Is your website giving customers what they expect…?  The components of your marketing campaign — website, advertising, social media presence, message — all must be cohesive, or conversion rate suffers.  This is especially true for small businesses, and even more so if you’re among the smallest of those: a sole proprietorship.

FACT:  When your marketing campaign isn’t cohesive, Web visitors fly the coop.

Therefore, tweaking your marketing to ensure its cohesiveness is one of the fastest FREE ways to boost conversion rate exponentially – across all ad sources.

Q: How do I make my marketing campaign “cohesive”?

A: STOP thinking of the following four aspects individually. START thinking of them as four inseparable parts of a whole:

Your ad¹
…in some online venue²
…drives traffic to a website³
…that’s focused around your primary offer⁴.

All four components must provide what the prospect expects, or they will not “convert” from “prospect” to customer.

And that ain’t good.

Note, a website’s ultimate conversion rate is not just influenced by the content physically on the site.  Many things go into it: traffic source, quality of traffic, ad copy, etc.

That’s the point.

So being cohesive and strategic in your marketing as a whole will boost conversion of the site.  Got it?

Four Foundational “Cohesiveness” Requirements to Boost Conversion of Your Website

1.  A relevant ad.

Write an ad (using AIDA) that effectively captures prospects’ attention and gets them to take action – basically, getting them to visit your website where it will close the sale (or get whatever desired result) for you.  (Tip:  Results-oriented websites exist solely for this purpose.)

AIDA is the simple little formula you should be following when creating any and every marketing piece (flyer, ezine ad, banner, blog ad, full-blown sales letter, etc.) in your marketing campaign.  It stands for:

Attention:  Capture theirs.
Interest:  Generate it — make ‘em curious.
Desire:  Inspire it — make ‘em desperate to learn more.
Action:  Spawn it.  Tell ‘em what to do next.

Properly teaching AIDA requires much more space than I have here, so I promise to write about it later.  (Subscribe to the blog to be notified when I do.)

2.  A relevant ad venue.

Have you placed your ad somewhere your target audience is likely to hang out?  Sure, people who want to lose weight are, well, all over the place.  But does that mean you should advertise your business, umm, all over the place?  No.

A weight loss ad on a custom flooring website is just a costly fail, no matter which way you slice it.  Don’t do it.

Think about whether your prospect will be in a “weight loss” frame of mind when browsing “Website X.”

If the answer isn’t a snappy, “Absolutely!” then do not advertise on “Website X.”

3.  A results-based website. (Yours.)

Your ad sets an expectation in your prospect’s mind.  It creates the desire for something specific.  It generates interest toward a particular thing.

Does your website then satiate that desire and feed that interest… or does it leave people hanging?

One of the easiest ways to instantly boost conversion rate is to refine your landing page’s focus.  (<–tweet this)  Since our marketing is one unit, and not various unrelated pieces, for maximum marketing response, we must view the landing page as an extension of the ad(s) we use to drive traffic there.   (<–tweet this)

4. Your primary offer.

Provided that the relevancy of your ad source supports your ad…which generates desire and leads prospects to a website that further influences them to finalize the action (buy/subscribe/donate/contact/etc.)… does your product then deliver what the rest of your campaign has led them to expect?

I won’t spend much time here, as it’s obvious that your offering needs to be quality enough to support all the effort you’re putting forth to market it.  But remember:

Offering a crappy product or dismal support is not the only way to end up with dissatisfied clients.

You can have an exceptional product… but if it’s not what you’ve led the client to expect, return rate will be high, and satisfaction low.  (<–tweet this)

Case in Point: One Prime Example of Incohesive Marketing

While on a website researching how nonprofits can inspire more charity donations, I saw, below the article, four health-related ads.  (Huh?  Okay, whatever.)

I clicked the top one — you know, because I’m easily distracted — and because I was promised…

Since I’m trying to eat more veggies, I figure they may as well be the ones that “kill” my arch-nemesis, the adipose (if I can stomach them).

So away I go.

This takes me to a website with a headline that reinforces what I was after… but oddly, I don’t even notice the headline at all.  (Not until I went back to get these screenshots for you.)  No, instead of reading a word, I immediately and forcefully grab the scrollbar with my mouse, yanking that joker down the page, steadfastly in search of the bulleted list — Numbers 1 through 7 — the fat-slaying foods I was promised.

First bummer, there’s nowhere to yank the scrollbar to — the page is only one screen long.  Fine.  But not really… because I’m losing patience fast.  (I was initially researching charity donation stuff.  Remember?)

I press on.

At page bottom, there are two images:

I click on it (the picture, not the link — another important thing to note), and then…

“Hi, my name is Dr. Charles.  And P–”

At that point, I give up, click away, disgruntled… and begin to write this article.

What happened there…?

When I clicked on the pic to visit Page 2 of this website, a video started immediately, with some random guy — oh, “Dr. Charles” — spouting off at me.  There was no way to turn him off or down, and then a ridiculous cartoon line drawing started (???) that I truly didn’t care to experience, thanks.

And STILL nothing had answered the question of where the @#$% these seven magic foods were that were going to burn away my abdominal fat.

So just that quickly, three clicks later — maybe 4 seconds, tops — Dr. Charles had lost me.

His marketing campaign wasn’t cohesive:

His ad promised me something his website didn’t immediately deliver.

Considering the fact that I came from a website COMPLETELY unrelated to anything health-oriented, I also wasn’t in the frame of mind to be digging around for more information on the topic of fat loss.

Doc’s ad did the job.  He used AIDA successfully and got me to act… but AIDA shouldn’t end with the action of the ad:

For the highest marketing response, your website must support the efforts of your total marketing campaign.

Yes – your website is a vital part of your overall campaign, critically affecting marketing response.  Evaluate its effectiveness now by asking yourself the following questions:

1. Will my website seem relevant to visitors — a logical and connected next step?

Tip: Consider where your audience is coming from to get to your site.  Consider their frame of mind at the time they’re seeing your ad.

If I were researching fat or weight loss, for instance, I would’ve likely given the good doctor at least a few more moments to see where his ridiculous line drawing was taking me.  (Well… no I wouldn’t.  No video fast-forward!?  I HATE THOSE THINGS.  But if I’d been given control over my experience, then I would have.)

Remember:  As a visitor, I’m already impatient (e.g. not willing to give this person more than a few seconds) because I’m following an off-topic distraction.

Tip: When your ad leads prospects to a website relevant to their current experience, they’re more receptive to your pitch… and marketing response improves.  Don’t kill conversion rate by targeting the right people at the wrong time.  (<–tweet this)

2. Does my website respect users’ time?

Tip:  Having your landing page headline reference what your ads promise is “good”… but it’s not enough.  Make it evident right away how your visitors can find what they came for, or you’ll lose them.  Quickly.  (<– tweet this)

And that drives the point home:

Is your marketing cohesive?  Is your website delivering what the client wants?  What they expect?  If it isn’t, your marketing response is suffering unnecessarily.  Tweak each piece of all your campaigns for consistency… and boost conversion instantly — starting today.

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