Build Trails for Customers that Don’t Dead End
You see it all the time: web marketing that fails to satisfy customer
wants and needs in the buying process from first exposure to
conversion. The problem is that it’s so easy to simply leave a buying
trail that you’re on with the web. All it takes is a click. This puts
buyers in total control and makes them uber-sensitive to what they
engage with online. The challenge for us as site owners and marketers
is to build trails from exposure to conversion that customers won’t want
to leave.
So,
when it comes to providing the “scent” that an online customer can pick
up on, what does it mean to build a “trail”? Well, studies have shown
that when people search for a solution to their need/want/problem
online, they behave very similarly to animals on the scent trail of
their food. They pick up a scent and then follow it until the scent is
broken (they’ve reached the end of the trail). They then either end up
with their food, or they experience the frustration of following a trail
only to reach a dead end. If they reach a dead end, they then go back
to the hub and start over until they’re satisfied.
We’ve all
experienced this when using a search engine. You click a result and
it’s not quite what you’re looking for, so you go back to click on
another result and begin a new trail. Or maybe you click on a result
and sense that you may find what you’re looking for, but then the trail
ends after 4 or 5 pages. So, you go back or refine your search or give
up.
All too often, the web experience gives users dead ends. The
good news is that since this is the case, you’ve got a great
opportunity. If you can get really good at knowing what your customers
are “sniffing” for, you can test and optimize your “trails” to provide a
better experience and more satisfied customers for yourself and less
for your competition.
So, what makes for a broken trail? It’s
simple really, but not so easy to fix. A broken trail is when a website
fails, at some point along the way, to help a customer reach his or her
goal, whatever it may be. As soon as customers sense that where they
are will not help them accomplish their goal, they are out. Since
people are always just one click from goodbye, this happens more often
than not on the web.
What
can you do to make sure you are providing the trails people need to
reach their goals? The first thing you must understand is that
different people are at different stages of the buying process when they
come to your site, so it should be prepared to deal with all the
possibilities. Second, you must take into account that you can’t sell
to every individual that comes to your site differently. But, you can
narrow it down to four dominant temperaments and how each of them
approaches a buying decision. If you can address the needs of each
temperament, you’ll provide more trails for your customers to go down,
decreasing the breaks in their Internet hunting adventure.
Here they are and how they approach the buying process…
To
best reach every customer that enters your site, it’s best to think
about them in this way. As you get familiar with your customer
temperaments, you’ll be able to develop more specific buyer personas
that will give you a framework for how your customers prefer to be
engaged in their online experience. Once you do this, you can then
develop testing scenarios based upon what you predict buyers want and
need to improve your scent trails. You won’t have to test random ideas
you come up with out of thin air, but ideas born from customer
intelligence that will help your business grow.
Mike Fleming specializes in Analytics and Paid Search for Pole Position Marketing, a leading search engine optimization and marketing firm helping businesses grow since 1998. You can follow Mike on Twitter at @SEMFlem. Mike enjoys playing, writing and recording music along with playing basketball to get his workout in. He resides in Canton, Ohio with a girl who threw a snowball at him one day…then married him.
Mike and the team at Pole Position are available to help clients expand their online presence and grow their businesses. Contact them via their site or by phone at 866-685-3374.
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