Hi Susan,
Thanks for the ideas. While I agree with all four of your points. I believe that the first two are really the most important.
I've found, over the years, that matching the second point, "Value of Offering," with the first, "Visitor Motivation," helps to organically
address the other two points, being "Ease of Action" and "Trust."
If people who are highly motivated to address an immediate need find high
value content that helps them get to solutions (i.e. a match of a valuable answer to an immediate question or problem), trust automatically goes up,
resulting in better loyalty and return traffic "and" such visitors also are more willing to take a few more steps, ignoring "Ease of Use issues, to
get to their answer or solution. In other words, a good answer to a tough problem makes people trust more and more willing to jump through a few more
hoops to get to their answer.
I also have learned that you can't design "Trust" into your site, you can only earn it by matching strong content
and a high level of professional services to visitor need. In other words, "Trust" is really just a symptom of being successful at achieving your first
two points and only develops, over time.
And, if you build Trust because you're providing strong solutions to meet needs, visitors will be more
tolerant of usability issues, even patiently providing you with ideas to improve "Ease of Action/Use," over time.
I hope this adds value. Thanks
for the article.
My Best,
Frank
--
Frank Guerino
Chairman
The International Foundation for Information Technology (IF4IT)
What psychology tells us about website conversions
4 factors that affect your chances of converting website visitors
Have you ever wondered why website visitors are quick to take some actions and hesitant to take others?
The simple answer is people tend to take the path of least resistance unless or until they find something they want bad enough to take a detour. Then they decide whether or not it�?s worth it.
This goes for everything from taking a new route to work to changing beer brands to switching from a PC to a Mac. (The last of which I am struggling through right now for the second time).
The point is there�?s quite a lot of psychology at play in the minds of visitors on your website. If you understand the basics, it can help you structure calls-to-action that result in more people taking them.
I�?m not a psychologist, but students of marketing and persuasion �? of which I�?m a lifelong member �? tend to be exposed to plenty of anecdotal and scientific evidence that indicates there are several factors that strongly affect whether or not someone takes action.
Here they are:
Strength of visitor motivation. In the technology market this usually means how much pressure the visitor is under to solve a problem. How big is it? How much pain are they in? How much does it cost not to solve the problem? The more pain and the larger the consequences of not solving a problem the more likely your visitor is going to take action.
Value you are offering. If your value proposition is very clear and easily understood, more people will take the action. If visitors can�?t really figure out exactly what you�?re offering and why or how it will help them, fewer will take the action.
Ease of action. The less friction in your process - the less you ask of your visitors - the more cooperation you will get. Friction occurs when you have too many steps in the process, ask for too much information or in other ways make your visitors jump through hoops. Less = more.
Trust. Whether you�?re expecting someone to hand over credit card information or just to give you their name and email address website visitors worry about the consequences of taking that action. If they don�?t trust you, they won�?t do it. A good privacy policy, strong case studies and customer testimonials, and payment systems verified by third parties are just a few ways of increasing trust.
That�?s it. Getting more visitors to take action and eventually become your paying customer is a function of how well you handle each of these issues.
Take a look at your calls-to-action. How well have you covered each of these factors?
Cheers,
Susan
Clicks 'n Conversions