Just having web site is in wan without any income. Therefore millions of web sites today focus on the area of revenue generation from their web site, already some people in very mature stage while still some are trying to finding ways to earn money through their web site. Therefore, thought to write something helpful for beginners.
As everyone know there are three fundamental ways to increase web sites’ revenue
- By increasing traffic
- By increasing Web Merchandising
- By increasing Conversion rate
Increase traffic
Traffic means visitors to the web site. The theory behind the increase traffic means, when we increase traffic, more will buy the product or service we sell. There are several ways we can increase traffic by spending money and without spending money. Advertising ( PPC ads, banner Ads, Content ads etc) Search engine Positioning , in other words listing in natural results in search engines ( search engine optimization) ,public relation campaigns, viral marketing activities ( today mostly used in social media sites) and various loyalty programs to return the customers. Most of the companies use combination of tactics to increase their traffic as much as possible, then revenue will increase.
Increase web Merchandising
This is the way to encourage customers to buy more or spend on more items at once, Package selling, cross selling, up selling techniques comes under this. Per customer spending need to high here. Some web sites offer extra services at discounted rates, then customer will spend for both product and the service and both party gain the benefit. Some create ads ( just the wording ) itself motivate visitors to become customers and spend more money on one site. Some web site keep very low margin and give the products or service at low price, then customers tend to spend more with them and they may become repeat customers as well
Increase the conversion rate
This is the area, should have more focus. Coz small changes in selling process without single spending, will increase revenue dramatically. If you have better understanding of your customers and their needs and what you sell, you can do this well. There are several ways I can noted here,
i. Remove unnecessary content on your site – visitors may come to you site with definite intention and not to go through all things you have. So make it easy to find what customers seek. Over estimating phrases or paragraphs are useless other than the benefits that customer can enjoy.
ii. Remove unnecessary steps in check out process – As I explain above point, customer wants to finish his work as soon as possible and want to focus on what he needs, most of web sites I have noted, they want to show all things they have to all to visitors come to site. It is not the wise way of check out process. Maximum three steps are good.
iii. Ensure navigation funnel is more clear. Don’t assume, your customers know your site as you know it, they know very less about your site and they want to navigate the pages they need very quickly. There is no human interaction to show the correct path to visit by customer. So you should facilitate the best navigation funnel to your customers to get the conversion rate as you wish
iv. Be transparent to your customer – display your privacy and guarantees well, then visitors may believe you, when you try to cheat your customer, long term you will lose lot, coz they never return to you.
Therefore when you think to increase your web site revenue, concentrate on all three aspects, you need more visitors and they should spend more money with you and then you will have better conversion rate. If your conversion rate is below 1.5%, you have to focus on your site arrangement, not to increase more traffic, it means you won’t offer what customer seeks. If you focus on all three aspects, and continue on improvements in all three areas, you will have good foundation to your web business and long term you can enjoy the benefits.
