Have Your Visitors Eating From The Palm Of Your Hand
31 May 2008
Ever wonder how you can build a relationship with your website visitors? If not, you should be.
Fact: People buy from people they trust. Building a rapport with your visitors is a sure fire way to turn that visitor into a customer. It's not as difficult as it sounds. I don't mean getting into a personal first name basis with every one of your visitors. That's impossible. But there are ways of building rapport and trust with your visitors. As someone doing business online, this is absolutely vital.
I've written in the past about ways to improve your sales and all of them involve some form of building trust with your visitor.
It's All in the Writing
Writing sales copy that the reader can relate with is crucial. You always need to write a sales letter with the reader in mind. Answer any questions they may have in your letter and you are practically guaranteed a buyer. The trick is to get out of your own head and into the visitors. Place yourself in their shoes. Would YOU want to buy your product after reading your own sales letter? It's an ego thing. Forget your ego and consider the ego of the reader.
Just Be Yourself
Personality goes a long way. All to often I read letters that sound so phony. Some marketer is trying to sell me with a "technically" written sales page. Sure all the bullet points, advantages, benefits and bonuses are there. But the sales letter has no personality. It's as if a robot wrote it (and that's probably what happened, using some pre-packaged sales letter wizard software). In my opinion, sales letters — or writing period — are much more effective if the writing feels like a real person. Joe Vitale says you should "write how you would talk". If you use slang, then write with some slang. It gives your writing a personal touch. That is something people can relate with and helps build a rapport.
I am not a technically trained writer. I am not even a very good writer (hey, I admit it). I do try to write in my own personality. I generally have no problem meeting new people and making friends. I feel like I am a likable guy and so I just write in my own personality. So far it has served me well enough. In fact, if you haven't yet, why not take a quick second to subscribe to my RSS feed and judge for yourself ;)
Prove You're Trustworthy
There are other things to consider as well. Your writing and personality are key to building trust but the visitor also has to know his information is safe. They also have to know that their gut feeling is correct — that you are in fact trustworthy! Some key things to help out here are Testimonials from previous buyers of your product. Some people feel these are cheesy. I never understood that feeling. Your visitors can relate to testimonials because they see other "regular people" who have bought your product and were so satisfied with it, they went out of their way to let you know! Video testimonials are best.
Etc.
Some more drastic steps can be paid services that vouch for your character. This can be things like the BBB Online program or Hacker Safe. While these aren't necessarily required, they will go a long way in the readers mind.
Sure there are many other ways of building a relationship with your websites. Far too many to cover in a single post. Think creatively and you will come up with your own unique flares that your visitor can relate to, which will lead to more sales.
Now go get to work...