My Website Doesn't Work!

How many times have I heard those words. You have a well designed website that was expensive to put in place. It's been operating for months. You should be getting more business by now.

Yet, month after month, you review your sales figures, and you can't see any increase in business activity since you launched your website. What's going wrong?

Google Analytics

First, you need facts to work with. Exactly how many visitors are coming to your website? Your web designer/developer should have opened a Google Analytics account for you when your website first went "live". You should have access to the account, or at least be receiving regular reports on visitor activity on your website.

This is information you need to understand how your website is performing - how many people are visiting your website in total, and how many are repeat visitors, and how many have visited only once. How did they find your website? What are they looking at most on your website, and what are they ignoring.

If you don't get this information, you're flying blind so request your web designer to arrange for you to access this valuable statistical data . Since it's available free from Google, you shouldn't expect to be charged by your designer to set it up for you - it only takes a few minutes after all, and it should have been set up for you in the first place anyway.

Check Out the Action

Now, with Google Analytics reports coming through to you, you can in fact see that your website is getting plenty of visitors. They're coming to your website because they're searching for what you have to offer. That's the whole point of having a website - to connect with people right when they're searching the Web to find exactly where to get what you have to sell. But, it doesn't seem like they're buying from you! Why?

Is the Design Right?

Does the website encourage them to respond in the way you want them to? In other words, does the website  make them take the next step of getting in touch with your business, so that ultimately you can turn them into a customer?

Have a critical look at the design of your website. Does it say enough, and in the right way, to encourage people to make contact with you about your products/services? Not sure - then ask your family members, your friends, colleagues - in fact anyone you know.

If the feedback suggests the website is failing in this area, you need to meet with your web designer and talk about what changes are required to turn this around. If the feedback is more positive, and you're confident the design is effective, then clearly there's something else wrong here.

More Statistics

Do you know how many email inquiries and phone calls your business is getting from people who visit your website? You should! Put a phone log in place and make sure your people ask callers how they heard about your business. Create a website contact log, and get your staff to record the emails coming into your business from your website, and which emails present a sales opportunity. If these contacts with your business are occurring, why are sales still not on the increase?

The Art of Selling

It may surprise you to discover that yes, the phone calls are coming through, and yes, so are the email inquiries. But, guess who's handling them - your receptionist.

Receptionists do a fantastic job at - well - being receptionists! But are they trained to sell over the phone? I bet they're not. Here is where the problem may well lay - you have the wrong person handling these inquiries.

The contacts you get through your website about your products/services are GOLD! They are already qualified since they wouldn't be getting in touch unless they wanted what you're offering.

Make sure that these inquiries are handled by your very best telephone salespeople. The phone calls and emails from your website should not come through your receptionist (who should already be busy enough). Your website must direct these potential customers directly to your best telephone sales people. If they are good at what they do, they will use their selling skills to turn these website visitors into your new customers.

Not only will these new customers boost your business bottom line through buying from you themselves, but if looked after properly during and post sale, they will refer friends, relatives, work colleagues  and others to you. This is "trusted-word-of-mouth-referral" business, and it is probably the best kind of business you can ever hope to get!

So, get cracking, and get selling - the sky's the limit if you have the right internal mechanisms to handle enquiries from your website by turning them into sales - Good luck!