Know-How Exchange : SEO/SEM

Can you remember back to when your website wasn't working well, and people were calling? If so, what questions were they asking? Where were they located? What was keeping them from buying? How were you able to buy from you with confidence? These are likely the questions people are still having, but not seeing the answer on your functioning website and not seeing the reason to call you.

One thing that I noticed was the your name/tagline doesn't convey an emotional benefit to your product. "Creations of a former Ethan Allen designer" doesn't tell me much.

The ad copy is obviously key to the CTR and to the expectations of a site visitor. But the bounce rate and engagement on the landing page are more important for converting visitors into customers. You should review ad copy and message-match on the landing page.

As for the landing page, it's really a catalog page ... without much benefit-copy and not a human in sight. In fact it's sterile. (Cabinets are very nice, but what's the BENEFIT? What's the emotional payoff?) I think that's a large part of the problem. No benefits. No pictures of happy customers. Not even a craftsman at work. Just wooden cabinets. I'd probably hit the back button myself.

This is just a quick observation, of course, based on the information you provided.

Both observations above are on point, but speculative, of course, and both require answers you may not have. I agree with both, adding that the photography is beautiful (furniture, too!), but beautiful site design does not translate necessarily to sales success. It may even be an inhibitor.

Here's another data-driven question: how do the numbers you report (thanks for them, by the way!) compare to before the site was overhauled? Does your Google Analytics let you compare the demo- and psychographics of site visitors before and after overhaul?

Another before/after question: is there seasonality to your business, and can you compare season to season? I would think that by August 15 people have stopped shopping for outdoor furniture (except on end-of-season sales -- a thought?) and are looking ahead to fall/winter (certainly the stores are!).

I loaded the MOZ bar (formerly SEOMoz) and it reports that you're woefully lacking in SEO-friendly attributes behind the scenes -- even though I see that you've "SEO-optimized" with a Wordpress plugin. There's no meta description, no keywords (not used by Google, but still valuable for lesser search engines), 2 outside links (a google search turns up 73, but many of them are dated, as far back as 2006. Google likes freshness as well as quality.), and NO social media presence whatsoever. (One post to Facebook from 2012, and no company page.) In good news, you're all over Pinterest -- but without your own page and buy buttons, it's clearly not doing you any good.

You might compare your site to a (more or less direct) competitor or two. This is one I have helped with SEO linkbuilding: www.lapuertaoriginals.com. SEO is not fast to produce results, but combined with some other ideas I have, you should be able to get traction (sales!) for the Xmas season. If you want to contact me offline: modza@odzaconsults.com Michael Odza

Quickly, on first blush. At the top of your site it says: STORAGE CABINETS. That's it. Nothing else. This gives me, were I in the market fro these kinds of cabinets, NO OTHER INFORMATION.

Make me work for my solution and I'll bale. Therein lies your answer.

The site just doesn't give me the feel I think I should get when looking for high end designs.

Descriptions in small font (all caps too), prices in large, bold font. What is with the cropping of the products in the pics? There's that odd, close-up header pic that seems to be always there. The products are almost always the only natural finish wood in the scenes. They often appear out of place in the pictures (show me how successful people use the stuff in beautiful arrangements.)

I have to send you an email for "Special Offers on pricing"? Great, so now I'll look like an idiot if someone I know says they got there's for a better price... unless I invest who-knows how much time on contacting you about your products.

Too long, complex sentences that waste my time because they don't say much of anything anyway. I just want some quality, fine crafted wood stuff for God's sake. But I refuse to go on some kind of quest to get it.

"Write us to discuss particulars with shipping to Hawaii or Alaska." What??

It is for these reasons, and several others, that you are getting chopped.

Woocommerce is a powerful ecommerce engine for Wordpress, Thats a good start.

If I understand your situation correctly, it sounds like the company has been successful in non-web sales but the ecommerce effort launched this year has not yielded satisfactory results.

It looks like you are using a paid search of some sort, is that Adwords?
If that is the case your ads may make a big difference, is there a compelling offer and call to action in them. Have you limited the overlap and do you have a broad list of keywords? have you analyzed the data to activate negative keywords to target more appropriate users?

Why have you narrowed down the links to only the storage landing page? While it may be the more popular item for the client in non-web sales, did you also determine that online customers looking for high end patio furniture search primarily for storage units? My guess is that the search traffic may be greater for other items, you may consider including those in the mix.

I also suggest standardizing your catalog images. establish a set of dimensions for all product pics so that grid style gallery layout looks more uniform. It just is more appealing and comfortable for the users.

You did not mention the pages typically entered and exited, do users enter on the product page? do they exit from a specific product? othe rpage? there may be clues in those patterns.

Finally, if you plan on selling high end furniture you may want to have a designer adjust your typeface and color pallet on the theme. I think you may benefit from an elevated production value, shoot for a more dramatic look. I like the furniture there, but if I was in the market I probably would have left that site and gone to a frontgate or other multi-brand site where I have more choices.

Basically, if you plan on converting users I think you need to focus more of refining your leads to high quality clicks, and when a user hits your page it should be a visually impactful presentation that captures and holds their attention. Product details should be readily available and the checkout process streamlined and intuitive. You need this to be totally easy for the users.

Also, consider Pintrest, houzz and youtube as lead generators.

Timberboxes - i remember when Brookbend asked for feedback on its web redesign a few months back. it needed a lot of work and it looks like some improvements have been made stemming from the M.Profs conversation and likely other conversations outside M.Profs. i'm glad you listened.

My question now is: Who are the customers you are looking for? And do you have any demo data on the visitors making up your Google Analytics numbers you shared up top? If Pinterest is becoming a nice home for your products (excellent analysis from Modza up there, btw), you might need to rethink how people are using your site. I suspect -and I could be way off base here- I suspect that your images are being repurposed; folks are doing e-renovations and wish lists, then doing Google Image Searches etc, and they stumble upon your images. THAT'S GOOD NEWS. But there is an opportunity there for branding to extend beyond these tertiary destinations. If possible (I'm not a master on web analytics, but deffo find one for Brookbend), think about:

- tagging your pics and following their web journey

- watermark your pics

- establish a stronger social media presence. it's A LOT of work, but it can and will pay off with its web-based word-of-mouth. obviously, the amount of time devoted to social is the question. i see that you don't have testimonials on the site still, but social can bridge that gap

- blog. i would say a very large percentage of those in the market for any patio furniture know or even care about quality differences. a lot of folks see it as disposable. let your blog speak the differences. i mention the blog because it can/will be a major source of web activity. and if not a text blog, then consider video-based blogging with a youtube channel or vine or vimeo or whatever it is that hip folks like these days. You can make excellent videos with a smartphone these days, so you don't have to spend a fortune on it.

Furniture buying off the web takes a lot of commitment and faith from the customer. I'm looking at your products, and that's a lot of $$ to plop down. Finding the likelihood that your customer-base is even interested in buying furniture in this way anymore is a big ask that Brookbend should be asking internally. Not so much that you shouldn't have e-commerce, but perhaps that it shouldn't be the only evident way for one to connect with your products.

I also feel that the new site lacks 'sizzle'. The photography in your old site works a lot better than the new photography. The current shots focus on the wood and build - the things carpenters appreciate - much more than the mood of a product in use. The old site also feels like there is more on offer - more links, more images and a little more life. I think some of this has to come through to the new design more strongly.

For instance, one reason for going to a responsive design is to better cater for buyers on a mobile phone. So imagine someone in their yard or on their deck who's flicking through some sites and images. They'd want to be able to take the photos they see on their screen and imagine how the product would improve the space they're standing in, how relaxed they'd feel or how good the meal would taste, or how neat the yard would be.

Now, for me personally I have reservations about some of the current big flat block designs. But obviously this is just the view of one person and others use them successfully. So a key is to do tests. Take your new design and old design and see how friends, customers and the odd stranger in your target buyer group react - what do they like and what's missing. If you need to, try a third option too. Next do some live testing. Try changing elements on the page (eg some of the suggestions mentioned) and see if you get improvements - maybe reinstate some of the older photos or trim some of the white space or shift to more collage type. MarketingProfs can take a guess at what would work better, but the only way to know is to test, test, test.