Search Engine Academy of South Carolina

Online you only have a few seconds to capture your visitor attention before they fall victim to “back button syndrome”. It is a big fear of everyone who concentrates on attracting visitors to a web site.   We all fail prey to the disease everyday we use the Internet.

I am sure you all can think of multiple occasions just within the last couple days where you were disappointed, overwhelmed, disillusioned and frustrated at results you got when surfing the net. 

When users come to your site for the first time they immediately want verification that you are delivering what they are looking for – this happens within the first 10 seconds of landing on your site.  In those 10 seconds you must impress, validate and earn their confidence that you are truly offering what they are searching for.

So what can we do to make sure your visitors are staying on your site once they have arrived?  You can break it down into 4 segments and address each one of them on your own site to make sure you are making a great first impression and not creating more “back button syndrome.”

To begin with it is not always about the design of your site but encompasses many factors like SEO, Marketing, Design and Research.

Let’s break down the 4 elements of keeping a visitor on your site.

#1 SEO – The Pathway into Your Site 

There are many different ways someone can come into your site:

They can do a search and find their way in from a search engine results page. -The most powerful way one can capture some ones attention is in the title that shows in the SERP’s (search engine results pages.) The title that you set on your Web page is the same title that normally shows in the SERP’s.  This title is the first impression some one gets of your site before they have even visited it.

Think about the way you search…you type in a keyword phrase into a search bar and you scan the results on the first couple pages.  You make your decision based mainly on what the tile says and you only click through once they have impressed you with the way they have described what you may find on their site.

You need to make your title jump off the page and stand out above all your competitors. 

Your keyword phrase needs to appear in your titled but the clue to improving your click through rates is to include both a benefit and clicking trigger to the equation. 

They can follow a link from a referring site.  -The text that surrounds the linking text that points back to your site goes a long way in building confidence in your site.  If you have industry related Web sites pointing back to your site it is a way of verify your information.

They can find you through paid advertising links. -As the same as your title in the search engine result pages your paid advertising must have a message that stops a web searcher and makes them click on your ad.  Your ad must clearly state what the user will find when clicking through to your site.  Your landing page must deliver what the ad has promised.

#2 – DESIGN 

As soon as visitors first encounter your site, they will form an immediate first impression…usually within the first 10 seconds.  Your goal for these first few seconds is to orient your visitor and make them feel that the site is worth exploring.  Remember you are trying to impress, validate and earn their confidence in them sticking around.  Your ultimate goal is to get them to click on a link and go deeper into your site.

Exciting designs are always a nice visual but unless they engage the visitor to crawl deeper into your site they will immediately suffer from “back button syndrome.” 

Let’s talk about a few design elements that will help in keeping your Web site sticky enough to keep your visitors.

1. Visual – Do your graphics match your target audience?  -Graphics affect the user’s behavior when they first come to your site.  The graphics should clearly portray which ones are interactive and help guide a visitor through your site.  People are generally lazy and need text broken up but related photos or graphics. 
   
2.  Are the colors of your site portraying the right message?  It’s no secret that website color schemes are a vital component of web design. If you’re just beginning to design, I should say that it may become no secret when the website you’re building seems to have the right elements, the design works … but somehow it doesn’t look quite right. It may be that the color scheme is a bit “off”.If so, that’s what your website visitors will perceive. They may not know why, but it won’t look right to them. Thus, website color schemes form a vital part of your visitors’ impression of your website.
   
3. Are your links easy to follow or does it take to long to understand what their next step should be?
   Web visitors see so many messages these days that most rely on a site’s architecture to guide them through your site.  You almost have to treat your internal links like a walk through the park.  Hold your visitors hand and walk them through each step along the path.  Make it easy for them to stay on the trail by creating breadcrumbs or clearly defined choices. 
   
4. Can someone figure out what the mission of the site is within just a few seconds?
   I am referring mainly to making sure your visitor clearly knows what your site is about all above the fold of your home page.  Convince your visitor that you have delivered exactly what they are looking for and they will stay on your site and crawl deeper. 

#3 - MARKETING 

Sales Copy – Writing Effective Sales Copy for Your Web Site A professional looking web site is a very important part of making sales. However, if your sales copy is weak, your web site will be useless.  Writing effective sales copy is simply learning how to write persuasive words specifically written for your target audience. You must feel your potential customers’ needs and write your copy with passion, excitement and benefit. 

1. Writing A Catchy Headline - This is the most important part of your entire sales copy. Not only should you include your Keyword Phrase is your headline you also must write a headline that demands attention and forces your visitors to read on. Most of your visitors will only read your headline. If it doesn’t instantly grab their attention, they’ll soon hit the back button. 
2. Writing Your Beginning Summary - Once you’ve captured your potential customers’ attention, you’ll now need to direct their attention to your summary Keep your summary brief and to the point and let them know exactly what you are about to offer them. 

3. Use Plenty of Subheadings - Subheadings are basically just smaller headlines used to break up your text blocks. They also provide your readers with important highlights of your paragraphs. Use plenty of subheadings throughout your copy, as not all your visitors will read your copy word for word. They’ll simply scan it and only read what catches their attention. 

4. Build Confidence - That trust worthy feeling you get on a Web site goes a long way in keeping your visitors focused on your product. Provide a limited time free trial or download, add trust building logos, offer a money back guarantee all these  will help build your potential customers’ confidence in you and put their mind at ease. 

5. Call for Action - Ask for the order and provide an easy ordering process. Continue to reassure your potential customer and lead them to your order page. 

6. Provide Testimonials - Testimonials provide another great way to reassure your visitors. Blend your testimonials in with your sales message. Avoid making your visitors have to click to another page to view your testimonials — chances are they won’t. By blending your testimonials in with your sales message, you can ensure they will be read. 

7. Writing Your Copy - Now, you’re ready to begin filling in the spaces. When you begin writing your paragraphs, get straight to the point, avoid negativity and hype, and write in small sections. Vary the paragraph sizes and limit each paragraph to four or five lines max. If you feel that your paragraph will be longer than four or five lines, try to use bullets to display important points.

   In addition, write in an everyday language that everyone can understand. Make sure you use plenty of white space. White space is the empty space between your paragraphs and around your text. You don’t want to overwhelm your visitors with a solid page of black text. Nothing will make them click away any faster.

   Pack your sales copy with benefits from your headline straight through to your order form. Make sure you don’t confuse features with benefits. Features don’t sell… Benefits sell. Your visitor wants to know exactly what your product or service can do for them.  

#4 – RESEARCH – Focus Your Design on Personas

Before embarking on any website design project, it is important to understand the needs of your users. It is then possible to identify the features and functionality that will make the website a success, and how the design can support users with different goals and levels of skill.

Personas identify the user motivations, expectations and goals responsible for driving online behavior.

A good way to get a good handle on your visitors is to create two or three personas that would best describe the audience you are trying to attract to your site.  A persona is a brief fictional biography that captures the individual you are targeting. 

Large companies spend a great deal of time research and creating personas.  But you can benefit from simple and quick personas based on your knowledge of your industry.

Once you outline 2 or 3 different outlines work into your design and sales copy these different marketable areas.

Think about your Web site…how many different personas do you currently market to?

Research Using the Internet 

Personas are a powerful search marketing tool. You can use them as a common-sense model for audience behavior, and test your assumptions about keywords, different search engines and landing pages.

Here’s how:  

Check Your Keywords - Sometimes a keyword shows promise because it gets lots of searches. But it may make no sense at all in the context of a particular persona. Check your keywords and phrases. Do they make sense for that persona? Keywords that don’t fit may still be relevant - you’re probably missing another persona that bears consideration.

Think About the Search Engines: Focus Your Effort - Which search engines do these personas most likely use? Different people prefer different engines. I won’t make any sweeping generalizations here - you can find this kind of demographic data on a site like Quantcast

Tailor Description Tags: Maximize Click through -Search engines use the description. META tag to format the snippets they show in their organic search results. If you already rank well for a few phrases, check and see which personas will use each phrase. Then see which pages are listed in the search results. Edit the description tags on those pages to best appeal to the relevant personas.

Think About Conversions: Pull it All Together - What’s your site’s goal? Will your personas, after finding you on a search engine under a particular keyword, and landing on a particular page, be more or less likely to convert?

Observe and Adjust - Watch how visitors behave when they come to your site from a search engine. Do they match what you expect? Probably not exactly. Adjust your description tags, landing pages, keywords and overall strategy accordingly. Armed with this knowledge, you can focus your paid search marketing (pay per click) efforts. You can also tailor your organic search engine optimization campaign to specific search engines.

As you can see it takes a multitude of factors to consider when taking that extra effort to keep someone on your site.  Your main goal is to get in head of your visitor, deliver exactly what you are promising and make your site so that it impresses, validates and earns the respect of your visitor and try to do it within those valuable 10 seconds before the back button syndrome happens.

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