Information Technology Reference
In-Depth Information
the sales persuasion process starts and sometimes ends before the funnel shown
in Figure 12.2. this is typically part of your overall site persuasion architecture, of
which the form is only one part.
Prequalifying Traffic Sent to the Funnel
let's focus on your site setup so we can examine some of the elements that per-
suade visitors to enter the sales funnel. the following is not the only possible setup, but
it is a great way of classifying your content:
c
•
reating an outline
d
•
efining the problem
•
E
xplaining the solution
•
p
roviding a call to action
•
p
resenting the conversion form
your call to action is likely different from page to page; it may be subtle on the
front page and a whole lot more aggressive on the product page. that alone makes a
difference in how visitors enter the funnel and how they perform on your form—in
other words, their conversion rate.
therefore, you can't just optimize on the form itself; nor can you just decide to
overexpose your call to action everywhere on your site.
certain factors within the form optimization process exist that you simply can-
not optimize much on. say you are in the business of selling mortgages. Although i
am not a mortgage expert, i am quite sure you cannot change the sales cycle much.
so in the case of selling mortgages, you might look at your funnel and decide to
be less aggressive on those final steps, in case this is not the right time to drive people
into taking out mortgages. Essentially, you would hold back on your call to action
early on in the sales cycle. you shouldn't always assume that the increase in form-fills
offsets the expected decline in conversion.
think about the type of traffic you throw to the funnel and to the form itself.
High-value paid search traffic is likely to perform differently than low-value paid
search traffic. therefore, you must be able to tell whether people are qualified to make
a purchase or other conversion, and if they are not qualified, you must discover why.
now, how do you do determine if people are qualified to enter the form? Begin
by looking at the following metrics, keeping in mind that this list is dependent on your
industry and the type of clients you are working with:
t
308
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he number of previous visits to the website
•
t
he number of pages viewed in the current session
•
t
he type of pages read in the last session, according to our classification from
earlier
t
•
he average time spent on the site
