After quickly taking notice of something unusual, Mike asked me to read an ad from the placemat in front of me. It was a great lesson in the art of typography.  "With great power there must also come great responsibility" said Uncle Ben to Peter Parker. The analogy can be used for how type is displayed.  Anyone can completely change the meaning or feel of a group of words just by using a different type of placement, font, or style.

Would Your Pet Enjoy “Jail”?
Upon first glance the ad reads “Happy Jails Pet Grooming.” Somehow I can’t imagine many people enthused to take their beloved pet to “Happy Jails Pet Grooming.” This is a classic example of how something as simple as a font can change people’s visual interpretation of advertising.  Because of the font used a many people read “Tail” as “Jail.” To make sure the misinterpretation wasn’t a fluke I tested the ad with a few other friends later in the evening.  They also read the ad as “Happy Jails Pet Grooming.”   

The More Eyes the Merrier
If you’re going to run advertising online or offline always get someone else to double check your work.  There are numerous times when a designer or a company interprets their work one way and the public interprets something completely different.  This mentality has lead to more than a few failed advertising campaigns over the years.  Always test your advertising with the public before going public.  A few people can quickly identify something that isn’t obvious to you or your company.  Use their feedback to make any necessary corrections.  When it comes to advertising and marketing, get out of your ego and into the customer’s ego.   

Additional Resource:

• Proofing Your Work on Paper

Web Copy Arguement: Short or Long?

Opposite Sides of the Fence
How many times have you visited a web site and found the text to be long winded? There is a fine line between long winded copy and compelling copy.  This subject area is one place where direct marketing principals and usability somewhat conflict with one another.  Each discipline has its advantages and you can use both to your advantage. 

The Web Usability Argument
From a usability standpoint you should try to keep your copy as short and concise as possible.  Make sure that the copy is easy to get through for the user.  Use bullet points and short simple sentences.  That’s always been good standards from the web usability world.  Years ago, when I first came across some of the long copy web sites it was easy to point out all the usability issues.  A few years later I’m left questioning some of my own standards.

The Direct Marketing Argument
As a result of first hand experience, I've seen the virtues of long copy.  It goes against some usability standards, specifically those that call upon web site owners to keep their copy short and to the point.
It’s difficult to argue against results.  One person I know has a long copy web site and he’s doing tremendously well.  He is one of many whom I’ve studied.  How can you argue against long copy if helps you build an email database of over 40,000 opt-in email addresses and over a hundred thousand dollars in revenue in a few short years?

Another fun Dan Kennedy example to drive home the point …
”I was once having lunch with a client of mine and with a guy who was trying to sell my client on joining a new advertising co-op. The co-op guy spent ten minutes criticizing my client’s current ad, telling him it was too cluttered, had too much copy, and so on. When he finally shut up, my client innocently responded: Well, maybe you’re right. It only pulls an eight-times return on investment.”

Source: Kennedy, The Ultimate Marketing Plan

Looks Lousy, But Performs Like a Champ

I can’t help but come back to this conclusion time and time again: some of the most successful web sites are visual bombs.  These visually unappealing web sites usually follow a systematic method which includes a specific focus on proven direct marketing principles.  When you ask most companies what they'd look to improve with their web site, the most prevalent answer is: "We need to make it look better." Few web site owners or companies say "we need to find a better way to generate leads or increase our online conversion rate."  What is your online litmus test for success?

Flashy Air Show Web Sites
One industry that is very visually oriented when it comes to web sites is the air show industry. There are some extraordinary looking web sites produced by very talented artists. Yet, I honestly question weather most of the flash and dash air show web sites bring their owners an appreciable ROI. Yes you should look good, but at the cost of increased sales or marketing potential?

Stay Marketing Focused
Most web site owners are better vested in spending more time focusing on sound sales and marketing principles as opposed to focusing too much on the visuals. Dan Kennedy has some very interesting viewpoints as it applied advertising and marketing:  “Some of the most productive, profitable advertising and marketing in the history of the planet could never qualify for any of the awards.  Much of the best marketing gets its results in an ugly way.”

Kennedy also points out some of the challenges faced by most web sites. “Most web sites are designed by techno-geeks and/or graphic artists who are not sales people. They do not know how to sell. They do not know when they are disrupting or destroying the selling process with their technological bells and whistles.”

It isn’t about what a web site looks like, it’s what the site can accomplish.  Is your web site generating good leads for your business and helping sell your products or services? That should be the ultimate question for any business oriented web site.

Getting The Best Info – First!

One of the great things the Internet offers is the ability to share information almost instantaneously.  If you have an RSS (Rich Site Summary / Real Simple Syndication) reader you can get web site updates as soon as they’re published. You can educate yourself quicker and faster, provided the information is legitimate. The topic of online legitimacy was covered in a previous post: How Accurate Is Online Information? One of the largest online information hurdles is determining what information is good and which should be ignored. 

Anyone Can Become an Expert
Today anyone can buy a domain and have a web site up and running within a few minutes.  This allows people to publish worldwide at little or no cost.  Online information can be used to control and create either positive or negative outcomes.  There have been presidential elections impacted by what a person posted on their Blog. In the last US presidential election a Blogger challenged the traditional media when it came to President Bush’s military records.  How many times have you received an email or been given a link to an article that’s supposedly legitimate? A few minutes later someone is trumpeting around the office with the “shocking news” they received. Unfortunately all the junk floating around dilutes the credibility of the legitimate information.   

It’s Online First
Provided the information you find can be legitimized there is some great info to be found online.  Top experts write some of the most up to date information on their Blogs before any information gets published in traditional mediums.  If you’re reading it in a book, chances are the information is at least 6 months to a year old.  Some of the best information I get is directly from Blogs I believe to be highly credible.

There are reasonable steps anyone can take to make sure the information they’re getting is legitimate.  This allows you to be at the forefront of new and helpful information.

Ask yourself the following questions in regards to the information you find online:

• How long has the web site been operating?
• What are the author’s credentials and experience?
• Is the author of the web site or Blog published elsewhere?
• Is the web site updated on a regular basis?
• Does the information come from a .gov or .edu extension?
• Has the author been featured as a keynote speaker?
• Does the web site provide good contact details?
• Is the information presented in a balanced and objective manner?
• With what organizations is the author or web site affiliated?

Be vigilant in making sure you’re getting the best information possible.  Below is a short list of Blogs that I trust and visit on a regular basis:

• SethGodin’s Blog
• SEOBook.com
• ChaosScenario
• Firetop
• Seomoz.org
• ShoeMoney
• DIYCashFlow
• CopyBlogger

Radio versus Pay Per Click: Snapshot

This is a follow up to last week’s radio advertising post.  That post revolved around a buzz marketing web site, Pony-Hawk.com. Because of the short run of the project the following information should be considered more of a casual observation as opposed to any type of definitive and tested evidence.  One of the most intriguing findings was the difference of radio impact versus the performance of a simple PPC campaign.

To My Surprise
I thought that having the web site pushed on a local FM radio station with tens of thousands of listeners would result in more web traffic.  The premise and content were an ideal match for the station’s demographic.  It was mentioned on the radio at least three times during the morning hours and then numerous other times during the day. The associated graph shows the start of radio coverage and resulting traffic.  The highlighted numbers represent web site visitor counts.

PPC Numbers
The PPC (Pay Per Click) campaign was run with a budget of $5.00 per day and bidding on two keywords, sanjaya and pony-hawk, in Google Adwords.  A number one position could be bought for 4-5 cents per click.  $4.80 delivered an average click through rate of approximately 2% on 6300 impressions and approximately 113 visitors. The PPC campaign was started after the noon hour.

One thing to keep in mind is that the site had not been indexed by search engines.  This made organic search engine optimization extremely difficult and an Adwords PPC campaign the first choice.

The entire process gets me interested in comparing and contrasting a well implemented radio advertising campaign with a pay per click campaign.  Every web site owner should understand the importance and usage of basic web analytics to track and measure advertising impact.

Additional Resource:

• Radio Advertising: What You Ought To Know

Using A Little Sex Appeal

Vincent Flanders, who authored Web Pages That Suck, came up with a quote years ago that sums up what people will wait around for online: “If you've got a picture of a naked body -- hey, people will wait forever.”  This was especially the case in the days of the dial up Internet.  Today a large number of users have high speed access and they are impatient as ever, but they’ll still wait and give you their attention courtesy of a little sex appeal. Sex appeal can’t be applied to every web site, but some companies have found a way to take advantage of it and still stay classy. 

An Unexpected Fortuitous Disaster
We all know that sex appeal can have a significant impact on getting attention to a web site.  One of the first mass web broadcasts in Internet history came courtesy of Victoria’s Secret.  They attempted to do a live online broadcast of one of their fashion shows.  Superbowl advertising was bought to promote the online broadcast.  Most people who tried to log on to watch the live web cast weren’t able to log on. From a technology perspective it was a massive failure. 

At the same time, the technological fiasco turned out to be a stroke of marketing genius.  The Victoria Secret web site was flooded with traffic after people couldn’t access the event.  The show was later posted online driving even more traffic to the Victoria Secret web site.

A Real World Example
One web site that makes use of sex appeal tastefully presented is Yahoo’s “THE 9.”  Host Maria Sansone strikes a good balance that appeals to both men and women. The video format and interactivity make it an easy winner with users. Somehow I don't think that Barbara Walters would have as much success as Maria enjoys online.  The appeal needs to be a good match for the audience and the medium.

It isn’t for every site, but the benefit of a little sex appeal can send significant traffic to a web site.  There are a number of tasteful choices.  The hard part is finding a good one.

When They Have To Hit Submit

Today I’m going to briefly approach the submit button from a trust and credibility standpoint with some added usability added to the mix.  It is possible for one simple thing like the submit button to have a noticeable impact on a web site.  There are many times when a developer will take for granted the placement and implementation of a submit button.  This article stemmed from a client expressing their opinion on the poor implementation of an online form during a recent review meeting.  There are certain factors that can be addressed to make it easier for a user to submit.

Placement
The placement of a search or submit button can impact click through rates for form submission.  Regardless of the logic of placing a submit button at the end of a form, the bottom might not always be a logical place.  In some instances it might be beneficial to think logically before thinking visually in regards to submission button placement.

Where does the information go?
One question that comes up during usability studies that involve submission forms is “where does the information go after I hit submit?”  Users are particularly sensitive when they are filling out personal information.  Let the user know exactly where their information is being sent. 

Privacy Policy
Another piece of information you should nest near the submit button is a privacy or SPAM policy.  Make users feel more comfortable by ensuring the user that their privacy and data will be safely protected. Also letting them know they won't be inundated with email might give them more incentive to submit their information.

Give Feedback
After the user hits the submit button let them know that the information has been successfully sent.  This can be as simple as a thank you or acknowledgment page. If you have an autoresponder setup let the user know to check their email.  There have been a few instances when a client inadvertently broke an online form.  The issue wasn’t detected until a few weeks later.  Users are usually the last to know if a form is properly submitting information.   

Is there an alternative option?
There are instances where an online form might stop working.  In some cases the web site owner isn’t aware of the problem.  Always provide the user with an alternative method of submitting information like email or via telephone.   Keep that information near the submit button.  Let the users know there is an alternative.

Always be away of the small things you can do that have a larger impact on the user.  The ability to submit information is an important interactive element to many web sites.  Keep the process simple and provide the user with feedback.

Radio Advertising: What You Ought To Know

Last week I started an interesting project with a friend revolving around buzz marketing. We decided to setup a niche web site for American Idol’s Sanjaya Malakar. The web site focused on Sanjaya’s “Pony-Hawk.” You can visit Pony-Hawk.com for more information.  One of the marketing channels that we had at our disposal was FM radio. We were able to secure a number of “plugs” from a local radio show.  The station we selected was an ideal demographic match for the web site. 

Our project didn’t involve actually buying advertising.  The station agreed to feature the web site a number of times during the morning as part of a cross promotion.  Each time the web site was mentioned the listener was prompted to visit the site.  Pony-Hawk.com led to some interesting observations when it comes to radio advertising.

Compare Ad Run Times with Web Traffic
If you are advertising on a radio station make sure you can get a report of when your ad is broadcast. To my understanding this is something the radio industry will provide clients as part of their advertising package or upon request. Use your web statistics and compare the advertising times with when people are visiting your web site.  Use the correlation to determine a rough return on investment.  It might take a few weeks of advertising to get accurate and good data.

Try To Advertise When People Are Using Their Computers
It’s so easy to forget a domain name by the time you get in front of a computer.  There are also times when you can’t even search for the company or service because the web site isn’t indexed properly.
Try to run radio spots when people are at work or in front of their computers and listening to the radio.  Companies try to dissuade personal internet use during work, but people check the web all the time.  If someone hears an ad and is interested in the product or service, they might be apt to visit the web site.

Some Other Radio Advertising Points To Remember

• Is the domain name easy to remember?
• Is the domain name repeated at least three times during the ad?
• Does the radio add have a USP and call to action?

Our radio results for web site mentions that translated into web site traffic were fairly low.  This isn’t to suggest that radio advertising doesn’t work.  I’m a big believer in consistent messaging across multiple channels.  You can’t just advertise for short period of time expecting big results.  At the same time I don’t believe you should advertise on a medium with no ROI.  You statistical data can help determine if you’re missing the mark.  Dan Kennedy has great advice when it comes to marketing: “get the right message to the right people via the right media and methods.”

Additional Resource:

• Your Domain Name and Radio Advertising

News and a Greater Attention Span

There was an interesting article I found the other day regarding the reading habits of users.  The study compared the reading habits of how people read online versus reading information from traditional media like newspapers.  When users found something of interest to them they tend to read word for word.  This contradicts with the popular web usability notion that users are more apt to skim.  “The EyeTrack07 survey by the Poynter Institute, a Florida-based journalism school, found online readers read 77 percent of what they chose to read while broadsheet newspaper readers read an average of 62 percent, and tabloid readers about 57 percent.” (Goldsmith)

Questions and Bullets
The article supports the traditional usability recommendation to break information into easier to digest chunks and make the information interesting. “People paid more attention to items written in a question and answer format or as lists, and preferred documentary news photographs to staged or studio pictures.” (Goldsmith) Thought provoking questions are a great way to hook the users into your content.

Online Versus Offline
The study also points out some key points of focus being different for online versus offline readers.  In newspapers the readers focused on large headlines and photos. When a reader was on a web site their initial focus was on navigation and story teasers.

What's the Impact?
It will be interested to see how some of the gurus in the usability industry react to the findings. A number of findings reemphasize what current web usability already supports, but there are some counterpoints.  You still need to give the user a good reason to click on an article.  Users aren’t apt to read anything that doesn’t hold their interest or is poorly written either online or offline.

*Source: Web news readers have greater attention span: study