Showing posts with label Rate. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Rate. Show all posts

Tuesday, February 14, 2017

Conversion Rate Optimization: How to Actually Convert the Traffic on Your Site?

pexels-photo-94654Everyone has heard the saying that ‘content is king’. Unfortunately there’s often a disconnect between creating incredible content on a blog or landing page and then converting the traffic you get from it. Webpages must be properly designed and presented in order to consistently convert online consumers. This design will depend on a thorough understanding of buyer personas, competitor websites, value propositions and website analytics. Any website redesign should rely on solid data from legitimate sources like Google Analytics.

Succinctly Present Unique Value Propositions

According to Forbes, when online visitors arrive on the homepage or landing page, they should immediately understand the value of purchasing the products or services. For example, the Internet is swarming with similar email service providers that all offer business customers unique advantages. The best option is to present a call-to-action that is directed at a specific demographic. This means that an email service provider should state that their email service is extremely user-friendly with free email marketing and campaign templates available.

Any small business owner, who will most likely have to do everything by themselves with limited computer training, will immediately appreciate the non- technical simplicity of the offer. On the other hand, calls-to-action for connecting through social media or newsletters should justify the effort by offering exclusive benefits. It may help to use clearly written advantages in bullet points with references to proven facts or research.

Leverage Psychology Principles

Business owners should apply basic concepts of psychology to their web page’s design, formatting and presentation. For example, cognitive psychology reveals that people typically organize their knowledge and experiences in symmetrical patterns. This means that people naturally prefer clarity over complexity because complicated things may lead to potential problems.

A webpage that is crowded with walls of text will turn off online consumers. When consumers are presented with a long product return policy, they are more likely to choose a business with a simple return policy that guarantees no headaches or holdups. In addition to this, a company’s homepage may display multiple calls-to-action, such as signing up, browsing the store, reading news updates or receiving free gifts. A high number of calls-to-action will actually result in indecisiveness.

Refine Calls-to-Actions

A company that simply posts what they feel are incentivizing calls-to-action may be disappointed when online consumers fail to respond. Effective calls-to-action need a short and effective headline paired with an informative infographic to help guide visitors. For example, instead of encouraging online visitors to try a new downloadable product, the call-to-action should state a request, such as “download now,” and clarify the cost, which should be “free.” Keep in mind that some people are visual learners respond stronger to pictures and videos, while other visitors may speak another primary language.

Many websites feel that their lengthy production selection process helps consumers to find the right item, but it also wastes time for who those in a rush or know what they want. Major retailers, such as Amazon and Wal-Mart, feature search engines that result in hundreds of unrelated items. Therefore, offer alternative product selection search engines for the most popular items.

Online Consumer Research

Mapping buyer personas, who are specific groups of potential customers, will help to establish the archetypal consumer for marketing purposes. Optimizing websites based on buyer personas shifts the focus from profits and products to consumers’ needs and wants. People care about themselves and finding answers to their problems, so website designs should be optimized accordingly. Establishing buyer personas will explain decision making processes and clarity how they arrive at final conclusions. Buyer personas can be created through web analytics and interviews with customers. For example, a Lawn Doctor’s lawn care services page will need separate subpages for both residential and commercial clients.

As a final note, it’s important to understand how website visitors’ past experiences contribute to their interpretations of current interactions. To illustrate, many calls-to-action for purchasing an item display a shopping cart button or a button with says “add to cart.” Both of these must be used together because the shopping cart icon has only recently emerged, so many consumers will be used to reading text.

The post Conversion Rate Optimization: How to Actually Convert the Traffic on Your Site? appeared first on Blogtrepreneur — For Busy Entrepreneurs.

Blogtrepreneur – For Busy Entrepreneurs

Conversion Rate Optimization: How to Actually Convert the Traffic on Your Site?

Wednesday, February 1, 2017

The Pathetic and Paltry Time Magazine Assignment Rate & Rights Grabs

time_istockphoto_430x579.jpg

What’s good for the goose is clearly not good for the gander. «Purchase» is not «license.» According to Time’s own website (here) » We license Time Inc.’s peerless content, brands and products to partners in new businesses and emerging markets.»

adjective1. having no equal; matchless; unrivaled. Synonyms:unmatched, unequaled; unique, unsurpassed. * source: Peerless, at Dictionary.com

Yet, that «peerless content» which Time wants contributors to produce is not something that they are purchasing like a computer or plane ticket. The software they pay a fee to license from Microsoft and Adobe, while seemingly purchased, is not, it’s licensed. They may have «purchased» a physical CD of the software, but they do not have ownership of the software to use across multiple platforms unless they obtain a broader license to the work, and pay an appropriate additional fee.

As reported in PDN Pulse (here), Karen Myers, who is Time’s UK’s Director of Corporate Communications, said “…Contributors need to bear in mind that commercial realities dictate that we will be using the content that we purchase in many different ways…» yet Time’s website Terms & Conditions (here) make it abundantly clear (regarding the intellectual property on their website) they «own, solely and exclusively, all rights, title and interest in and to the Web Site, all the content (including, for example, audio, photographs, illustrations, graphics, other visuals, video, copy, text, software, titles, Shockwave files, etc.).«

Time UK has been, and it will remain, licensing content from contributors. They will not be «purchasing» ownership of it any more than I can take that Norman Rockwell I want to buy and (once I do) make posters and lithographs off of it. Yet that is what Time UK (and as has been suggested by others, this is a trial balloon for US contracts) wants to do.

This smacks of what occurred in the late 1990’s, when Time unceremoniously foisted upon contractors, contributors, and freelancers, a new egregious contract. Many of the seasoned team of photographers, stood their ground and refused to sign, only to be replaced by those who looked up to them as standard bearers — «peerless» photographers, to coin Time’s characterization. The «new team» stepped in to fill the void, crumbling what ground those photographers were standing on. You can, no doubt, see those who were undercut by the newcomers sitting back and saying «what goes around comes around…» and not missing a wink of sleep as the downward spiral continues.

(Continued after the Jump)

How Far Down Is That Spiral Going?

In 1980, the Time Magazine contract indicated a rate of $ 350, and in about 1990 it was $ 450. In 2000 and on through to about 2011, it’s $ 500. It’s about $ 550 in 2014.

In 1980, $ 350 was worth, well, let’s set that as the baseline, and say $ 350 is worth $ 350.

Would the 1980 photographers taken an assignment for the «Peerless» Time Magazine for $ 191? No, they would not.

Here’s how Time Inc’s (NYSE: TIME) assignment rates have worked, throughout the years.

First is the middle line, which tracks the rate as paid. The top line is the rate had it kept up with inflation alone. The bottom line is the buying power of that rate, over time.

Time_AssignmentFees_OverTime.jpg

How did we arrive at these numbers? The US Department of Labor has a calculator (here) that allows you to compare buying power, over time. It’s a fact that essentially everything increases in cost over time. That loaf of bread in 1980 was about $ 0.50 and now it’s $ 1.50. Gas? Of course — more expensive too. As such, your ability to buy something has been reduced, over time, unless you get a «cost of living adjustment» in your income stream.

If Time were paying an assignment rate of $ 1,000.00 it would have just kept up with inflation relative to their previous $ 350 assignment rate from 1980.

Has their per-page ad rate gone up? Yes.

Have their employees received cost-of-living salary increases? Yes.

Where is the equity in paying those that produce that peerless content that brings in readers? Absent.

Know that if you’re a photographer now that accepted the $ 500 back 10-15 years or so ago (when it should have been about $ 750), you were undermining the photographers who tried to take a stand for better pay then. Now, when you try to take a stand, make no mistake about it, there will be photographers who will fill the void, and you can join the ranks of past Time Magazine contributors saying «what goes around, comes around — trust me, I have experienced the financial pain that proves it.»

You either stand together, or fail separately. Your choice.

—————-Related: The REAL ‘New Frugality’-Time Style, 7/25/09


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The Pathetic and Paltry Time Magazine Assignment Rate & Rights Grabs