When you are running a business online, you need to think about what makes a customer tick. And, perhaps more importantly, what makes a customer buy. There can be a lot of factors that determine a customer’s buying behavior, and you need to be aware of them all. You need to make sure that there are no issues that could stop a customer buying from you and that there are lots of strategies in place to ensure that they keep coming back to your business.
We’ll start by troubleshooting some of the issues that could be affecting your sales and then look into ways to market your company effectively online.
So, first let’s make sure you’re aware of the biggest potential issue that will stop customers from buying.
Bad Reviews.
These days, if a customer wants to find out information about your site, they’ll check out the review section below a product or service to purchase. And, if you’re not advertising reviews or the ability for customers to post reviews, they’ll look elsewhere. There are plenty of sites like Trustpilot that give info on sites online and ensure customers know what they are getting into. So, blocking reviews on your site won’t solve your issue here. Instead, you need to understand how to handle negative reviews.
It’s important to realize that you can’t just ignore them and hope that they will go away because that won’t work. Instead, you need to make sure that you are responding to negative customer reviews when necessary. Some reviews might suggest issues with your business model or how you handled an order. If that’s the case, it’s important to reassure other potential customers that there are no issues at all.
And, if you can’t do this, you can at least think about apologizing to disgruntled customers. Particularly, if you think the issue might have been caused by an action you made. Of course, in some cases, you might just be best to apologize regardless.
Errors And Issues.
If customers make it to the end of the marketing funnel, they will be ready to complete a transaction, thus buying your product. But things can still go wrong at this stage, and one of the issues that you should be watching out for is software errors. Behind every site, there is software running to process sales, complete transactions and get customers to that reassuring ‘order successful’ page. However, it’s not uncommon to have a few glitches in this software that causes issues with sales. Typically, the problems are minimal, but you do need to watch out for a pattern of errors with sales. Eventually, this could lead to customers not bothering to try and make a purchase. That’s why you might want to look into Advanced Web Transaction Monitoring with Retrace. This will allow you to keep a check on issues with transactions and guarantee that tech problems don’t cause a loss of sales.
Of course, issues with transactions aren’t the only problem that can stop customers committing to a purchase. It’s quite possible that the problems begin as soon as they click on your site. In cases like this, you need to look at the load times of web pages. Slow loading times will usually lead to customers getting bored and heading off, usually in the direction of your competition. If that does happen, you might just lose a sale completely, and you don’t want that. That’s why you should look into web hosting possibilities. Hosting your site gives you more control over aspects such as speed, ensuring that it functions as it should for your customers.
Too Many Ads!
Be careful about arranging sponsored content for your business website. You won’t typically find this on sites where transactions are the main point of the web page. However, you might have sponsored content on your blog or running in the background of your site. It is a great way to give yourself an additional business income. However, it can lead to problems if customers aren’t happy with how much the sponsored content disrupts their use of the site. Popups should certainly be avoided, particularly if they are going to redirect customers away from your business page. You’ll usually find that information sites have this issue.
Pulling Customers Back In.
However, that doesn’t mean that you can’t use this type of advertising to your advantage in certain cases. Remarketing is a great example of this. Through remarketing, it’s possible to get lost customers back to your site and ensure you get a second chance at pushing them towards a sale. You might have been close to getting a sale from a customer, but perhaps they were distracted. They might have clicked off or compared your product with something else online. Through remarketing, you can advertise to them, even when they are off your site. An add for your site will appear on their web page, as they continue to search online.
Hitting The Target.
Or, how about just making sure that you are targeting the right customers for your business. To do this, you should focus on the content of your site. It’s crucial that it connects directly to the people who you want to buy from your business. For instance, you might be selling baby clothes. Obviously, the target customers here is new parents and to make sure you attract them you can add posts on your site relating to parenting. Make sure that any content connects to their point of view, and you can increase the chances of securing a sale.
Remember, if you want multiple purchases from the same customer, you need to think about adding fresh content on a regular basis. This gives customers a reason to keep coming back to your site, even if they are yet ready to make another purchase. It reminds them of what your business can offer, and it might even encourage them to stay loyal to your company.
Using this advice, you can avoid the issues that results in companies losing customers and hook a lot of buyers into your business.
