How to find answers in product info, Q&As, and reviews.

You’ve likely seen this capability on Amazon, when you’re utilizing their “Customer Questions & Answers” capabilities and when you start asking your question…it will suggest answers from the content that already exists within the page.   The result looks something like this:

You want to have this capability within your own site.   To accomplish this, there are solutions that you can integrate into your product page like Answerbase’s Product Questions & Answers solution which will autosuggest answers from the existing Q&A content…but also allow you to identify that you’d like it to suggest answers from other information on the page including your product descriptions, product specifications, product reviews, etc.

Why you want to find answers in product info, Q&As, and reviews.

The reason you want to have your product questions and answers tool find answers in product info, Q&As, and reviews is to answer questions most efficiently for the sake of the customer as well as your business.   Customers are looking for an answer and they’d like a quick answer to their question, so if you make it easy for them to find the answers they’re looking for they’re most likely to convert.   In fact, Answerbase see that up to 75% of the questions that get answered convert to a sale.   This ensures that they don’t bounce from your page to try to see if Google can find another site that has the answer readily available.

This capability will also save your company time and money by reducing duplicate questions.   Answerbase sees some sites decrease their inquiries by up to 83% as existing information is suggested as answers and takes care of the customer when available.

This combination of increased conversions and decreased inquiries have a notable impact on your bottom line, as you’re increasing revenues while decreasing costs to get them.

Other benefits of product Q&A engagement

Of course, your customers will ask questions that you haven’t covered and those will inevitably be posted.   The benefits of this engagement and these new inquiries is that it’s growing valuable content that can be used to ensure that question is answered for future customers.   If you publish the content in a way that is optimized for Google (like Amazon, Best Buy, Answerbase Customer sites, and others), you can also see those Q&A threads pulling up in search results similar to this:

That ensures that you can answer questions efficiently not only for the people who are on your site, but that content can lead brand new customers to your site as they’re asking product related questions through Google and other search engines.

Ecommerce merchants will also use that Q&A engagement to identify gaps within their current product information, descriptions, and specifications….and look to optimize that information so it includes the information that is inquired about the most.   This ensures that over time, your customers have easy and efficient access to all of the information they need in order to convert to a sale and purchase the product.

We hope this post has been informative.   If you’d like information on how you can support this on your site where your product questions and answers capabilities can automatically suggest answers from your product information, reviews, and Q&As….you can schedule an Answerbase demo here and we’ll have a product specialist walk you through.

The post Find answers in product info, q&as, reviews appeared first on Answerbase.

When looking for that product information, the answer to their pre-sales question can be found throughout the page….typically in one of the following formats:

• Product images
• Product descriptions
• Product specifications
• Product reviews
• Product question and answer content
• Product manuals
• Product-related videos
• Product-related articles

That’s a large list of areas where they may be able to find the answer to their product question, that may be the only barrier to them converting to a sale. Seems like quite a bit to look through to get an answer to one question, doesn’t it? It’s because it is.

This is the reason why having the ability to easily search through and find product information within the product page is critical to ensuring that customers can easily find the information they’re looking for…and get on with the purchase.

This post covers how you can provide this capability to your ecommerce customers, to remove those barriers to purchase and increase your sales.

How do customers search and find product information now?

On most ecommerce websites customers don’t have the ability to search and find the product information they’re looking for….they’re forced to browse (more like “dig”) to find it.

Some ecommerce merchants make a good amount of product information available, which is great, but they expect the customer to read and browse through the available information on the page in order to find the information they’re looking for which will seal the deal.   That information can become so robust that it becomes unmanageable for a user to efficiently sift through.

Have you ever seen a lengthy product description? See this example:

What about a detailed product specs table? See this example on a product page:

And that’s not even starting on the hundreds (or sometimes thousands) of product questions and answers that have been addressed or product reviews that have been given, as well as any product documents where you can download the full product specs sheet or product manual.

It’s great that all of this information is available. What’s not great is that customers are being left with the burden of sifting through and reading all of those details just to find the specific information which will convert them from a visitor to a paying customer.

Your job as an ecommerce merchant is to make the access to that information as quick and painless as possible.

How can product page search be done better?

Let’s see how Amazon addresses this, because they’re doing a good job. Notice how Amazon provides this field before your get to the product description and more detailed product information on their pages.

They encourage the customer to ask any questions they may have about the product and Amazon will look to find answers in the following places:

• Product information
• Q&A’s
• Reviews

As you start to type in your question, it will search through all of the product information it has and auto-suggest the information to the user as seen here:

It gives you results from all of the product information sources that are available, and also allows you to filter whether you’d like to see the information from the Product Information, Customer Q&A’s, or the Customer Reviews. This ensures that wherever the information that the customer wants to see could be found…is presented to them as quickly as possible so they can get on with the sale.

Engaging customers through product questions

When customers are looking for product information, a search can typically be phrased in the form of a question and it’s a great way to engage the user in order to get them to that information. It’s a natural way for the user to see that there is a way to get the specific information they’re looking for, and engage.

You’ll notice on Amazon in their customer questions and answers section on each product page, by default they will show the most popular Q&A content underneath the ask question form as seen here:

But…as soon as the customer starts asking their specific question…they search through all the available product information regardless of where it can be found, as seen here:

Supporting product questions and answers on your ecommerce site is the easiest way to get those customers engaged and make it so they can easily find the product information they’re looking for…and move onto the sale. If the information isn’t currently available in the information you’ve already provided, it allows them to go ahead and pose that question to your team (and other customers if you’d like to enable that capability) and then that question can be addressed to help convert that sale as well as any future customers with a similar question in the future.

Answerbase (who powers product page Q&A) sees that up to 75% of the questions that are answered on product pages convert to a sale. That’s quite a lift in revenue by simply helping to ensure customers have easy access to content you’re already providing.

How can I support this on my own ecommerce product pages?

If you’re looking for a tool or an app to support a product questions and answers capability similar to Amazon’s on your ecommerce site, Answerbase powers ecommerce product Q&A and can also index your other product information including product details, product specifications, product manuals, and product reviews. If you’d like to speak with a representative about what Answerbase can do to help customers easily find product information and convert to a sale, Schedule an Answerbase Demo today.

The post Make it Easy to Find Product Information on Ecommerce Product Pages appeared first on Answerbase.

A conversion marketing strategy does just that; it implements campaigns both on and off your eCommerce website to increase conversions and reduce cart abandonment. In this article, we share some great ways to boost your conversion marketing strategy.

3 Strands of conversion marketing

Conversion marketing can be split into three main areas of focus;

• Onsite conversion tactics that happen on your eCommerce store
• Offsite conversion tactics that happen elsewhere online
• Post-visit tactics that happen following conversion or abandonment.

Let’s take a closer look at each of these and the tactics you can employ at each stage.

1. Onsite conversion tactics

A common misconception in eCommerce is to think that marketing stops once a customer lands on your website.

This couldn’t be further from the truth. You’ve invested time and money getting your customer to your webstore; now is the perfect moment to ramp up your marketing efforts to get them over the conversion line.

You might already be using popups and discount banners, but to really boost your onsite marketing effort, consider highlighting your service instead of price.

Guarantee fast delivery

Offering fast shipping is a great tactic to reach time-poor buyers, last-minute shoppers, and today’s impatient consumer. Marketplaces like Amazon and Walmart all offer fast shipping, because it shifts focus away from price and onto service, helping listings to stand out in the crowd.

On your own website, fast shipping is necessary to compete with big marketplaces. Use it to appeal to your customers’ need for risk aversion and immediate gratification by guaranteeing 2-day delivery. Even better, include a countdown timer to show exactly how much longer a shopper has in order to receive their item in two days, creating a sense of urgency that drives shoppers to the checkout.

Make product information accessible and clear

Did you know that around 20% of ecommerce failures are due to lack of clear or available product information?  Take the time to write great product descriptions but also utilize a product question and answer solution like Answerbase.   Answerbase has case studies where up to 75% of the product questions asked convert to a new sale.  Don’t let the customer leave your site to find the information elsewhere, engage them and convert the sale on your site!

2. Offsite conversion tactics

Customer interest, buying decisions, and even the purchases can happen long before someone lands on your checkout page, making offsite conversions tactics just as powerful as onsite. Consider these offsite conversion-boosting tactics for your marketing strategy.

Social media engagement

97% of shoppers say their decision to buy a product is based on reviews. If you’re using Facebook and Instagram solely to promote your website, then you’re using them wrong. Social media is a perfect tool for advertising existing customer reviews, to get new customers buying your products before they’ve even clicked onto your website.

Share reviews in your Instagram Stories, re-post Facebook photographs of customers using your products and create highlights of user-generated photos and videos.

(Source: Instagram)

Multi-channel selling

Multi-channel selling expands your business’ reach to online marketplace customers. By using the right sales tactics, such as fast shipping programs and marketplace ads, you can convert these customers on their chosen sales channel.

Following that, you can encourage repeat purchases from your eCommerce website by:

• Directing these customers to your webstore by asking them to complete a product review or sending them product recommendations based on their marketplace purchase.
• Sending these customers a discount code to use on their first direct purchase or sending details about your loyalty program.
• Replicating marketplace fast shipping programs by offering 2-day delivery and implementing fast shipping tags on your Shopify store.

3. Post-visit tactics

And finally, your conversion marketing strategy should include post-visit tactics that bring customers back to your checkout page – whether that’s for the first time following abandonment or the second time following a purchase.

Cart abandonment emails

For customers that didn’t make it through the checkout on their first visit to your website, a cart abandonment email can bring them back and, if done right, can even increase their original basket size.

Top tips for an effective cart abandoned email include:

• Highlighting the benefits of buying from you, including fast shipping, free returns, and product guarantees.
• Offering an incentive for completing a purchase such as money off or free delivery.
• Adding details of the products left in the customer’s basket, along with customer reviews, to make picking it back up easy.
• Signing off with a clear call to action, such as “Complete Your Purchase” or “Get the Goods.”

Post-purchase emails

For customers that did make it through the checkout, a post-purchase email can bring them back for a repeat purchase and, if executed correctly, can lead to a lifetime of repeat purchases.

Top tips for increasing customer lifetime value using email include:

• Thanking customers for their purchase and providing them with their tracking number and contact details should they run into any problems.
• Reinforcing the benefits of buying from you, including 24/7 customer care, next day deliveries, or loyalty programs.
• Recommending other products relevant to their first purchase, such as complementary items or what other customers usually buy next.

Conversion marketing final thoughts

A conversion marketing strategy doesn’t have to be complicated to succeed – you just need to think outside of the box for simple ways to attract attention, entice decisions, and get those customers through your check out.

About the Author

This is a guest post from Rachel Go, who handles content and partnerships at Deliverr. Deliverr provides fast and affordable fulfillment for Shopify, Walmart, Amazon, and eBay stores, helping to boost sales through programs like 2-day delivery for Shopify, Walmart 2-day delivery, Seller Fulfilled Prime, and eBay Fast n’ Free.  Deliverr’s FBA-like multi-channel fulfillment comes with clear pricing, easy on-boarding and a hassle free experience to grow eCommerce businesses.

The post How to Boost Your Conversion Marketing Strategy appeared first on Answerbase.

Let’s explore some thoughts around both Customer Acquisition and Customer Retention, and how to create a healthy balance between the two to create a very healthy ecommerce business.

Ecommerce Customer Lifetime Value (LTV)

The first thing we need to set a foundation on is an understanding of Customer Lifetime Value (LTV).   The Lifetime Value (LTV) of a customer and its relationship with how much it takes to acquire a customer is the lifeblood of a business.   This is the foundation of any healthy business, whether the business realizes it or whether they just end up in it because “it’s just working”.   As a general rule, your Lifetime Value of a customer, how much they’ll spend with you over the long term…..needs to be 3x more than the cost that it took to acquire that customer in the first place.   If its lower than that, you’ll likely end up feeling business pressures and if that ratio doesn’t get to a healthy place it won’t be a surprise to anyone if you’re out of business.   So, understanding this relationship between customer acquisition and how much they spend is critical to understanding if your business is healthy or not (and also may shed light on whether you’re consistently feeling strapped or whether you’re living in a cloud where everything seems peachy and you’re living in abundance).

New Ecommerce Customer Acquisition

The benefits of new customer acquisition is obvious, you get brand new revenue from new people and it appears to be the fastest way to hit your short term revenue goals.  There has never been a time in history that its been easier to reach your target market through social media and other channels.   Gone are the days where you need to sit at the counter of a retail store and wait for somebody to walk into your store, digital marketing and ecommerce stores allow you to get your products in front of a global audience and efficiently fulfill those sales.   Even with these new channels, you need to discover what channels are relevant for the products you sell…and make sure that your marketing costs stay in check with the lifetime value to sustain that magic ratio mentioned above…or better yet….improve that ratio.

If you have an ecommerce business and doing business, its likely you already have a decent foundation here….so we’ll just highlight a couple tips and methods here to assist with New Customer Acquisition.

• Link Regargeting: Its likely you’re already doing traditional retargeting of your audience (if not, see next bullet point)…but something to explore is “newer” services that allow you to accomplish Link Retargeting.  If you’re not crazy about getting your social media feeds super active in sharing content relevant to your target market, it may be because its a huge effort to write original content and then understand whether your audience will actually engage it or not.  You can take a step towards that, by simply following all of the industry news and content that is created by great sources…and then share those on your social media feeds consistently.   Then…simply by clicking on a link to that content created by amazing article writers, etc….you can capture who clicked and add them to an “Audience”…where then you can have your advertising show up to them as they’re browing the internet, through social feeds, etc.   This is a great way to engage your target market and grow a large list of potential customers.
• Retargeting Website Visitors: Again, this is likely already being done which is why I’m adding this last…but in case you’re not….when you get somebody to visit your website you can have advertising services like Google, Facebook, Twitter, etc. add that visitor to an “Audience” and then you can create campaigns which will get your advertising in that person’s face as they browse the internet or through their social network feeds.   If you’re not doing this now, you need to be…since retargeting ads are on average MUCH cheaper than getting the visitor to your website in the first place…and you already know they have some level of interest in your products.  You can even show them products they’ve actually viewed on your website.

If you have any questions about how to accomplish the above goals, we can help point you in the right direction so feel fee to Contact Us and we can guide you with services and partner agencies that can help you out here.

Ecommerce Customer Retention

Customer retention speaks to how well you’re providing the products that you’re selling and the quality of those products.   If you sell a unique product, the product is great and they continue to want to purchase more from you….you will likely retain that customer over a long period of time.   If you’re offering exceptional customer service and you’re considered a thought leader, where the experience in shopping on your online store is just a much better experience than other stores….you’re likely to retain those customers and keep them coming back.  The longer you can retain customers, the more they’re likely to purchase from you, and therefor it increases their lifetime value.   This not only helps ensure that your business reaches the 3:1 ratio we spoke of before…but if you do it very well you can likely exceed that ratio and create a very  comfortable and healthy business where you love your customers, your customers love you….and everybody is thriving in a mutually beneficial relationship.

Sounds great, doesn’t it?  Here are a couple tips on how to get there:

• The Products:  Obviously selling great products that your customers are going to have a great experience with is the foundation here.   If you sell unique products that people love (and ideally repeat purchase), and then have other products in your offering that supplies for the needs of that same audience….as long as they continue to have great experiences with your products they should keep coming back for more.  Don’t ignore that you’re dealing with a competitive environment as well, but as long as you can supply great products at a competitive price…you’re building a great foundation for customers that keep coming back fore more.
• The Customer Experience: You can have a great product, but if your customer ordering and delivery process isn’t up to speed with a customer’s expectations….and they can get things delivered notably faster through another provider…there is a good chance you may lose them to somewhere else.   The good news is that there are all kinds of services like Shipstation and others that allow you, even as a very small provider, to have top notch turnaround/shipping that competes with the best of them.
• Service & Support: What can distinguish between you and the huge corporations sometimes is the fact that you combine what is listed above with that old fashioned fact that you care and are more closely connected with ensuring your customer has a great experience.  All other things being equal, are you or your direct employees more motivated to shower your customers with amazing customer service than a person sitting in a cubicle working for somebody else, and about 5-6 management levels down (or more) from the actual owners of the business?   I would assume the answer is yes, so make it happen.  Ensure that YOU are the thought leader and expert behind the products that you sell…and you freely share that information in a way that us super helpful to existing customers and potential customers.  Make the experience not only painless, but actually insightful where the customer walks away thinking “they are all-stars”.   They’re more likely to come back for more.

Retaining Customers & Acquiring New Customers Simultaneously

There are ways to do both of these things in the same breath, and in ways that can actually reduce your costs at the same time.   As your customers are going to your product pages and getting details around that product to see if they want to purchase, both new customers and those who have previously ordered….there are questions that they have which they’d like answered before they pull the trigger on the purchase.   For both of these groups, give them an easy way to ask those questions about the product and get a great answer from your team.

If you’re using the right ecommerce product page Q&A software, they should also be building a knowledge base of product-specific Q&A content as time goes on….so that you only need to answer a question once..and then every time its asked again down the road it pulls up your previous answer where that customer gets services instantly and simply goes on to purchase.  Answerbase customers see up to a 60% reduction in repeated questions as those are managed automatically which reduces costs and then up to 75% of customer questions turn into a new conversion from this process.

Finally, that content that your posting is VERY VERY VERY valuable for search engines.  The same questions that your customers are asking on your product pages….are the same (or very similar) to questions they’re asking on Google (and other search engines) when looking for products like those that you sell….so if your Q&A software is doing its job its managing this SEO benefit as well.   Answerbase creates a new landing page for relevant Q&A from your product question interaction….and that has lead to year over year organic traffic growth in the ecommerce merchants we service.   Here is what one customer had to say:

Answerbase has doubled the overall traffic to our ecommerce site, and increased our organic search traffic by four times! – Ron from Epestsupply

When it comes to Lifetime Value of those new customers coming through that process, we’ve also seen that new ecommerce customers acquired through Answerbase are up to 6x more valuable than those coming from Facebook and up to 2x more valuable than customers coming from Google as a whole to the ecommerce stores we service.  This goes a long way as you look to retain more existing customers, attract new customers, and grow the Lifetime Value of our average customer over time.

We hope things post has been helpful for ecommerce store, feel free to Contact Us with any questions and we’ll look to provide helpful consultation to help your ecommerce business thrive.

You can also start a free trial of Answerbase today if you’d like to add Q&A to your product pages, or upgrade to a more efficient use of that Q&A content.

The post Ecommerce Customer Acquisition vs Customer Retention to Grow Your Business appeared first on Answerbase.

The Internet’s Content Deficit

Did you know that Google recognizes that about 15% of the trillions of searches done per year, don’t have sufficient content available to fulfill that demand for information?  When asked how many searches Google manages, in 2016 Google communicated that it was at least 2 trillion searches.   Since then….they’ve just communicated “Trillions”.   But let’s do some math there, let’s say they are still processing even just 2 trillion (we use “just” lightly there, and its almost certainly expanded from there as Android continued to increase its market share since then, etc.)…..with 2 trillion searches that means that over 300 billion searches per year don’t have content in place to effectively fulfill the demand.   That’s astounding, isn’t it?   It’s both astounding and a huge opportunity….that they’re capitalizing on through Google Question Hub.

Of course…this content gap and the need to fill it isn’t new…Answerbase has been helping to fill the content gaps for years through more efficiently managing ecommerce customer questions in an SEO friendly way.  But, what’s interesting about the Google Question Hub is that Google is privy to is what searches are just bubbling up to the surface where the searches are brand new….never been seen before.   That is content that isn’t yet available, because the demand for that content is just popping up.  There’s an opportunity out there for merchants who can effectively use these new tools.

This content deficit is certain to not go away, since there will always be new questions asked about brand new products, brand new services, etc…but the efficiency of filling that content gap will certainly improve…and Google’s helping to do that in a major way.

Google Question Hub Identifies Brand New Questions Needing Content

So…it still begs the question….What is Google Question Hub?

For these brand new questions that are on the cutting edge of what people are searching for….Google is providing a way for users to submit their queries for the world to know about so the content gap can be filled.   See a screenshot of how this is playing out in the regions where Google has started to collect these queries….

Then…as they’re collecting these queries Google’s Question Hub allows publishers you to see those questions that are posed through Google…where Google just doesn’t have sufficient content to present a good answer.

See some screenshots of how this is currently displaying for publishers:

There are other screenshots that show that Google will let publishers know when the questions have been asked multiple times, further supporting the demand for that content…and therefor as the recognition of that demand grows it further justifies it may be worth taking a look at.

How Google Question Hub Impacts Ecommerce Content Marketing?

The simple answer to this question is having more data to make better decisions with content strategy…in order to service customers that will purchase your products with great content they actually want.   With all the other tools that digital marketing departments and agencies use to formulate their content strategy, Google Question Hub has the potential to be an important part of that decision making.

The value is simple, you’re able to quickly identify what new questions that your current customers (or potential customers) are asking about the products that you sell and having that known demand shape what you post content about.  This is obviously very early as these questions are just bubbling up to the surface….but but as they gain some traction that becomes interesting because if it is a question that will be repeated then you have the opportunity to have a great answer of a question related to products you sell…and lead them to your online store where they can purchase from you, grow your remarketing list, grow your email marketing lists, etc.   For digital marketers who are consistently asking the question “What do we prioritize next?” when it comes to content strategy, this can help answer that question.

Google Question Hub & Answerbase

As mentioned earlier, Answerbase is helping ecommerce merchants to fill in the content gaps (and create better content for searches that do currently have results) as ecommerce merchants have a monetary incentive to provide great answers to questions that their customers ask through the Answerbase product page Q&A widget.   Those answers on average receive a 96% positive rating by customers…and those Q&A combinations are spawned into landing pages which we’ve seen increase organic traffic to their ecommerce stores year over year as it better fulfills the content demands.   Most of the time these are questions that have been asked before (for some of our customers over 60% of the questions are answered through existing content), but most of the time that content is being held/managed in emails or other support ticket systems in a way that isn’t SEO friendly…and therefor there is a deficit in the information being made accessible in a way that Google can actually use to fulfill the customer demand.

But…what Google Question Hub allows Answerbase customers to do is to use any additional resources to start addressing relevant questions that are just bubbling up to the surface from customers through Google.   Answerbase customer can post that new Q&A content through Answerbase as well, to continue to add to it’s valuable knowledge base and be automatically fed into the sitemap, which will allow them to stay on the bleeding edge when it comes to content creation to service their customers and potential customers.

If you’d like to learn more about Google Question Hub and it’s implications for ecommerce digital marketing, or how Answerbase will be utilizing this data, please Contact Us and we can schedule a call about how it can help your ecommerce content marketing strategy.

The post How Google’s Question Hub will impact Ecommerce Digital Marketing appeared first on Answerbase.

Let past performance be your guide.

Take stock of the content you’ve published and see which topics are continuing to perform well and which aren’t. Track conversions of the key business goals that you’ve set for your content, and see where you are. With software that’s available to track content performance today, you can get a good deal of useful information without having to spend a lot of time on this. Using the Content tool in Google Analytics, for example, you can quickly see page views and time spent on pages, as well as compare performance to past dates and track which pages are most visited. More importantly, set up goals in Analytics to see what content is actually converting for you. HubSpot also delivers insights including page performance reports that you can sort by topic. Finally, your own content and knowledge base may also give you insights into what content is performing well. For example, our Answerbase Q&A software has built-in Content Insights specifically around customer question-and-answer activity to identify the most popular topics. You want to focus on your content that is most popular, solving the most problems and delivering the desired results. Identify these topics and let this be where you start.

Ask your employees about customers’ continued interests.

We’ve talked before about looping in sales, customer service representatives and others with direct customer contact as you’re developing content so you can get their input on what they’re hearing from customers. It’s just as important to check back with them regularly on this, and to ask specifically about pain points that customers and potential customers are currently experiencing. Consider creating a formal program for them to give you this feedback based on what customers are telling them – perhaps a weekly email asking for the top five concerns they’re hearing about. It’s worth the effort, because anytime the content in your blog, Q&A forum or other information source on your website successfully addresses an issue that’s of immediate concern to someone, you’ll see a payoff, whether it’s making a sale to a new customer or keeping a current customer happy. But first, you need to know what they’re concerned about at any given time, and that’s where your own people can be a huge help in keeping focused on the right topics.

Check what topics are “hot” and trending on the internet.

After you’ve identified some relevant topics for your audience using the above approaches, there are tools available to identify which of those topics are trending generally in search and social activity. If a topic that’s performing well on your website with your audience is also serving a large and growing audience in general, that’s where you want to focus your attention. First Stop is Google Trends, where you can see how content topics are performing in Google searches over time and if the topic is gaining or reducing in search popularity. For trends on social media, BuzzSumo identifies hot topics based on the number of total shares across Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, Pinterest and Google+. Use these tools to further refine the topics that you know are performing well on your site, and that will give you great guidance on where you should be focusing your time and efforts.

Always remember that the topics you chose when you started your content development efforts aren’t necessarily the topics people want to read about today and or that will continue to give results. Staying on top of what kind of information people find useful and informative is vital. It’s something that takes a constant effort – but that doesn’t mean it has to take a lot of time or resources, given the tools available to help you with it. Follow the tips above to make quick work of fine-tuning your content, keep it fresh and get the best business results.

The post Tips to Focus Your Content on Topics That Bring Results appeared first on Answerbase.

Let Other Customers Sing Your Praises

Don’t just tell potential customers how great your product or service is – let your other customers do it for you. Customer reviews are powerful tools for increasing ecommerce conversions. Because those customers are speaking from their own experience of having tried your product or service for themselves, they can provide persuasive first-hand evidence of its benefits. So make it a point to get their feedback and share it with others. A good ratings-and-reviews program will enable you to systematically collect reviews and publish them on your website – as well as share quotes from them through other channels such as ads, direct mail and in-store signage. Look for a solution from a reputable vendor who can help you establish best practices for a successful effort.

Worried that you might get bad reviews? Don’t be. You’re bound to get some negative reviews when you invite customers to comment. But rather than looking at a less-than-stellar review as a liability, think of it as an opportunity. You may discover there’s a problem with a product or service that you didn’t know about before, and you’ll have the chance to find a way to fix it. And when you do, you may very well convert that customer into a fan and an advocate for your business. That’s almost as good as – or maybe even better than – converting a visitor into a customer.

Fill in the Information Blanks

It should come as no surprise that providing shoppers with sufficient information about a potential purchase is an important step in converting them into buyers; after all, would you buy something online if you didn’t have all the information you need to make that decision? Of course, you can’t possibly address every single point of information a customer might want right there on your web page. You have to find other ways to be sure customers can get all the information they need to choose to buy your product or service. Two effective approaches are Q&A content and Live Chat capabilities.

Adding Q&A software to web pages is a great way to provide a potential customer with additional information to make a buying decision. As this example shows, Q&A content typically appears on a product web page as a link to existing Q&A content that’s been built up over time as people have asked questions while looking at the product. Shoppers can either browse through that content or ask a new question, which you can in turn add to the Q&A content to enrich it even further. This way, if someone is poised to hit “Add to cart” but won’t be comfortable doing it until they know for certain a particular point of information, they have a place to go to find the answer or ask the question.

There are times when a customer wants to have a question answered by a live person – either because that’s simply their preference, or because they’re experiencing an immediate issue that they need to resolve before they can complete their purchase. For example, if a customer is trying to use a coupon code during checkout and it’s not working, opening up a live chat window to ask a service representative to resolve it may be the way to go. Getting the issue resolved on the spot can mean the difference between going through checkout and abandoning the cart. According to at least one survey, live chat was the deciding factor in making a purchase for 38% of the respondents.

Make It Easy to Make the Purchase

Overly complex, time-consuming processes for buying a product or service online can stop customers in their tracks. From using too much jargon to requiring too much customer information, anything that frustrates a potential customer or slows down the purchasing process can result in a lost sale. According to Statista, two of the main reasons people abandon website shopping carts are navigation that’s too complicated and purchases that take too long.

Do yourself a favor, and keep it simple:

• Include simple, prominent “order now” buttons that are optimally designed and placed.
• Provide flexible payment options, including all major credit cards and alternatives like PayPal.
• Allow customers the option to buy without having to register on your site.

After you’ve worked to get people to your website, don’t risk losing them when they’re so close to buying. Tell them what they need to know to keep moving toward a purchase, from other people’s opinions to specific product information, and then make it easy for them to take the next step once they’ve made up their minds to buy.

The post 3 Ways to Convert More Website Visitors into Customers appeared first on Answerbase.