If you’re selling online, and you’re interested in Optimization, it simply makes sense to spend some time focusing on your shopping cart. It’s a key area of focus for a few reasons:

It’s often where “low-hanging fruit” grows. Conversion obstacles can often be removed quickly, leading to large gains in a short period of time. It’s an area where you’ve already succeeded in persuading the prospect. They are in the Late Stage of their buying process, so a relatively low investment can give you…

...continue to read "Shopping Cart Optimization: Canned vs. Custom"

Because I live in the optimization world, I sometimes assume that certain web site strategies are common sense and obvious. I sometimes forget that the only reason why they are common sense and obvious to me: Because I analyze and optimize web sites all day, every day. That’s a bit of an unfair advantage!

At FutureNow, we work with clients in a variety of industries and business models: e-commerce, lead generation and catalog. Lately, I’ve had the pleasure of working with some…

...continue to read "A Clicks-to-Bricks Site Optimization Checklist"

Generating targeted traffic and conducting website optimization are critical to increasing online sales. Ok, yeah, you already know that

But did you know that traffic generation and website optimization aren’t mutually exclusive? There are tactics that will help you accomplish both goals at the same time, and one FutureNow Partner recently spoke to me about a tactic that’s working well.

Our Partner is a software development firm that specializes in web-based applications and good old web development and design. They are currently gaining leads…

...continue to read "All Aces: Overlapping your Marketing Efforts for Better Results"

Lots of folks have been asking us lately about the connection between site traffic levels and online optimization strategies.  There are definitely some correlations, but there also seem to be some myths or mis-perceptions about those connections.

We often get asked:

How much traffic do I need before I start optimization?

Do I get enough traffic to my site to even consider optimization?

Will my tests take forever to run if I don’t have a lot of traffic?

How fast can I expect to see…

...continue to read "Myths About Site Traffic and Optimization"

Us Grokkers are continuing to focus on what types of things eRetailers can work on to make Holiday Shopping more enjoyable (and persuasive) for their prospects.

Enter the “Product Configurator.” While it sounds a bit like an evil robot out of control, what we’re talking about today is simply an online application to allow prospects to customize a product on their way to buying it. This can be a lot of fun for online shoppers if done well, and lead to…

...continue to read "Let Them Build Before They Buy"

Lots of our clients and prospects are asking questions along the lines of: I want to optimize before the Holiday rush, but I don’t want to introduce too much change at such a critical time.

A valid question/concern, to be sure.  Our answer is, of course, “It depends.”  However, here are a few approaches that we’ve seen work:

Extreme Effort Until a Certain Date

Look at your previous year’s analytics and the upward trend of conversions closer to the holidays.  …

...continue to read "How Much Pre-Holiday Optimization is Enough?"

OK, Grok faithful, we all know that the Holiday Season is coming fast. Last year was “make or break” for a lot of eTailers, and this season will be critical for many more.

The ones who make it through will be those who are passionate about the customer experience, AND who are able to prioritize their work between now and the “Holiday Crunch” so that the hours expended actually impact the number of sales they make.

Where do you start if you want your…

...continue to read "Keep Them In the Cart this Christmas"

Seth’s blog post on “Things to ask before you redo your website” is a must read for everyone involved in online marketing.   Seriously.  If you haven’t seen it yet, go read it now.

What I love most about this list is the way it segregates into sub-components or elaborations on Future Now’s  three questions that are the basis of Persuasion Architecture:

1) Who is coming to the site?

2) What is it they are trying to accomplish?

3) What…

...continue to read "Redesign? Ask The Right Questions!"

Increasingly more people are joining the optimization crowd. Savvy marketers need to do more with less budget. Others just want to beat their competitors. No matter the motivation, optimizing your conversion rate is a no-brainer.

What seems more difficult is deciding where and what to optimize. All of us have our plates full already. Adding optimization to the heap seems uncomfortable, even painful.

It doesn’t have to be.

It may not be easy, but very little that is worthwhile ever is.

When no clear starting line…

...continue to read "What Is Your True Conversion Rate?"

True “interaction” happens when request and response of pages happen in sub-second speed.  So just because people have cable and dsl connections doesn’t mean you should fill your pages with bloated code and heavy images.

In fact, the natural advantage of fast loading pages is one reason Google patented the sparse design of their home page.  They know that simplicity, speed and relevance rule the web experience, and that every millisecond counts.

Think about that time you had to connect…

...continue to read "Make Your Images Load Faster"