Fives tips to converting more visitors into paying subscribers - these tips also apply to non-subscription sites selling products

Have you ever wandered into a store and upon walking in the door, knew you made a mistake? Knew the store wasn't the kind of store you'd want to shop in?

I know this has happened to me - many times in fact.

I'd see a store with an intriguing sign or name and decide to stop in and take a look. And almost immediately upon entering and seeing the layout of the store, the jumbled displays, the dirty floors, the dim lighting, I knew I needed to get out.

Conversely, I've accidentally discovered little hidden away shops that upon walking in, I knew I would be making a purchase. I knew I would buy something, and I knew I'd probably come back and buy again.

Your web site is much like these retail stores.

The impression you give when a visitor first walks in (sees your main page), has a lot to do with whether they will stick around to make a purchase or immediately head for the exits.

Here are five tips to help convert 'window shoppers' into paying customers.

1. Keep the pushy salespeople in the back - Don't you hate it when you walk in a store and the sales people immediatly pounce on you, follow you around the store, and won't let you take a few minutes to check out the items by yourself?

   Most people don't like this and many will leave the store and never return. We just don't like pushy sales people.

   The same is true with your web site. If you start pushing hard for a sale from the moment someone reaches your site, you will in effect be pushing many visitors away before they get a chance to view the site.

   On the web the equivalent of pushy sales people are 'in your face' pop up ads, heavy handed sales letters, unbelievable testimonials, and just too much emphasis on making the sale.

   If visitors feel you are only interested in forcing them into buying something, they will leave. So put your sales people in the back of the store, give visitors a chance to look around.
   
   

2. Keep the 'good stuff' up front - When you walk into a book store, chances are the first two displays you'll see will be 'best sellers', and 'new releases this month'. Doing so immediately gives the customer something to look at, a reason to browse further, and gets them in the mood to buy.

   On your web site, you'll want to put links to the kinds of article headlines your visitors most likely want to read right up front. These immediately show the visitor you cover the topic they are interested in, and give them a reason to do a little browsing on your site.

   The more of these kinds of articles the visitor sees, the more reasons they have to become a paying member of your site.
   
   

3. Show community activity - If you drive by a restaurant and don't see any cars in the parking lot, you might be hesitant to eat there. The logic goes, if no one else is eating there, maybe I should avoid the place.

   But if the parking lot is full of cars and you see lots of activity, you'll probably think, 'This place must have good food - there's always a crowd.'

   The same goes for you web site. If visitors feel your parking lot is empty, they may be hesitant to buy. But if they get a sense that you have a popular site, they will be more likely to join.

   On a subscription web site you can give non-members a peek at your 'parking lot' by displaying headlines from your discussion forum on the front page of your site. This lets visitors know that there other members of the site, and that there is an active discussion. In effect, showing discussion forum posts lets them know the parking lot is not empty.

   Adding discussion forum headlines to the front page of your site has another added bonus - it gives the google robots additional material to use when ranking your web site.
   
   

4. Give them a sample - Have you noticed that when you shop at grocery stores these days they often have stations set up throughout the store where host/hostesses offer you free samples of various foods?

   They do this because they know that if you like the sample, you might make a purchase. And even if you don't like the sample, you might come back to the store on other days to try other food samples. And eventually, if you keep coming back, you might make a purchase.

   On your web site, you can do the same thing - offer free samples. In the case of subscription web sites, you can do this two ways:

   • Free tip of the week - Offering a free tip of the week email is a great way to stay in contact with visitors and provide them short samples of the kind of content you offer on your site. The tips allow you to show the kind of valuable information you provide, and at the same time, keep visitors up to date on what might be new on the web site.

     On our own Tip of the Week, we include a short tip related to web business, and include a list of new articles on our web site. And invariably, within hours of sending out our weekly tip, we sign up new members.

   • Sample articles - Another way to give visitors a 'taste' of the content you offer is to invite them to view sample articles chosen from your web site.

     We do this by having a Sample Articles department our own site, and have learned that by adding a link to this department on our subscriber log in page, we get more non-members reading sample articles, and that has led to more subscriptions.

     Just by adding the following line, we have seen our new subscriptions increase by 15%:

     If you are not a subscriber, we invite you to view the subscriber benefits at Subscriber Benefits or view some of our sample articles

   
   
5. Offer something free - When my wife takes me shopping, she has to keep me on a short leash - at least in the grocery store. That's because when I see a 'buy one get on free' offer, I usually can't resist - even if the item is something I would never eat.

   Store owners, direct mail copywriters, and TV advertisers know that one sure way to increase sales is to offer the buyer something extra - something they want and can use - free if they make a purchase.

   The same works for subscription web sites. If your subscription offer includes something free the visitor wants, and can't easily get elsewhere, they are more likely to join immediately.

   This free something can be a report, a CD, a DVD, a video, a T-shirt . . . almost anything the visitor would value and want.

   But you have to be careful - if the free item being offered has no value in the eyes of the visitor, it can reduce the apparent value of your entire site. So choose your freebies wisely.

   Personally, I prefer physical freebies - CDs, DVDs, ball cap, gold coins (I worked with a site that was planning to offer a gold krugerand to each member who joined for a year).

   The point is . . . to sweeten the deal by including something free.

If you follow these five tips you should see a dramatic increase in the subscription sign up rate of your web site. (And these tips also apply to non-subscription sites selling products.)

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