What Roi You Should Expect From Your Web Site
|
|
Is Your Web Site an Expense or an Investment?
Why don't you think of your web site as of an investment rather than of an expense? Having a web site is very similar to having an investment property.
Let me show you why.
When you are buying an investment property, you have to invest a certain amount of money at the first place and then pay trivial ongoing fees (property management, rates, maintenance, etc.).
From time to time you would spend some money on improvements and renovations.
You are receiving firm rental income and are enjoying the natural increase in property value.
The very same arrangement applies to your web site. At first you are paying for web design and search engine optimisation and then carrying out some ongoing expenses (web promotion, maintenance, support, monitoring, fine-tuning, etc.).
And from time to time you spend some money on enhancements and new marketing initiatives.
Your site is getting sound web traffic and your business is benefiting from new and returned clients and ultimately from more sales.
So far both, your investment property and your web site look very much alike, don't they?
There is a big difference though. Your rental income is limited by numerous factors that are beyond your control, for instance, area vacancy rate and market rental value.
Internet, on the other hand, has no limits. Everyday, search engines alone average over 300 million searches conducted by people looking for information, products, and services.
Imagine if you could get ranked well in major search engines. The shear volume of "ready to buy" visitors coming to your web site would skyrocket your sales and profits.
How to achieve 200% Return On Investment from Your Web Site
Now let's get back to your investment property. The market is growing and you have achieved an excellent ROI of 9%. Can it be better? Sure it can. With little luck it can be 13 or even 15%. But can your investment property acquire the ROI of 200%? It's highly unlikely.
But being applied to your web site, a ROI of 200% (and much higher) becomes very visible. And it's easy to calculate.
Pretend that you've spent $20,000 on setting-up and are paying $1,000 a month for maintenance resulting in an annual expenditure of $32,000. You want to not only get a 200% ROI but to also cover all your initial costs within the first year of online presence.
To achieve that you need to sell $96,000 worth of products online. If your average price per item is $100, then you need to sell 960 items in 12 months.
Let's be conservative and assume that your online purchasers will only buy one item at the time. So you need 960 buyers (80 buyers a month).
Many studies show that an average online conversion rate is between 1% and 5%.
Because since we are conservative, we expect our conversion rate would be 3%, meaning that you need to attract 32,000 visitors to your site during the year. This is just 88 visitors a day.
A typical well-optimised online store would have much greater traffic. In fact, one of our own clients gets 800+ visitors every day.
Now let's do some math.
32,000 visitors x 3% conversion rate x $100 average sale price = $96,000 in revenue and 200% ROI.
But there is more.
You Can Do Better! Is 1,000% ROI a Myth or a Reality?
Let's assume that every web page of your site, including online catalogue is optimised for a unique key phrase giving you an additional entry point for search engines.
In other words, if someone is looking for a particular product name listed in your online catalogue, the web page displaying this product will be highly ranked in search engines' results.
The more products you have to showcase, the more entry points you provide for search engines resulting in more online visitors.
With a comprehensive online catalogue of 2,000+ products you could easily double your estimated traffic and have not 88 but 176 visitors a day (64,000 a year). (Remember, we are very conservative.)
If we take into account that your market is a niche market and you can effectively reach your target audience, then we can expect that your conversion rate would be greater then average and you could convert 6% of your visitors into purchasers.
You've been innovative and have developed a pursuing after-sales strategy including multiple purchasing, special deals for more purchasing within a certain time frame, newsletters offering great discounts, etc. As a result your average sale price has increased by 10% and is now $110 per purchase.
Now our math looks quite differently.
64,000 x 6% x $110 = $422,400 in revenue and ... take a breath ... 1,320% ROI.
Over time your online performance can only be better simply because mature sites are ranked better in search engines, your online catalogue is getting bigger, your web traffic is growing and you have a steady income stream from returned customers.
Although the above scenario may not suit all business models, your web site can (and should) deliver outstanding return on investment.
So, if you like the picture and if you never thought of your web site as of an investment, think again.
Joseph Zaritski is a Founder of Pro Internet Marketing (Australia) - a Melbourne based Internet marketing company with main focus on "search engines-friendly" web design, Internet copywriting, search engine optimisation and positioning and web marketing.
|
|
|
Created & Maintained by Empower! CMS Web Sites
Host2Sell Web Hosting | Emarketing Workshops | Site SEO Review | FREE NewsletterWeb Accessibility: The Basics
What is web accessibility & why is it important?Web accessibility is about making your website accessible to all Internet users (both disabled and non-disabled), regardless of what browsing technology they're using. In addition to complying with the law, an accessible website can reap huge benefits on to your website and your business.Yo...(related: Web Development)
Frequent Business Question: How Do You Start A Web Business?
Today it seems everyone is jumping on the entrepreneurbandwagon, and who could blame them? Setting your ownschedule, working from the comfort of your own home, andnever having to deal with a horrible commute or officepolitics again, this option is quite popular among all ages.With the advent of the technology age, it seems moreindividuals are looking to the internet to...(related: Web Development)
How To Handle Web Surfers Who Disabled Javascript
There are hundreds of millions of Web surfers today. Each of them uses one of multiple web browsers available now. You as a Webmaster create cool web pages that are full of graphic and JavaScript and look very impressive in modern web browsers like Internet Explore...(related: Web Development)
Bring Your Visitors Back Clamoring For More! Maintain And Improve Your Web Site Weekly - Part 1
80% of your Web site is Maintenance!Once your Web site is up, you must maintain it. That means changes, and each time you make a change, you may make a mistake. I'm really grateful when people point out myWeb glitches by emailing me, and these encourage me to be more proactive by checking my site each week.If your visitors get a link that doesn't work, see incomplete instructions, or read your dull instead of passionate copy, they will leave your site immediately, and not bookmark it.Before you invite potential buyers to see your masterpiece you need to check and correct all parts of your site, and especially the home page. Use the seven tests below to guarantee you loyal customers and clients.1. TEST YOU...(related: Web Development)
A Website Is Not Enough
Your ObjectiveYour small business needs an appealing and professional website but that is just the beginning. If no one visits your website and -- more importantly -- if it does not bring in new customers and allows you to sell more to your current customers, then your site is not effective. What do you need to improve your online marketing efforts?The first step is to decide on a primary goal for your website. Is it to directly sell products or services through e-commerce? Or is the goal to capture leads so you can follow-up and make the sale by email and phone?For e-commerce you need a website design with a shopping cart system, that encourages people to purchase products using the shopping cart. Both the design and written content should maintain this focus.If your goal is to capture leads, the key is to hav...(related: Web Development)
Enhance Your Website With A Yahoo-style Directory
Does your website have a links/resources page?Do you exchange reciprocal with other websites to help boost your targeted traffic and search engine rankings?Do you believe that a relevant, yet comprehensive resources page provides tangible benefits to your site's visitors?If you answered "yes" to one or more of these questions, then you should consider adding an inexpensive (or free!) Yahoo-style Directory to your website. A quality Directory script will add an air of professionalism to your website and provide valuable content ...(related: Web Development)
Selling Your Site: Outsource Or Homemade?
To the starting internet entrepreneur, there is nothing more discouraging then the erroneous realization that your dream for a self sufficient business cannot be realized without a heavy investment. This may be why so many people shy away from the internet; seeing all the flashy sites, many of which are $50 templates, people are afraid to enter the world of internet sales and marketing.One obvious, but perhaps fri...(related: Web Development)
The Problem With Paypal On Your Web Page
When I set up my website I felt paypal was a very simple and easy solution when people wished to purchase my products.For 6 months I was getting 150-200 unique visitor...(related: Web Development)
Art, Artists And The Web: Part 4--what To Do After A Website Is Designed
What to do if you are an artist after you finish your website.Unfortunately, just because you've created a website, does not mean that anyone will visit it. The first thing to do is visit a website called "Words In A Row", www. wordsinarow.com. This is one of the best websites that explains how to have you...(related: Web Development)
site-map - Copyright © 2006 Empower! Web Design | All Rights Reserved. | Web Development