Is your website Growing or Slowing?

Is your website Growing or Slowing? By: Paul Barrs

There are many ways to determine your website's success. The unfortunate part in this is that most website owners are completely unaware of what numbers they should be looking at on both a weekly, monthly and yearly basis.

In a nutshell - the numbers tell the whole story.

First up, before you can begin to analyze your website's success ratios you must determine exactly what it's primary and then secondary objectives are.

EG. Is your website set up to take e-Commerce orders Online vs. Is it's goal to generate leads for sales follow up.

As a final outcome, one of these two options will most likely be your final measuring stick. That's easy to see and understand. However, there are also many other numbers you can and should look at to then help improve and increase your success ratios.

1. It begins with traffic. Next time you go into your website's statistics data area take a look at how much over all traffic you are getting. Next, look more carefully at your traffic to see whether it is "targeted" to your website with a high level of interest in what you have to offer, or whether it is just general "run of the mill - I found you by accident" traffic.

How can you determine this? Easy. First look at what search engine phrases people used to find you. If you're selling short stay accommodation packages for the north of Sydney and one of your top search phrases is "overnight accommodation north Sydney" then this is targeted. If one of the top search phrases is "family accommodation Sydney Australia" or "sandy beaches Sydney" then this is untargeted traffic.

Another key you can look at is the average time that your website visitors stay on individual pages, and also where they navigate through your website. As with most websites the highest pages views go to the main page - but where do they go after that? How long do they stay on pages? This allows you to determine if they are actually reading the content of your pages of just 'browsing'. Targeted traffic visitors always read the majority of the content of your information pages.

Once you have determined the percentage of targeted traffic to your website, you can then compare that to actual "sales". That could be either Bookings Online or Contact Forms submitted, depending on your goal and your set up.

2. Another area to look at which relates to long term success is how many of these people subscribe to either your free monthly e-Newsletter or your free email information pack. This is another very important number.

Calculate the percentage of visitors to your site vs. subscribers. If it's under 5% then you've got some serious work to do. Your goal here should be to obtain at least a 10% conversion ration to 'free contacts' where your visitors give you permission to send them future information.

If you find that your actual 'sales' conversion ration is low (under 5%) you may want to give serious thought towards boosting the profile of your free information services.

Once you've received permission to send a prospective client information by email and you then make sure they get good quality information, you can then keep them as a "free customer" for many years - which will eventually convert them to a paying customer.

3. Finally, you should set aside the time to review these numbers at a minimum each month and then make changes to your website accordingly.

A website on it's own it usually nothing more than a waste of time and money. Your site must be geared towards performance and results, not just free information. People love free stuff Online, and they will milk you for everything they can get.

My advice is that you capitalise on this 'freebie' mentality and use it to your advantage.

Paul Barrs

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Paul Barrs's website "Home Business Mastery" is fast becoming one of the top Home Business Resources Online. Visit today and subscribe to his free weekly audio seminars through his eZine Home Business Gold. http://www.paulbarrs.com

The Holiday Season Is Almost Here

It's getting to be that time of year again. First we have Thanksgiving, in the US at least, then comes the bustling shopping season for Christmas. Everyone will be shopping hard trying to max out all of their credit cards.

Being the brilliant marketer I am, I'm going to help you get lots and lots of gifts for free. Now these may not be something you can pass along to Grandpa, or to Aunt Alice, but more than likely, something you as an Internet Marketer type, will be very glad to get.

I can't spill the beans about this just yet, but keep coming back here and watch for the countdown to begin. I will fill you in on the details a little more as the time gets closer, so keep this site at the top of your "favorites" list, and check back often.

In the meantime, read through the previous posts, and I will continue posting Marketing Tips and Opportunities, so come back daily to read what's new.

Thanks,
Your Marketer-IN-Arms,
Jonathan

Autoresponders- Essential Business Tools

Autoresponders As An Essential Business Tool By: R.G. Srinivasan

Did you know that one of the major purposes of a website is to capture visitor information and create an effective

prospect list?

Do you also know you could write a newsletter or email broadcasts with important announcements and send it out to

thousands of people in an instant without spamming anyone. Did your web designer tell you the method to do it or

provide the software for it?

The most neglected aspect of millions of websites is an effective strategy to capture the details of the visitors

and following up with them frequently and convert them to sales.

With spam laws getting tougher, spamming bulk email lists is no more the option. The emails list providers harvest

the mail ids and put out attractive ads of millions of email ids which if you use will get you on the wrong side of

your customer as well as your hosting service provider. Further uninvited emails invoke a feeling of anger in the

receiver and there is not even a remote possibility that they would ever become your customer.

The key is your Optin list. An optin list is simply a list of web site visitors who have filled in a form at your

site and opted to receive information from you.

Building your optin list involves two steps. 1. Having a website. 2. Having an Autoresponder

Now you have learned to drive in traffic to your website. What happens to all that traffic? They just do a bit of

window shopping and move on even if they are interested as they may have other work to be attended to.

This is where, if you have a form asking them to leave their name and email ID in return for a subscription to an

ezine or a free ebook, comes in handy. They leave their details which is effectively giving you permission to mail

them further. This is the beginning of your optin list. Over a period of time as you drive traffic to your site, you

build up a list of thousands of targeted prospects. Note the word targeted as they have left their details due to

their interest in your product/service or business.

Now this form is sent to an external remotely hosted autoresponder or your own autoresonder system (ready software

are available for this) which immediately sends out a predrafted thank you letter acknowledging his interest with

the details of the download of your free eBook or confirming the subscription to the ezine or both.

There are personalization features built into any good autoresponder software which would automatically pick up the

first name of your prospect that has opted in. This helps in building a personal relationship and actually increases

the sales you make.

You can set up your autoresponder with pre-drafted emails packed with information on your products, announcements,

special offers or anything of interest to your customer you can think of. This makes your sales process a 24/7

system projecting a professional image.

These letters having been prewritten can be few in numbers or go up to even hundred letters. You have the

convenience of specifying the interval in which they should be sent by the autoresponder.

Research has conclusively established that you need a minimum of 7 follow ups for a conversion.

Now you have a fully automated system which takes care of your follow up without you having to lift a finger or even

touch your keyboard.

You also have the facility of sending special broadcasts or announcement in between your automated series. The

broadcast feature can also be used to mail your ezines or mini free eBooks, ebrochures or product catalogues.

The most important thing to remember in this is your letters have to be absolutely professionally written and very

powerful to induce conversion to sales. If they are boring or sloppy they would just opt out of the system by

sending an unsubscribe return mail to your autoresponder and you have lost the prospect forever.

It is best to have the letters professionally written if you think your writing is not powerful enough.

So now you know all about it, I am sure you can initiate some massive action to make your website a cash magnet.

R.G. Srinivasan is a managerial professional, Writer and author. He writes a blog on home-business at

http://www.home-businessresources.blogspot.com for online marketing tips, resources, opportunities and online

promotional strategies.

To experience firsthand how an autoresponder collects your information and sends your newsletter to your website visitor, Click Here , and sign up to receive my marketing tips newsletter.
Jonathan

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Thanks,
Jonathan

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