The most common way to track and measure the effectiveness of a website is by measuring what is known as the ‘conversion rate’. This means, the amount of users who follow through with the action (or actions) that you want them to. In many cases with corporate websites this action is to make an inquiry.
It’s commonly thought that an increase in inquiries means your website is successful and doing its job, and for this reason many website owners want it to be ‘as easy as possible’ to make inquiries and do initial business via their website. Now, while it’s important there are no road blocks on your website – I’m not sure that making everything easy peasy is always the way to go.
The real goal here is an increase in the right inquiries; the inquiries that you know have come from those who are willing to make some sort of investment to work with you. The best investment from a potential new client is an investment of time and effort. If you were to make it so easy to become your customer that anyone can do it in their sleep, then I suggest you may see a huge increase in the amount of inquiries… but would they be the right type? It’s more likely that they would be inquiries from people who do not understand the value and effort from your behalf to engage with them, answer their queries and build a relationship
(Note: I am not talking about ALL industries here – obviously there are some industries where the only investment required by a client or potential client is money. Your local corner store does not ask for investment past the dollar value of what you are buying).
Don’t be afraid to make things less easy.
It can be quite a scary thing to think that you might introduce a process or system that makes it less easy to inquire or do business with you. But – if the process/system is being introduced for the benefit of both parties – there’s no reason not to.
I went shopping with a friend last week for new running shoes. We went to a few sports stores and browsed and then ended up in The Athlete’s Foot. Before even trying on any shoes, my friend was made to take off the shoes she was wearing and have her foot measured. I don’t care much for watching other people’s feet being measured so this gave me a chance to check out the Air Jordans and think about my basketball playing days.
Next thing I knew she was standing on a sensor pad getting her foot sized up for measuring her arch and weight distribution. Lastly – she had to walk across the sensor pad to have her ‘roll’ measured. This is what they call the ‘Fitprint’ Service. Sounds like a lot of work, but this does a few things (other than measuring her feet and giving me time to perv on a pair of Hi Tops I’d never wear, of course).
This approach asks my friend to invest in the purchase process, and go through the process that the company has decided is beneficial to both the customer and the store. If she did not want to go through and have her feet measured and assessed she could have gone to a number of other sports stores and just tried on the pair that appealed the most to her visually. Unfortunately the chances of the prettiest shoe being the best fit for her are slim, even if she thinks she knows what she needs. If she were to go and buy the shoe that she thought was the prettiest in another store – chances are she’d be complaining about shin splints after one trip to the letterbox. So the staff at The Athlete’s Foot are trained to find out exactly what you need before even letting you try on a shoe, asking you to invest in the purchase process.
In many cases – a Company’s internal process (such as the ‘Fitprint’ Service) can seem arduous to the outside world, but it has to be understood that they are usually there for a very good reason! The Athlete’s Foot example tells me several things. It shows that they care about what they do and don’t just want to make a sale – they want to make the right sale. Additionally – they’re eliminating people who are just browsing and ‘having a look’. If I’m just window shopping for shoes then I’m not at the point where I want to invest my time and effort just yet, and ultimately, if I’m not ready to invest time for a purchase – then why should the staff invest their time trying to help me find a pair of shoes?
So processes might make it ‘not so easy’ but they help to ensure that your customers and potential customers are the ones who understand that the value you add is worth some investment on their behalf.
[ Yes, another note: I’m not suggesting making an inquiry or sales process unnecessarily complicated – I’m just talking about asking for a small investment of time/effort to build a working relationship ]
About Emily
