High traffic counts are a worthless statistic unless it adds to 
your bottom line.

Thousands of unique visitors a day to your website may seem like 
an achievement, but you can't pay your mortgage with it. You 
must learn to convert those visitors into buyers.

Increasing your website conversion rate (the percentage of 
people that come to your website and then make a desired 
action - like buying something), is the latest buzz among 
Internet marketers and a highly sought after skill.

You could hire a conversion expert for thousands of dollars, buy 
a course that promises miracle conversion increases, or you can 
keep reading and learn 9 powerful principles that will increase 
your conversion rate.


1. Attract the Right Visitors

You must embrace the shocking reality that not everybody wants 
what you have to offer. If you are selling spoilers for Honda 
cars, I don't want your product, even though I own a car, a 
Honda even.

If you are selling very expensive shoes for women, my wife 
doesn't want your product, even though she is a woman who 
wears shoes. She isn't interested in the expensive part.

Do you see how you might possibly be attracting the wrong people 
to your site?

Unless you really know why people buy your product, you can't 
know who you are looking for. Market research, understanding 
product benefits, and surveying your buyers all provide 
laser-tight focus on who your target audience is, saving you 
precious advertising dollars and increasing your conversion 
rate.


2. Develop a U.S.P.

So you have decided to sell Fantasy Fiction Books online and 
have started attracting the right audience. But ask yourself, 
"Why should they buy from you instead of Amazon.com, Barnes & 
Noble, or all the other booksellers on the Internet?"

Enter the Unique Selling Proposition, a simple statement that 
communicates why buying from you is more advantageous than 
buying from Competitor X.

Low price can be a USP, although not the only one. Walmart uses 
it to devastate their competition. "Always low prices. Always."

Other USPs could focus on convenience, selection, quality, 
reliability, better service…whatever need not being filled 
in the industry or any benefit that you offer better than 
the competition.

Developing a strong USP provides potential buyers an initial 
incentive and a reason to come back again and again.


3. Write Good Sales Copy

Sales copy is simply words that attempt to persuade towards 
action.

Good sales copy communicates the most powerful and compelling 
reasons why someone should buy your product. It is geared toward 
the benefit of the visitor, not your company. It includes an 
attention grabbing headline that compels people to actually read 
your copy. Reasons to buy are clearly listed and easily 
recognized when scanning the page.

Sales copy is incredibly neglected yet one of the most powerful 
leverage points in selling on the web. You will get many more 
people to buy your products when you form a powerful argument 
full of great reasons why they would benefit by buying from you.


4. Inspire Trust

People naturally don't trust businesses, especially online 
businesses. If they haven't bought from you before, you have 
a hurdle to overcome.

   * You can inspire trust by presenting testimonials of users 
     that have bought, used, and benefited from your product. 
     If you are in the B2B market, give case studies how your 
     product or service benefited another business. Include 
     specific numbers for greater credibility.
       
   * You can offer a powerful guarantee that shifts the burden 
     of risk off of the buyer and back on to your company.
       
   * You need a solid and comprehensive privacy policy that 
     tells people what you will do with their information. 
     They probably won't read it, but they need to see it 
     there.
       
   * You need your business contact information in a place 
     people can find it.
       
   * You can tell people about what kind of security your 
     shopping cart uses.
       
   * You can include seals from the Better Business Bureau or 
     TrustE if you belong to those services. 

Bottom line - fear can keep people from buying. You must 
overcome that fear with facts that inspire trust.


5. Create a Powerful Offer

Begging your visitors to buy from you rather than your 
competition is pointless. You must give better value, offer 
stronger guarantees, and have more convenient payment options 
than your competition.

For examples of powerful offers, watch infomercials that have 
been on the air awhile. TV time isn't cheap and infomercials 
that run for longer than a couple of weeks are probably making 
good money. Even if you are turned off by the approach, examine 
the offers and learn why people are buying those products. 
Infomercial marketers help create offers so good sometimes you 
feel foolish to pass them up.


6. Eliminate Annoyances

You can't get people to buy if they are turned off by your 
website and leave.

According to a 2002 study by Retail Forward, the top 5 website 
annoyances were: pop up ads, banner ads, congested web pages, 
slow page loading times, and difficulty finding a product.

Let your competition annoy its visitors and let them come to 
you. Make your site easy to use and get rid of the most common 
annoyances to give your visitors every reason to keep coming 
back to your website.


7. Find Out Why People are Buying

As already mentioned, you must attract the right visitors to 
your site to increase conversion rate. To do that, you must 
find out why your customers are buying from you. It may not 
be the reasons you think.

Interview enough customers and you will see several powerful 
reasons why they chose to do business with you. That information 
can help you refine your USP and sales copy to further dominate 
your competition. Always let the market tell you why they are 
buying, never assume.


8. Capture Emails

Not everyone will buy from you the first time they come to your 
web site. If you can collect their email address by giving them 
something of value for free, you earn the right to market to 
them again and again.

Say 100 people come to your site in 1 day. 2 buy from you. 25 
give you their email. 2 buy later from email offers you send 
them. You just doubled your conversion rate. Email can be a 
powerful conversion rate increaser if used wisely.


9. Test, Refine, Re-Test

Rarely does anyone start with a killer conversion rate. There 
are many ways to apply the principles we have talked about. 
Only by testing one offer against another, one headline against 
another, one USP against another, will you find out which option 
your market connects with the most.

Testing and refining helps you constantly improve based on 
knowledge gained from factual data. Nothing can be left to 
chance, assumption or whim if you are really going to make 
your website into the powerful sales force it could be.

Start implementing, testing, and improving these 9 powerful 
sales leverage points and you will see your sales rate steadily 
increase to the benefit of your bottom line.

And that is something you can take to the bank.