{Welcome back to the Damn, I Wish I Thought of That Email
Newsletter. This is text of the great issue all of our email
subscribers just received. Sign yourself up using the handy form on the
left.}
When a customer commits a mistake on your site, it's your fault. Watch for
these trends and look for opportunities to improve your site.
1> Search results
2> Mistyped URLs
3> Abandoned forms
4> Check it out: A collection of epic mistakes
1. Search results
Customers using your internal search are looking for something specific that
they can't readily find on their own. Catalog retailer Fingerhut discovered that
55% of on-site searches were returning no results. Upon fixing a mere 15% of
these failed searches, Fingerhut saw conversion rates increase 26% and projected
over $1 million in incremental annual revenue to the company within a year.
The Lesson: Search results are where you'll learn what customers want and
what content on your site is hard to locate.
Learn More: Fingerhut research
2. Mistyped URLs
Take a look at the URLs that are sending people to your 404 "error" page. It
could be a result of a dead link somewhere on your site, or it could be that
visitors are being forced to guess how to find specific content. The North Face
takes full advantage of their error page with their "404 Goat" that eats their
links and pages, as well as a link to let them know how the error occurred.
The Lesson: Use your 404 page to find ways to make your site easier to
navigate — and to have some fun.
Learn More: The North
Face 404 page
3. Abandoned forms
If a large percentage of your forms are being abandoned, it could be a signal
that you're asking too much or you're not giving a good enough benefit to
filling out the information. Likewise, if you're getting bad information, your
form itself may be confusing and poorly designed. Keep your forms simple,
focused, and only ask for the information you really need.
The Lesson: If a lot of people are abandoning your forms, you're frustrating
a ton of prospects and customers.
4. Check it out: A collection of epic mistakes
While we're on the mistake theme here, check out the web's biggest collection
of mishaps: The FAIL Blog. It's a nearly constant stream of videos and photos of
blunders, screw-ups, and goofs — and even includes the occasional "WIN."
Learn More: FAIL Blog
Share This Post
Thanks for the word of mouth! Your message has been sent!
Please enter a valid email.
Your email failed. Try again later.
ConAgra Foods: Embracing a social media culture
Kraft: Building structure around social media management
BlogWell: How Big Brands Use Social Media
SMBC: Building social media to scale
Microsoft: Learning (and playing) with Ribbon Hero
{ 1 comment }
Re #2. Better yet, don’t ask your users to send you information about the missing page. Just write a script that automatically sends you that information via email and/or db. Get the bad link and the referer to that page. We do that, as well as registering the 404 hit in google analytics.
http://www.groupcard.com/badlink
Comments on this entry are closed.