Uncle Joe's Make Over Diary

[joe.pistell]

3/11/2011

Dear Diary. I am going to press into virgin territory and begin the Used Car King.com makeover. My goals are to DOUBLE lead counts with no new ad dollars spent (aka double the conversion rate) and boost engagement metrics 25% (time on site, pages seen, etc).


Phase1 for makeover for Used Car King - Used Cars & Trucks | Syracuse, Utica, Binghamton, Rochester, Central New York REQUIRES talking to our shoppers to see what they like and dont like.

I've added the free 4Q survey to the site to get a read on the overall score of my site.

I'm a big believer in Avinash Kaushik's belief that shopping is a TASK and web sites are here to help shoppers COMPLETE TASKS.

Survey questions:

1. What is the purpose of your visit to our website today?
2. Were you able to complete your task today?
3. If you were not able to complete your task today, why not?

more as it comes...

 

[joe.pistell]

While I collect a few hundred site wide surveys using the 4Q system, I'll be driving my developer pals at HomeNet nuts. I'll ask Matt and Mike to build a survey that can return feedback from a specific page and group them by class(i.e. finance, tradein, VDP, etc).


A survey lives or dies on the quality of the questions asked AND you must keep it simple.


Did you find what you were looking for on this page?
Yes or No.

Was it easy to find?
1-2-3-4-5 (1 = easy, 5 = hard)

Was it helpful
1-2-3-4-5 (1 = easy, 5 = hard)


Cant find something?
Whats missing?______open text______


I love the 2tab invite system found on the right side of GoPro Official Store: Wearable Digital Cameras for Sports
(CAUTION:Video on site is addictive!!!)


I am a believer that if you satisfy the task of the visitor, you'll be rewarded with repeat visits or the sale itself.

 

[joe.pistell]

Great Feedback coming in already!

"...the worst thing about this site is the continuous pop-up asking if i want help. say 'no' and navigate to another page and it pops up again. gets so annoying that i leave and go elsewhere."

I have been RANTING on this topic to Chat vendors for YEARS on this topic and they look at me like I am from mars. Grrr...

Todd Smith of AE has built a solution for me but I haven't rolled it out. No excuses. My Bad.

 

[Ryan Thompson]

You should turn this into an e-book Joe! "how i turned my website into a lead machine" - Be great to see the story in play by play mode. Good luck with everything Joe, I'm sure it is going to be a masterpiece.

 

[Bruce Novicky]

Our lead count has more than doubled since I started in Jan 2010... but man once you hit that wall you need to get really innovative to boost without spending... I wish you well Joe.

I am always fearful of the type of traffic we drive to the site... if it kills the conversion metrics it was a waste... the key is keeping conversion steady while increasing traffic. Easier said than done.

 

[joe.pistell]

TY Ryan. It's a labor of love 4sure... and it's NOT for everyone.

My site is an indie site, it gives me flexibility that only small and nimble boutiques can offer. It was custom built by the brave souls at HomeNet. I dream up the marketing concepts, refine them, draw mockups in photoshop, define technical logic and rules as best as I can, then turn to my very smart developers (Matt n Mike) to hammer out the details.

The process of evolving an idea into a feature that sells more cars ain't easy. Matt and I have been on the phone 1-5 times a week for the last 3 years, refining and tweaking. I easily have thousands of emails between us.

This also would never have happened without the complete trust and financial commitment of our owner. What we're doing here ain't cheap.

more as it comes...

 

[joe.pistell]

Our lead count has more than doubled since I started in Jan 2010... but man once you hit that wall you need to get really innovative to boost without spending... I wish you well Joe.

I am always fearful of the type of traffic we drive to the site... if it kills the conversion metrics it was a waste... the key is keeping conversion steady while increasing traffic. Easier said than done.

Ecurb,

Know what you mean. More traffic can drive conversion rates lower. BUT, be careful! If you dwell on that "teeter-totter relationship" alone, then you may miss some other opportunities.

STOP DWELLING ON CONVERSIONS (and the ratios).
If you optimize for conversions then HOW or WHY optimize for the minority?? We all know that 90% of your BUYERS never send your store an email... yet we score ourselves on this metric? See what I am saying? If you optimize for the FEW and not the many, all your doing is making the HIPPO HAPPY.

Here's my take.
We are not ecommerce sites, we operate CATALOG sites. The ecommerce site pays the bills by a conversion. We do not. It is our job to ENGAGE the visitor and keep them riveted to our site. In my world, because the vast majority of shoppers PREFER to remain in stealth mode, I must embrace these silent bastards that drive me nuts!!

If you want to make your stealth shopper happier, Optimizing our catalog site MUST be dominated by engagement stats (time on site, # pages viewed, % return, etc). Improve these numbers and you'll see buyers trickle down the pipe.

p.s. my site lead count is up >500% from the old site I replaced. Last year I added ONE LEAD TOOL and my excellent lead counts doubled year over year. Many secrets to the mystery are in my DR post Autotrader and Cars.com need a link to a dealer website | DealerRefresh

 

[joe.pistell]

Dear Diary... Makeover will juggle

• New Look
• Improved Navigation
• Upgrade to new database
• New SEO architecture mods
• New SEO landing pages
• Reduced Page Load times
• Adding New Features (& improving old ones)

Optimization to include A/B Split testing


Goals:

• More SEO traffic
• Better Engagement Metrics (time on site, pages seen, return visits, etc)
• Better Conversion Rates (more leads)
• Reduced PPC costs (higher quality scores)

 

[joe.pistell]

Todd Smith & team of ActivEngage has already turned on the "chat park" feature. We'll see if it impacts use.

4Q survey has nearly 150 entries. I am scoring well. Comments are nearly all favorable. Negative comments are all about product (i.e. "I want a YELLOW xterra", "you don't have what I want", "your prices are too high", "the car I want is gone!", etc...)

From the survey, I see a big opportunity for a wizard tool to help shoppers find a match.

 

[Jake L]

Todd Smith & team of ActivEngage has already turned on the "chat park" feature. We'll see if it impacts use.

4Q survey has nearly 150 entries. I am scoring well. Comments are nearly all favorable. Negative comments are all about product (i.e. "I want a YELLOW xterra", "you don't have what I want", "your prices are too high", "the car I want is gone!", etc...)

From the survey, I see a big opportunity for a wizard tool to help shoppers find a match.

Joe, any thoughts on adding a blog to the new UCK?