Lots Of Visitors Can Be A Very Bad Thing
So suppose your all singing, all dancing, brand new e-commerce site is now up and running, all you have left to do is get people to look at it, right?
I have spoken to many business owners that think that to be a successful business, they need to get as many visitors coming to their site as possible – irregardless as to where they come from. Their marketing strategies reflect this, often centering on just getting as many incoming links from other sites rather than actually focusing on targeting the locations where interested customers may congregate.
This type of approach is not only inefficient, it can also actually damage your business. Having many uninterested people come to your site will only serve one purpose – to use up your bandwidth, and cost you money – not to mention the resources you used to get them there in the first place.
It is important to realise that for every different type of business, the target market is typically different – especially for those that specialise. A music store may target a the local student populace, for example, whereas another may target more mature consumers. The important part is to know where your target market is so you can tell them about your products or services. Think of accident claims solicitors advertising in casualty waiting rooms, or flyer’s from clubs being left in the student union of a university.
What you must do is to find out where the people most likely to make purchases from your site are – what would they be interested in, where would they go and what do they do? What is a common theme among your customers? Target these areas, and push your message on them – by reaching customers that are already interested in your products and services, you are essentially ‘preaching to the converted’ – many may already be looking for the things you provide, and by coming to them, you are creating an opportunity for them to make compulsive purchases.
Additionally, if you can target these customers often enough, and keep them coming back to your site, you can even increase the probability of them making purchases from you by as much as eight times.