There’s nothing more disheartening than seeing visitors flooding into your site thanks to some good campaigns . . . But then not sticking around.
This is the frustration Bret Hoyt Sr., president of contract manufacturer Vitakem Nutraceuticals, was experiencing.
“Our website wasn’t working for us,” recalls Hoyt. “We had visitors coming in but very few were contacting our sales team.”
Hoyt approached me to see how we could turn this around.
Identifying The Problem(s)
Since the best solutions are built on a clear understanding of the problem, we started with a website content audit.
First, through an initial interview, I ferreted out the goals for the website, Vitakem’s USP and the competitive environment. Then, by examining the website data and assessing the website’s content I gathered clues that helped paint a picture of why website visitors were skipping away at the drop of a hat.
Here’s what I discovered:
The initial copy had been well optimized for search engines. But the human visitors had been largely ignored. In fact some of the website copy was downright unintelligible.
Adding Glue To The Webpages
Drawing on my knowledge of the nutrition industry and interviews with Vitakem’s sales team, we honed in on the pressing issues most prospective customers care about. I replaced the website’s existing copy with copy that was written for these potential customers while maintaining optimization for search engines.
As a result, the site’s overall bounce rate dropped from 57% down to 40%, with some individual pages dropping from bounce rates into the mid 80’s to bounce rates in the 20’s and 30’s. These numbers told us that less people were “bouncing” off the pages (leaving soon after they’ve arrived).
Lead Generation Tactics
Now that visitors were sticking around more, we wanted to take them to the next step – initiating contact. The only invitation offered to visitors to contact the sales team was a Request-A-Quote link or a bland Contact Us option.
The site offered no opt-in incentive to visitors who were not ready to get a quote. Even worse, by making a quote request the sole contact option, it framed the whole sales discussion around pricing.
To change the focus of the conversation, we created a white paper, “6 Questions You Should Ask When Choosing Your Nutritional Supplement Manufacturer”. This paper positioned Vitakem not only as a service provider, but also as a helpful partner in making the crucial decision of choosing a contract manufacturer. And it took price away from the center of the initial conversation.
To gain more traffic, the report was also repurposed into several SEO articles that were used for two purposes: 1.) To bring in traffic through SEO and article marketing; and 2) as part of a survey and 3-part email series sent out to lapsed leads bringing them back to the sales team.
Following on the heels of the report download came a carefully-crafted 11-part autoresponder series. This series highlighted the report’s tactical information. It also prodded prospective customer pain points, reminding them of how Vitakem could help them. Each autoresponder’s call to action encouraged the prospect to call the sales team.
Finally, as an added push to encourage even more visitors to get in touch with the sales team, we created a 2-minute video. The video welcomed visitors to the home page and directed them to the report offering.
A Website That Helps Grow Business
Vitakem’s CEO and President, Bret Hoyt, Sr. couldn’t be more pleased with the results, “Since implementing the marketing funnel Sarah created, we’ve had a 20% increase in leads,” Hoyt reports. “But even more importantly, these leads are already pre-sold on our services helping us with our lead conversion.”
By finely tuning the messaging on the website, the report and the autoresponders to tap into prospective customers’ most pressing problems we made Vitakem an option visitors couldn’t ignore. The website and the report spoke to their questions, doubts and interests. And as a result, more visitors contacted the sales team and more of these leads were predisposed to like what they heard as the process continued.
Concludes Hoyt, “Overall, investing in Sarah’s expertise and keen understanding of the nutrition industry has been invaluable for my business.”
For more information on how a lead-generation strategy like this could help your B2B nutrition industry website, be sure and get this meaty report:
“How To Turn Your Website and White Paper Into A Recession-Busting Dynamic Duo”
Or email me at Sarah @ HealthyMarketingIdeas.com to schedule an appointment to discuss your marketing concerns
{ 2 comments… read them below or add one }
Every article of yours that I read has great, actionable information Sarah! I got an idea for an irresistable offer just from this article..”Considerations When Choosing Clay”…or something like that. I am going to have your website audit in Q1 in 2012. I have a list of changes to make first! Thanks so much!
Janet, so glad to hear you got so much out of this article and have solid plans for 2012. When you choose your irresistible offer, think about what your prospective customers are really anxious about – what is nagging at them. What are they dying to know right now? If you think most of your prospects have already decided to go the clay route, this may work. But if you’re trying to convince them clay is the solution for them . . . you may want to consider a different angle. Looking forward to learning more about your plans.