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We have worked with many demand or lead generation companies over the past 10 years. Most of the time when they come to us, they ask us to help them increase the number of people they convert into a free trial, a free download, or to create an account. Conversion Isn't an Event, it's a Process We always like to focus first on increasing the number of leads towards the top of the sales funnel. However, without the next step, consumption, the companies don't necessarily achieve their better but usually unstated goal of increased revenue. This is the same fuzzy focus that has companies intent on getting more clicks to their PPC ads just so they can show the increased traffic numbers without focusing on converting that visitor into a lead or sale. To tell you the truth it is not as hard to get visitors to take the uncommitted step, as it is getting them to actually use and consume the product. When you optimize for customer experience you really need to take the whole scenario from awareness (clicking your ad) through conversion and ultimately to consumption (and ideally to evangelism) into account.

Hanging out at SES Chicago last week, I spent some time with Stewart Quealy, VP of content development for SES, who told me that he enjoyed my last column about the power of a great unique value proposition. He suggested that as more new faces begin to adopt conversion rate optimization, some may not be as familiar with the fundamentals as many of us are. And of course, the end of the year is always a good time to talk the fundamentals. This week, I want to discuss another conversion rate optimization basic: the call to action (CTA).

SEO is nice for popularity, but conversion is even better. So, before you go out and start snatching up more keywords than you can shake ...

There is perhaps no challenge greater than tracking offline impact of your online presence (campaigns or other activity). It is perhaps one of the last few complex nuts left to crack. Why? Because it is hard. Not impossible. Just hard. And for now it is equal parts quantitative, qualitative and faith.

The ecommerce business is partly a numbers game. And the object of the game is to increase your sales and profitability. You need to understand how your site's visitors are converted to buying customers. Not that you need to immerse yourself in the minutiae of data that many web statistics programs produce, but to reach your site's sales potential, you need to have an understanding of its key numbers and have a simple method for tracking them over time.

On the face of it, viral marketing optimization (VMO) bears little resemblance to more established digital marketing practices. In retail and lead generation the basic principle to optimizing conversion is long established as driving people into the funnel and then pushing them down it. Viral Marketing turns this funnel upside down. The viral marketing end is really a beginning. Success starts at that single point of conversion and moves wider and the benefits of optimizing the viral funnel get compounded in ways other marketers can only dream of.

The Internet makes copying photographs, artwork, and words easy, since a relatively unsophisticated user can just browse the web saving or copying nearly anything that suits his fancy. As an e-business owner you'll want to both protect your photographs and, conversely, ensure that your employees are not taking protected work of others. After all, a copyright violation could cost thousands of dollars in legal fees, time, forced subscription fees, and potential fines. U.S. copyright protection extends to all forms of "expression" including software, written papers, charts, digital files, music, video, and presentations. This protection begins the moment a work is "fixed in a tangible medium of expression," and copyrights are federally enforced. Generally, ideas, short phrases, facts, slogans, and useful articles are not copyright protected, but most everything else is.

Once the party's over, are you leaving customers out in the cold? Thank you pages typically don't receive much design or marketing attention. After all, by the time a site visitor sees a Thank You page the chase is over, right? The visitor purchased a widget, filled out the signup form, or downloaded a white paper - in other words, the web site has won, and another conversion stat has been chalked up in the company's analytics package. Success! Check out our positive ROI!

What are FUDDs? We're not talking about wabbit-hunters or the beer of choice in Shelbyville. FUDDs are fears, uncertainties, doubts and deal breakers that influence consumers' purchase decisions. How you address them can have a huge impact on your conversion rates. PayPal and ComScore recently conducted a study on shopping cart abandonment and discovered customers' top reasons were

he final variable in the Marketing Experiments conversion sequence is "a" for anxiety about following through with a purchase. Some of this anxiety is about the product, some is about you as a retailer. You must address both. And unlike friction (resistance) which must be minimized and balanced with an attractive incentive, anxiety needs aggressive overcorrection on your website. Ecommerce anxiety comes in a number of flavors, including fears about: * Quality of the product * Quality and reliability of your customer service * Will the item arrive on time? * Will the product be as described or as appears on screen? Is it the right color or size? * Will it fit? Is this item true to size? * What if the product needs to be returned? * Is this site secure (privacy, credit card information)? * Is this really the best price? Today's post will focus on anxiety on the product page specifically.

The elements of persuasive architecture -- momentum, calls to action, credibility, trigger/keywords, AIDAS, WIIFM, and benefit-oriented copy -- depend on proper hyperlink use. Understanding what to hyperlink, when to do so, and why can turn mediocre conversion rates into superior ones.

Picking up where we left off in the Marketing Experiments Conversion Sequence C = 4m + 3v + 2(i-f) -2a, the last couple posts covered "m" for Motivation discussing optimizing your ecommerce sites for "hunters" on home pages and search and navigation. Today I want to look at motivation from a different angle. I want you to choose a landing page that is top priority for you to optimize. For example, your most profitable product with the highest abandonment rate. I want to get you thinking about which customer motivations are most likely to match your business, your products, your typical customer and your landing page presentation.

It's been a long held concept that natural search, aka SEO, is a top internet marketing tactic for acquiring better conversions, leads, and ROI. Now, eConsultancy has collected data and documented a study in the U.K. showing that natural search is the best tactic for generating online leads, concluding it is greatly underused despite the fact that it outperforms nearly all other types of online marketing.

While most of Radically Transparent is about managing and monitoring your online reputation, we spend a lot of time explaining that customers are discussing your brand and would love to have you join the conversation. New research from ExpoTV.com shows just how badly your customers want to hear from you.

Sucharita Mulpuru and Forrester Research recently released a report called Myths And Truths About Online Customer Reviews. The report covers a lot of ground, but I want to hone in on customer behavior after reading negative reviews. Many retailers have avoided adding reviews for fear negative reviews will hurt sales, despite the proven conversion benefits they deliver. From the report, here are 7 actions consumers take after reading not-so-shining reviews (customers may take more than one action)

""We really love this new website you've built! Now we'd like to send out an email to all of our customers, friends and anyone, and it should look exactly like the website except with a spinning mailbox at the bottom, and have my photo, and my cat's photo…" Ever had that conversation with a client? You've built plenty of websites in your time and could knock off a blog template in your sleep, but HTML email? Seriously? HTML email has the reputation (often well deserved) of being a horrible design medium."

E-mail marketing is one of the more effective and less expensive ways to retain and engage customers. In fact, early this year comScore found that e-mail had a 4.4% sales conversion rate in the US. In a survey by MarketingSherpa and ad:tech, 44% of marketers said that e-mails to house lists had "great ROI." CMOs told Epsilon researchers that e-mail was the marketing tactic that they would cut last-but that doesn't mean subscribers don't cut e-mail newsletters. According to an Epsilon and ROI Research study, 55% of e-mail subscribers in the US and Canada unsubscribe from opt-in e-mails occasionally-and 14% do so frequently.

Yesterday, Jeff Sexton blogged about the importance of watching your cost per visitor (CPV) and revenue per visitor (RPV) trends. One of the best ways to get a handle on optimizing these key performance indicators is to get a better sense of your traffic mix. Instead of looking at your traffic by what marketing efforts are bring the most amount of visitors and converting best, look at your visitor mix as a starting point.