Recent research shows that the average website visitor leaves within the first 9 seconds.
Nine!
That’s long enough for the average person to blink slightly more than twice!
So… in a little more than two blinks of an eye, your website has to do something to win a visitor over.
The good news is that it is very possible. After all, a hummingbird can flap its wings 630 times in nine seconds – and it is not as smart as you are!
So, what is the key?
This is a complex topic that will require several articles to cover, but it all starts with one thing: Making your visitors feel welcome.
How?
Well, it’s not by posting, “Welcome to Our Website!” Research has shown that websites that take this tack get nothing in return.
Why?
Imagine showing up somewhere that employs greeters, and the person shakes your hand with their mind a thousand miles away. You are not going to feel welcome.
But…
If that greeter stops the line and makes you the center of the world…
You’ll feel welcome.
Think back to your dating life. You go out with two different people. They are equal in every way except that one only talks about themselves, and the other is interested in you.
There’s no question; the second one is the person who gets the second date.
It’s the same way with your website. If the content on your site is nothing more than, “We…we… we…” your company comes across as only caring about itself.
The 1970’s want its brochure back!
Fifty years ago, business materials were filled with “We are… we have… we did…”
Thanks, in part, to social media, the market today wants interaction and caring. It doesn’t care upfront if you’ve been in business for seventy years. It cares that you care.
The trick to building trust with your online visitors through caring is how. Since you can’t interact with each visitor interpersonally in the first nine seconds, most companies have created what amounts to an online brochure—like the printed brochures companies put out fifty years ago.
But this is not the 1970’s, which creates an opportunity for your business to beat your competitors.
So what is the key?
It all begins with your market research –specifically, your buyer persona.
Let me explain.
If your company sells eyeglass cleaners, do you care if someone looking for welding supplies leaves your website? Of course not. You’d rather they did because they would not be happy customers if they bought your product and tried to use it in the welding process.
But you want people who need eyeglass cleaners to stick around… and you know what their problems are and how your product solves them.
So…
Talk to that group of people – and only that group– on the page where they find you! Usually, that means your home page.
Show them that you know the problems and frustrations of dirty eyeglasses. Show them that you are familiar with how inconvenient the standard industry packaging is, how it creates a hazard – or an environmental issue – and how you’ve fixed that problem with your revolutionary new package design. Or whatever your customers are concerned about.
The point is to talk to your website visitors as people who you are genuinely interested in and who need the solutions you provide. This will catch the eye of those visitors who are looking for you. It’s not the only step required for website conversion, but like that date, it will go far toward getting that second look!