Hello all! I’m very pleased to announce Mindspring Design’s first live, free webinar. Here are the details:

9 Steps to Building a Successful Small Business Website
November 25, 2009 @ 2:00 PM EST
Enter Webinar Room Here | Sign Up Below
Dial In (International): 702-473-3463
Atendee Passcode: 646377

On the agenda….

1. The webinar is scheduled to last 30-40 minutes.
2. We will cover what small business owners need to consider before they even consult with a web designer.
3. We will discuss the main steps small-business owners often overlook.
4. We will talk about what we can learn from a few case studies.
5. And you will leave with an actionable plan to get your business website started or even updated.

You can sign up below. After the webinar, I will post a recording of the webinar. And I will also be doing a review of the free, online webinar software called Dimdim that I will be using. It is supposed to be a free alternative to WebEx, so we’ll see how that goes!

Sign Up for the Webinar Here:

Volusion Live Chat Software offers live web chats for businesses who have an online presence and need to offer live support to their customers.

Live Chat is a great web feature to include if your product is complex and needs explanation, or if people need help during the buying process. Written FAQs and forums are excellent resources, but sometimes you just need to talk to somebody. And Live Chat is a great alternative to the telephone. It’s a convenience for customers that can give you an edge over your competition and increase conversions.

The free Volusion Live Chat version offers a free chat application for your computer. You download and install it in a few minutes. When you sign into the application, customers know automatically that you are online and available to chat.

You have the ability to chat with 5 people at once, from one department. And you can customize the online and offline messages that people see. You can upload your own logo and your own “LiveChat” buttons or use the free ones provided. Just copy and paste the code into your website‘s HTML code and you’re done.

I installed this on my website for testing purposes. Volusion Live Chat was simple to install and use, and I liked it so much that I kept it on my website. I look forward to chatting with potential and current clients about web and graphic design.

Is this scenario familiar? It’s the bottom of the sixth, and bases are loaded. But once again the team just can’t seem to get any runs. The crowd lets out a collective sigh. Tracking your web analytics software can be just as disappointing. Your SEO, link building, and Pay Per Click Advertising efforts have increased the number of visits to your site. But these visitors are disappearing like sand in a sieve.

Experienced designers know they should be focusing on web site conversions — not just counting the visits, but making the visits count. We will discuss just three of the many ways you can improve your web site conversions and increase the success of your site.

First of all, your web site should have definite objectives. There are informational sites, e-commerce sites, blogs, etc. Your goals should be specific and quantifiable, for instance: to receive e-mails, online inquiries, phone calls, etc. Meeting your objectives means the you have attracted your ideal web site visitor and they have answered your call to action, completing the sale or becoming a lead. How do we do that?

1. Offer clear, consistent navigation.

Your navigation should be descriptive, and lead people to where they think they should end up. This is about THEM, not you. Web visitors scan a page very quickly looking for keywords they’ve thought up in their own brains. So your menu items should include words and phrases your visitors would be expecting, not cute, kitschy titles or what you want to force feed them. Then each click of the mouse needs to take people from a more general to a more specific place — getting them closer to their objective. If someone isn’t finding what they are searching for, they will become bored or frustrated and give up. And you’ve lost a web conversion.

2. Focus on benefits & problem solving.

I can’t stress the importance of this enough. Web copy is just as important as the content of any marketing piece. Your web content must focus on the visitor’s needs, interests, problems. Talk about specific ways in which your business will meet these needs and solve these problems. Now, you’ve got a listening ear, and now you’re on your way to getting a web conversion. Writing on the web must take into account many factors such as audience, purpose, search engines, etc. So small business owners need to spend time, effort and money on quality web copy. And please spell check!!!

3. Tell people what to do.

This is where your call to actions comes in. Think back to your site objectives. Each page should have clear directions about where visitors should go. And it’s gotta be big and bold and extremely clear to web site visitors. Do some informal web site testing: ask a couple of friends or colleagues to sit down and use your site. Look for signs of confusion or hesitation, and frantic clicking of the browser’s Back Button. These are all signs that you may need to call-out your call to action.

These were just three of the dozens of ways you can improve web site conversions. Contact an experienced web designer or a usability expert to increase your web conversions. And start turning those hits to home-runs.