Maximize ROI: Conversion Funnel Design & A/B Testing

12/15/2004 - Wednesday, December 15, 2004 -  1 comments   

Design For Conversion Rate

In 2002, The Stockbridge Country Inn decided it was time for a facelift to their web presence. An estimated 22,000 unique visitors for the 2002 calendar year with 350 reservations made, their Conversion Rate was an estimated .62%, which means for every 100 unique visitors .62 users were booking a reservation.

The first priority in the redesign was to increase awareness of their current specials and promotions while redesigning the main core navigation elements to increase user ability to locate all areas effectively. Because the innkeeper did not have have immediate access to web mail, the solution to keep the reservations desk populated with inquiries was to use eFax software, which enables all inquiries to be filled out online through the site's reservations form and is directly sent to the innkeeper's fax machine. Combined with Search Engine optimization, a fresh new look and feel, this is a powerful tool to better assist the business model of Berkshire Lodging accommodations in Stockbridge MA.

The result? 32,000 unique visitors and 638 Room reservations for the 2004 calendar year, and a Conversion Rate of roughly 2%. With more optimization on interior subsections of the Stockbridge Country Inn website, they plan to increase traffic to 50,000 unique visitors for the 2005 calendar year, and to set a goal of 750 room reservations.



For more information, check out the redesign, or feel free to inquire about their current specials online.

12/6/2004 - Monday, December 06, 2004 -  0 comments   

New Netflix Friends Launches Beta

The new Netflix Friends program is pretty cool. It seems that they are just in beta now, because you really cant find it anywhere on the site. Here is how Netflix describes it:

"We're letting a handful of customers give the Netflix Friends feature a try before everyone else. We do this to get feedback so we can make the right improvements to the Netflix Friends feature before we make it available to all customers. As part of the Netflix Friends Sneak Preview program, please provide your feedback and thoughts on the new feature using this form. The more we hear from you, the better we can make the site!"

If you are Netflix subscriber and wish to be invited, please post a comment here or email me.

12/1/2004 - Wednesday, December 01, 2004 -  0 comments   

Landing Page Design

This week I reviewed some landing pages designs (will show later). All were designed well, but my suggestion would be to have more call to action with an offer (but no price). They look more like branding pieces (or tours) than they do landing pages. We are not branding designers, we are direct response marketers to make an immediate ROI. Another effective suggestion is to reduce the amount of copy and add of buttons or HTML forms to get push users forward to the next page.

The focal point should always be the call to action, form or promotion. Here are some examples of successful landing pages (traffic driven from banners, search or emails).

eHarmony
LavaLife
Google
eBay