Finding Your Unique Value Proposition

You’re good at what you do. You wouldn’t be in business otherwise. But how can you convince others that you’re the one they should turn to when they want to build a house, design a website, or buy an energy drink?

The key lies in developing an effective Unique Value Proposition and being able to follow through on your promise.

What is a Unique Value Proposition?

A Unique Value Proposition is more than a company slogan. It should embody the essence of your company, stating not only what sets you apart from other companies doing the same thing, but also in meeting the needs and goals of your target market.

What Visitors Want (Even if They Don't Know It)

When it comes to redesigning your website, you’re prepared to make a significant investment of both time and money with the goal of improving conversion rates and creating a more positive image in the minds of people who visit your site.

But your familiarity with the site layout sometimes makes it difficult to determine what aspects might be frustrating to a visitor. In order to increase usability in website redesign projects, try to look at your site as though you had never seen it before and work on making it as user-friendly as possible.

Follow the Unwritten Rules of the Web

Usability in website redesign ultimately boils down to whether a user can quickly and easily find what he wants to find. As the internet has developed, most sites follow a few unwritten rules for navigation and placement. Ignore them, and your viewers will either become frustrated or they will miss vital information.

Tell Us What You Think and Win

Enter the Conversations on Website Conversion Book Club’s giveaway by answering this question:

How can asking the question “So What?” help small businesses improve their online communications?

Be one of the five lucky winners of the book “So What? How to Communicate What Really Matters to Your Audience” by Mark Magnacca.

To enter – just give a response to the question in the comments section below.

Winners will be selected using Research Randomizer’s Software.  Contest closes on June 16th. Winners will be announced on June 17th in a blog post.

Then join the lively discussion at the Conversations on Website Conversion Book Club beginning on June 21st as we start reading “So What? How to Communicate What Really Matters to Your Audience”.

The "So What Matrix"

You’re sitting in another seemingly endless meeting.  The speaker is delivering a power point presentation. He’s in the middle of it and you can’t wait to make your escape. That little voice in your head keeps saying, “Yeah, well so what” to every point, he tries to make. Where did this meeting go wrong?

Four Common Website Conversion Problems

We’re almost six months into 2010, how is your conversion rate doing?  Is it improving or is it stuck where it was at the beginning of the year and not budging?

So, here’s an idea for you.  We’ve come up with four common conversion problems that we regularly run into on websites we analyze.  Go over your website, see if you have any of these problems, and then just fix them.

Are You Using KPI's to Fine Tune Your Website?

Web analytics ninja’s like to toss around buzzword phrases such as “key performance indicators” or KPIs.  Sometimes, though, it can seem like any and every operational metric available becomes a KPI, with little differentiation between what data truly indicates functional success and what simply provides interesting, but low value details.  At the end of the day, a key performance indicator should live up to its name—it should be an effective measurement of how well your website meets its stated goals.

Are You Still Pushing Your Marketing Messages?

As part of our internal Social Media efforts, I try to comment every day on some carefully selected Small Business Forums.

Push Marketing vs. Pull Marketing

I am very careful not to comment unless I can leave a thoughtful, genuinely helpful comment.  I am also careful not to make any sort of sales pitch and not to leave a link unless it’s dead-on.  It isn’t necessary to leave contact information, since the forum makes it very easy for anyone who wants to, to contact me.  “Who wants to” captures the essence of pull marketing vs. push.  If it isn’t voluntary, it isn’t pull.

Are You Ready to Star in Your Own Videos?

What if your business’ website could successfully tap into a pool of 2 billion daily visits?  Would that change the amount of conversions that your site can generate?  What if it was so easy that you could start tapping into this pool within minutes?  Would you want to?

Untapped Potential for Small Businesses

In just a matter of minutes, you could see increased sales, just by beginning to develop a presence on the video social network YouTube.  YouTube has so much untapped potential for small businesses, and it really takes nothing more than an inexpensive video camera and a little bit of know-how.

What Kind of Test Is Right for You?


Remember high school biology? Not the cute guy/girl three seats over, but those fascinating little petri dish experiments that had you exposing your precious bacteria to different stimulants to see which would help it grow faster.

How Website Testing is Like Petri Dish Experiments

Some experiments would have you comparing just two colonies, whereas others would involve multiple colonies with a variety of differences. A/B and multivariate website testing is much the same thing, except instead of growing green sludge, you’re trying to improve your website’s conversion rate.

Landing Page Copy: Projecting Without Screaming

Every high school drama teacher will tell you this: there’s a way to get your voice to the back of the room without sounding shrill. The principle is no less valid when using effective copy to promote landing page optimization. While generating “volume” is crucial, the key to effective copy is control—control of your tone and writing persona; control of which marketing elements are seen when; and control of how your audience can respond.