Have you ever been in the mall and walked by a store that had the creepiest cardboard cutout in the entrance, or even a really weird salesman standing at the front door?
That was probably the reason you did not go into the store. No offense to the creepy salesman.
Thankfully customers online cannot see if you’re creepy or not, so scaring them away is a much more difficult feat than you may think, but unfortunately, it does happen.
Scaring away possible clients happens more often than not, but through areas that you did not expect.
Noise
Noise can mean a number of different things, especially when it is online. If there is a lot of noise on your page, meaning unnecessary and distracting information, this can scare anyone away. Nobody wants to be bombarded with information before they get past your homepage.
Embedding videos on the front page can be a great and easy way to catch the attention of the customer, but only if they load correctly. If your videos are too slow loading or consistently lagging, the possible client will do nothing but hit the back button and visit another page.
Customers want instant gratification; they don’t want to wait for a video to load.
Background music is probably not a recommended idea for a business website either. If you have implemented music onto your page, this could be the reason clients are running the opposite way. Obviously there is a pause button for the music, but if they hate opera and that starts playing, they’re not doing anything but leaving.
Ads are a necessary evil when it comes to running your own business. It’s almost a guarantee that the page you’re visiting will have ads; fortunately, most Internet users have accepted this small fee. What is unfortunate are the video ads. If you can avoid having these on your page, please do so.
Not only are they terribly frightening because they play five minutes after you’ve been browsing and scare the crap out of you, but they’re annoying and always cutting out. Use text ads if you can.
Exploiting Personal Information
Although this is usually an uncommon accident, it happens and it is never good. Make sure to hide all of your client’s personal information. Never is it acceptable to display any of their information including last names, emails or even Twitter usernames without their permission.
Sure, testimonials are a great way to offer positive reviews for your business to new clients, but be sure to ask the user if you can screenshot their Facebook status or tweet. There’s no sure way to scare a loyal client away than to post their discrete social media life all over the web.
Using a client’s real first and last name is almost unnecessary; nobody would know if the name was real or not. If you are denied permission to use their full name, abbreviate!
The Registration
It has been proven by many websites that a short registration form is the best route to take when trying to get new client information. This should actually make more sense than it does. Nobody wants to fill out a form that says –
“Name, date of birth, address, zip code, country, email, Facebook, Twitter, Social Security number, cream or sugar…”
Not only is the registration process redundant for so many websites, but it’s intrusive. Why do you need all of that information to send out a newsletter? If a possible client gives you their email, work with the information you get and reel them in later for a sale. If you’re asking for too much information, they will not only refuse to sign up for your newsletter, but you may be losing out on a promising client.
Sign up for our FREE newsletter to get exclusive additional marketing tips and more!
