With all the consulting I have been doing lately, I find I am running into the fact that most people have the same five problems in business that are keeping them from getting the success they were hoping for when they started.
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1. Packaging
You can’t just have a good product. What people are actually looking at is the packaging. On a recent consult, the student had a great product. Three products, actually. When they described what they were selling, I thought that’s great! But they had to tell me what that was. When I went to their website, I wouldn’t have known what they were actually selling.
They had everything in order to sell these products, but they weren’t displaying the things that were needed to sell it. The problem was the packaging.
When I refer to good packaging, what I mean is, is it easy to tell what the website is selling? What’s the end result when a person comes there? Do I have to try to figure out what the offer is? If it’s not obvious and I have to think about it, then it’s not going to work.
Not only does your website need to look good, but what you are offering also needs to be packaged so it’s obvious what is being sold there. Your sales letter is not a place to be “artistic” or clever if it causes any ambiguity. Your website is not art. Art is subjective; what one person likes, the next will not. But there are standards for marketing websites. Certain things need to be in place and viewed in a specific way.
Is your headline clear about what your website is about? Are your images high-definition, and are the settings correct so they don’t appear to be stretched? Is your logo (product logo or company logo) of good quality? Do your colors work together? Are they professional? What I mean by that is you don’t want to use childish colors or colors that can be jarring. You may like those colors, but that doesn’t mean they are appropriate for your website. Is your content in a concise layout over the site so visitors can easily access what they might need to understand what you are selling?
It’s not just about your content. I’ve heard it said that it’s not about the website; it’s about the copy. That’s wrong. It is about the website. People aren’t going to buy something if where they are looking to buy it from looks like crap.
2. Know Your Offer
The second thing I see is that people just don’t know what the most powerful piece of their offer is or should be. They are hiding what their product does (which is what people actually are looking for) in a bunch of copy. They are not highlighting the most exciting, purchase- worthy aspects of their offer.
I’ve seen an offer where the customer would get a full one-on-one day with the product creator as one of the bonuses. That is CRAZY. That should be one of the main highlights of the offer.
You need to look at everything that encompasses your offer, including bonuses, and prioritize the salability of each aspect. And make sure you are highlighting those items in an enticing way.
3. Lead with the Outcome
When people put together their offer, they fail to lead with the outcome. That is what people are buying—the outcome. If people purchase your product or service, what is the outcome for the consumer? Without that, the customer can’t identify what they can expect or what they will ultimately end up with by purchasing your product/service.
At the very top of the site, in the headline, you need to make the offer and expected outcome clear. At first glance, the customer needs to be able to see that your product or service is going to do for them. If you don’t lead with the outcome, and they don’t know what they are going to get, then they are not going to buy, and you’ll be lucky if they even make it past the headline.
4. Organize It Logically
When describing your product in the sales letter, make sure you have the steps laid out in a logical order. It needs to be in the proper sequence in order to get a person to buy.
You may have all the elements and pieces explaining what the product or service does and what the customer will get, but if they are not in an order that helps a person understand, then it’s not going to get them to purchase from you. Let me put it this way…if you mess up the order of putting on your pants, yes, they will be on, but the outcome is going to be wrong. It’s the same thing with sales. You have to have things in the right order.
5. Getting the Right Kind of Traffic
Most people are not going to be able to use generic traffic-generating methods because they are marketing a niche product. Sure, I can show you ways to get tons of traffic, but it won’t convert because it is too broad, too generic. It’s like throwing spaghetti against the wall and hoping some will stick—what doesn’t stick is wasted. If your target is not the mass market, then generic traffic, no matter how inexpensive, is not good. You need to stick to advertising on places where you can narrow down and target your specific market.
It just so happens that there are two billion plus people on Facebook. Yahoo, Bing, Google, and YouTube, same thing. Somewhere in that two billion is someone who wants what you have—I guarantee it. But because you can narrow down who sees your ads, you can make sure you aren’t wasting money on the wrong people and really targeting the people who want what you have and who will buy.
Look at these five items and work towards them with your products, and I can promise you will have more success in your business!
