Shocking Event Web Site Stat - Most People Only Visit Once
A common misconception of event planners and organizers is that people are religiously visiting their event web site. As a result, event organizers continuously update their sites with new content . . . in some cases it becomes an obsession.
In my humble opinion, their efforts and resources are being wasted. Don’t get me wrong, updating your web site with relevant and timely content is very important. Keep in mind - event web sites aren’t like news web site.
People don’t come back multiple times a day to check for updates on an event web site. Consider the following . . .
Recently I crunched Google Analytics stats for 11 very different web sites spanning a 13 month period. The web statistics were drawn from a variety of industry segments. (Three of the sites were event web sites.) Traffic numbers from these sites were anywhere from a few hundred visitors a month all the way up to 24,000+ visitors a month. After the data was compiled, there was one shocking statistic that stood out . . . 71.67% of people visited these web sites ONLY ONCE! A stunning 86.11% of people visited these web sites THREE TIMES or LESS. There might be some slight variances to the previous statistics, depending on industry, but it’s something you should mind carefully. Most people are only visiting your event web site once. You don’t have to take my word for it! Take a look at your own web stats. Look under the Visitor Loyalty tab in Google Analytics and select the Loyalty link. Most event organizers never consider the visitor loyalty when they look at their web statistics.
What are You Doing to Capture Their Info?
If a majority of people are visiting your web site only once, you need to do something to capture their information. By capturing the user information of your target market, you have a powerful tool to lead people back to your web site. A qualified target list of prospects is also a tremendous asset for selling advance sale tickets to your event. The easiest starting point is attempting to collect a visitor’s first me and email address. Don’t focus on quantity, but quality. Take a look at the resources section below for additional information.
Those Annoying Pop-Ups
You might want to test a pop-up to collect visitor information. A note on annoying pop-ups . . . they’re only annoying when you’re popping up information that’s irrelevant to the person visit your site. That was always to problem with old school pop-up advertising. Present a value based proposition that the visitor actually cares about and the pop-up stops becoming an annoyance.
Knowing that most people only visit your web site once gives you the opportunity to do something about it. My strong recommendation is to try and collect email addresses right on your home page. To many people the recommendation probably seems highly counter-intuitive, but it works amazing well. Building a targeted list of prospects and then market to that list is the closest thing to an event marketing silver bullet.
Want to get more great info? Check out the articles below:
Event Web Statistics:
- Web User Traffic Trends to Your Event Web Site
- The Timing of Your Event Promotion
- Hold Your Event Marketing Accountable!
- Reading the User's Mind and Then Doing Nothing About It
- Web Page Statistics - "Hits" versus Visitors
List Building Articles:
- Event Marketing: Start Building Your List Early
- Automatically Generate Leads for Your Event Year Round
- Keeping Your Event List Engaged
- Don't Neglect Your Email List
- Event Marketing: Multiple Ways to Engage Your List
- Simple Customer List Building Suggestions
- Start Building Your List Early
- Late Event Promotion - Big List Growth
- Building Your List Above the Fold
- Are You Opting-In Above the Fold?
- Form Placement and Growing Your List
- Turn Your Event Into an Experience
- The Event Promotion System
Get Your Free Event Promotion & Marketing Video Training
I find it effective to have an easy sign up button for a newsletter or updates whenever you have an event website. I do agree that only a few people every visit your site more than once. I've also experienced that if you have too many lengthy or complicated fields that an attendee must complete to subscribe to your list, the chances of them signing up and finishing that form are slim. Make it simple, convenient, and easy.
Posted by: Pete Russelle | 09/24/2010 at 00:54