Converting visitors to customers – the third spoke of SEO

Too often, people think of SEO solely in terms of ranking position. They forget that if your website cannot turn that casual visitor into a customer—your ranking did nothing for you except send a visitor to your site for a moment.

Conversion science is the discipline of making sure the visitors to your site take some action to bring them closer to being a customer. Successful websites have specific and effective calls to action. A call to action is a phrase, graphic, or a section of your website that urges the visitor to take some tangible step toward becoming a customer or user of your product or website. The call to action can be a box that says Call Now for Immediate Service, Shop Now!, or Subscribe for Free! Get Updates by RSS.

A call to action doesn't necessarily mean that visitors purchase something right there, but that they take steps toward becoming a purchaser.

Your call to action will differ based on the space in which you compete. If you are a blogger and want to expand the reach of your blog, you'll want users to sign up to your RSS feed, or follow you on Twitter. In more traditional business environments, like retail and home services, you'll want people to call or e-mail to make an appointment. In a full e-commerce environment, you'll want to immediately drive people to make purchases.

The following screenshot shows an aggressive call to action in the home services (pool construction) niche:

For your calls to action to be effective, you need to keep them prominent, above the fold (on the upper part of your web pages that are visible before scrolling down is required), and persuasive. Above the fold is a term from the newspaper industry, meaning above the halfway point where a newspaper was folded.

Another rule of conversions is to have fallback positions, a second best option. In other words, if your users don't purchase something today maybe they'll sign up for your Twitter feed, which lets you keep them updated to new products. Perhaps later, these new contacts will eventually become customers.

Creating conversion-based websites

Each competitive space is different. However, conversion science does teach a few absolute principles that can help you create highly effective conversion-based websites:

• Don't hide contact information. About 30 percent of all websites do not display contact information prominently. In a business environment, this mistake is pure suicide. Put that phone number and e-mail up top where users can find it.

• Put the meat where the eyes are. Use the "above the fold" portions your header and sidebars for conversion tools and messages. Studies show that user's eyes typically scan the top and sidebar areas for information. Don't expect users to scroll to hunt for your phone number.

• Mix it up. Some users like to call, others like to e-mail. Give users more than one choice.

• Don't frustrate your users by directing them to non-functioning elements. For example, don't use Chat now buttons that lead to dead ends, that is, Chat is not available right now. If you utilize a call to action, make absolutely sure the action is available, even if it's a voice mail, that is still better than wasting a customer's time.

• Don't broadcast your poor service. Don't say To reach sales, call between 1pm and 5pm. That's just begging your customers to go elsewhere. If you must be out of the office (all of us must leave work sometimes) just send folks to a friendly voicemail and return the call later.

• Give fewer choices. Don't confuse readers with too many selections. If your viewers get confused or overwhelmed, they might slip into choice paralysis.

• Always give the next step. Don't lose your customers along the way. If they don't buy, get them to sign up for your newsletter. If you convert them to watch your video, make the next step an invitation to purchase.

• Sell benefits, not features. Your car will run faster! will convert better than Our fuel additives are the most powerful in the industry.

• Use testimonials. Tell your customers what other users say about your service.

• Guide their eyes and attention. You can literally point users to your desired action with arrows and buttons.

The following screenshot of Google's Cloud Print service shows several elements of expert conversion science at work. The user is guided visually to the call to action with a clear and simple button in a contrasting color. The benefit, Print anywhere, from any device, is short and clear. The page is uncluttered, which enables a clearer path to action for the user. The placement of the conversion tool is above the fold:

Truly effective calls to action are going to differ widely depending on the space in which you participate. You'll want to try different approaches and measure your results. In Chapter 10, Testing Your Site and Monitoring Your Progress, we'll cover how to measure the performance of your website.