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!"

Here are the top 10 converting websites for June 2009*. These are based on Nielson Panel data and are calculated by user to final conversion. Conversion-rate data is based on visitor conversion rates, not session conversion rates: i.e., No. of unique customers/No. of unique visitors.

1. ProFlowers 24.0 2. Vitacost 23.3 3. 1800Flowers 19.5 4. Roamans19.2 5. Office Depot 18.5 6. Blair 17.3 7. QVC 17.0 8. Victoria’s Secret 16.8 9. DrsFosterSmith.com 16.4 10. Amazon 16.4

*Source: Nielsen Online / Marketing Charts

Benchmarks according to the FireClick Index

Increasing your conversion rate requires…

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Here are the top 10 converting websites for May 2009*. These are based on Nielson Panel data and are calculated by user to final conversion. Conversion-rate data is based on visitor conversion rates, not session conversion rates: i.e., No. of unique customers/No. of unique visitors.

1. ProFlowers 38.6 2. Office Depot 28.0 3. Online Retail Total 25.6 4. Vitacost.com 25.0 5. Quixtar 23.4 6. ;Blair 23.4 7. Roamans22.6 8. 1800Flowers 20.5 9. Woman Within19.6 10. Spiegel 18.20

*Source: Nielsen Online / Marketing Charts

Benchmarks according to the FireClick Index

...continue to read "Top 10 Online Retailers by Conversion Rate: May 2009"

Conversion rate = The number of people who take the action you want them to take divided by the total number of potential people who could have taken that action.

When you break that sentence down, you start to understand how to optimize your conversion rate.

Who are these people? Are they all the same? Do they have different characteristics, needs, questions? Do all these people have the same amount of product/service knowledge that you do? Are they…

...continue to read "How to Optimize Your Conversion Rate(s)"

Here are the top 10 converting websites for April 2009*. These are based on Nielson Panel data and are calculated by user to final conversion. Conversion-rate data is based on visitor conversion rates, not session conversion rates: i.e., No. of unique customers/No. of unique visitors.

1. ProFlowers 42.8 2. Vitacost.com 28.9 3. Office Depot 25.0 4. MetroStyle 24.5 5. Woman Within 23.0 6. Schwan’s 21.1 7. CDW 20.8 8. 1800Flowers 20.8 9. Landsend 18.8 10. Drs FosterSmith 18.30

*Source: Nielsen Online / Marketing Charts

Benchmarks according to the FireClick Index:

...continue to read "Top 10 Online Retailers by Conversion Rate: April 2009"

Here are the top 10 converting websites for March 2009*. These are based on Nielson Panel data and are calculated by toolbar user to final conversion. Conversion-rate data is based on visitor conversion rates, not session conversion rates: i.e., No. of unique customers/No. of unique visitors.

1. Schwan’s 50.5 2. FTD 27.2 3. ProFlowers 24.3 4. Vitacost.com 23.7 5. Woman Within 22.7 6. Roaman’s 21.1 7. ColdWater Creek 20.0 8. Eddie Bauer 19.3 9. Blair.com 20.20 10. QVC 17.30

*Source: Nielsen Online / Marketing Charts

The online retail sector in…

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Many people have commented in past posts about ProFlower.com’s incredible conversion rates. You’ll often see them with a conversion rate over 30%. However, most people won’t dedicate the necessary resources they need to achieve such success. Over at EM&C, they cover what’s behind Proflowers.com’s incredible conversion rate by looking at their email marketing.

Here are a 7 things you can do to improve your email marketing performance:

1. Delete your entire email list! You might not need to be as drastic as this…

...continue to read "Have You Spring Cleaned Your Email Marketing Yet?"

No one but search engines and media properties make money from people clicking on ads. If you rely on sales of products or services, the revenue is a consequence of being seen as relevant to your visitors’ needs. After that click you must also instill trust, persuade visitors that you solve their problem, and that it’s simple to buy from you. The original conversion guru, New York Times bestselling author and ClickZ columnist, Bryan Eisenberg, will be presenting proven ideas…

...continue to read "Free Webinar: Post-Click Marketing: Maximizing Conversions Once Visitors Arrive"

Have you ever received great advice from a consultant but couldn’t implement it?

A recommendation is just advice, no matter how excellent, until you implement.

It’s only when you implement a recommendation that you reap the rewards.

Even when you know the advice is great you can get consulting indigestion.

You, the client, in consuming the advice can be the log jam or the hero of every consulting engagement. It’s rarely the consultant that makes the difference. If you choke or get indigestion then consulting leaves…

...continue to read "No More Consulting Indigestion"

1. Site-Perf – get an accurate, realistic, and helpful estimation of your site’s loading speed. The script fully emulates natural browser behavior downloading your page with all the images, CSS, JS and other files – just like a regular user. A unique feature is that site-perf.com allows to measure packet loss ratio with reasonable precision.

2. Customer Focus Calculator – will analyze the words on your page and determine if your copy is more about yourself or your customer. This tool will measure…

...continue to read "33 Free Tools to Make Your Website Better"