10 Secrets of Sales-Driven Websites Author: Jason OConnor Copyright: 2005

What makes a website successful? It depends on what explicit goal of website is. If goal is to make money, then a successful site is one that makes you more money than it costs you to maintain, manage, market and update.

So what should you do to ensure your website generates substantial sales?

1. State Your Goals In order for a website to make you money, you have to know what its specific goals are first. Just like any good small business consultant will advise you to create a business plan before you start your business, a good Web consultant will suggest that you create a website plan, with specific, written goals. “I want it to make me money” is not enough. "I would like my site to generate 1000 unique visits a month, produce 100 new leads a month, and create 25 new sales a month” would be much more useful, even if you don’t hit your targets.

2. Identify your Audience You must know who is currently and will be coming to your website. It is very important to have a clear picture of your typical visitor. The more specific demographic information you have, better. That way you can tailor your website’s look & feel, writing and calls-to-action properly.

3. Write Sales-Driven Copy Once you know who your visitors are, you can craft your writing accordingly. Clear, concise, grammatically correct verbiage is necessary to make sales, regardless of your audience. Furthermore, less big blocks of text better. Bullets, headlines and very short paragraphs are much more likely to be read online than large amounts of uninterrupted text.

Your writing should only talk about what you can do for your visitor. It ought to explain to each reader why buying your product or service will make their life easier, richer, more comfortable, or make them more attractive, intelligent, or successful. In other words, your website copy should very clearly explain how you will somehow improve each reader’s life. Therefore, use of word “you” is vital in any sales-driven website copy. And your writing should be descriptive, action-oriented and use active verbs instead of passive verbs. “You will learn more by . . .”, “Buy Now” and “Get your Free download” are examples.

So one secret of a website that generates sales is that writing on site describes specific benefits site visitor will enjoy if they buy product or service. It is action-oriented, uses words “you” and “yours”, and stays away from simply describing features.

4. Include Calls to Action Asking your visitor to do something specific is a call to action. At end of every site section or page, you need to include a call to action. It can be as simple as, “Click here to register”, “Contact Us Now” or “Go here to download your free Guide”. A sales-driven Web page will describe specific benefits to visitor in its headlines, bullet points and short paragraphs, and then ask visitor to take an action at end. Don’t leave your potential customers hanging. Instead, compel them to do something that will bring them closer to buying.

By Edward Green

Barter trade is a powerful instrument that represents a solution for companies with available stock or services. By accepting payment in trade money instead of cash, a business maximizes their efficiency by increasing stock turnover or billable hours. Using trade currency earned, that company can pay for goods or services they want, without paying cash.

1. Barter Generates New Clientele: Allowing you to increase your market and preserve your cash paying customers. This is incremental business – clients who bypass rival businesses to do business with you.

2. Barter Moves Surplus Stock: Retailers must keep their stock moving. Barter will bring you buyers to move surplus stock, eliminating advertising costs and weighty discounting otherwise needed to achieve this.