The PlanetDomain Blog

One of the saddest trends among ecommerce websites is the tendency for online businesses to treat customers as mere statistics or numbers on a sales graph.

But customers are far more than ‘clicks’ or ‘conversions’.

You may not have any direct involvement in each individual sale, with your website taking care of most of the heavy lifting, but customer satisfaction is as much an issue online as it is in a high street shop.

What Does the Customer Want?

A common mistake is to design a website based around what you want rather than what the customer wants, placing the business interests above those of the target audience. If the website is designed for your convenience over the customer, they may find the experience unsettling. A customer won’t buy because it helps you. They are there to serve their own needs.

When designing your site, view it through a visitor’s eyes. Set up the shopping cart to make transactions as easy as possible for the customer, provide confirmation emails and listen to feedback.

It is also not uncommon for businesses to attempt to ‘trick’ online shoppers. Using underhand techniques to bring traffic to a website, sourcing information to inundate unsuspecting people with partner offers and of course – spam.

Spam is the most obvious example of online businesses caring less about the customers and more about the law of percentages. Working on the principle that thousands of emails can generate a handful of responses, spam is purely a numbers game, where the individual doesn’t matter.

But many legitimate online businesses view customers in the same way. If enough traffic sees a poor product, chances are that some will take the bait and buy. The inadequacies of a business offer can sometimes be overcome merely by throwing more and more traffic at it.

Then again, there are some business offers that will never find a customer, no matter how many people see it.

Focusing on the Sale, Not the Result

The disconnected nature of online shopping allows for a greater risk of inadequate services and products, or in extreme cases, fraud. After all, when you receive your item in the post, often it is too much hassle to return it if it doesn’t quite meet your expectations.

But viewing online customers in this way can be very damaging in the long term.

Customers are not commodities, but it is easy to view them as such. As your only experience of them is as numbers on a report or clicks on a purchase button, the human face behind each of these actions is forgotten.

But the customer doesn’t forget. Repeat business is essential, yet customers won’t return if they feel exploited, disappointed or confused by your transaction.

Adding Personality to Online Business

This impersonal new form of customer service is testing some businesses to come up with new ways of interacting with their audience. Some of the more interesting websites I have seen use copy as a conversation, with every step of the transaction prompting friendly and conversational style of dialogue, more in tune with in a face to face situation.

Other businesses are injecting a bit of personality into their websites with blogs, video and images to add a human touch.

But appearances are one thing. Delivering on the service is another.

Don’t fall into the trap of treating your online customers as any less than the customers in front of you in your shop. After all, online customers have the whole internet to complain to.

Mobile phones (or Cell Phones) are a modern must-have accessory. No longer a big brick that you carry around with you to simply make a phone call, the mobile phone has become a necessity. It is also a feature-rich tool and an extension of your personality.

Mobile Phones are everywhere. From Zurich to Zanzibar the world has embraced mobile devices with great enthusiasm, and in particular the net-savvy Gen-Yers and business executives. Whether it’s the Chic fashion accessory that sits in your handbag which you can pull out to impress your friends at Friday night drinks or the feature rich phone that lets you do most of your work from that tropical island escape; the phone that doubles as a music player with the abrupt ring tones that annoys everyone in the office or the trendy Apple Iphone, these days everyone is connected.

Telephone companies in Australia are replacing traditional CDMA Networks with High-speed 3G networks for improved voice and data services. In 2008, the sale of mobile phones globally is outperforming computers by 4-to-1, with over 70% of mobile phones already enabled for Internet access, it is evident that Internet usage on mobile phones is on the brink of something huge.

One can already see evidence of this emerging phenomenon when commuting to work by train with executives checking their email, stocks and news on their blackberry or PDA-phone, whilst high-school students chat with friends on Instant Messenger, update their Facebook profiles or watching videos on YouTube.

.MOBI Domains

Dot MOBI is the Domain Extension exclusive for Mobile Phones. Websites operating on a .MOBI domain name are required to present their website in a format that is compatible and friendly with Mobile Phone handsets, so that the layout of the site fits, and easy on the eye when viewed on a smaller screen.

.MOBI launched in late 2005, and has proved to be a massive success with over 500,000 domains registered within the first year, and the popularity of some domains seeing domains such flowers.mobi fetch $200,000 at auction.

PlanetDomain is one of only three Registrars in Australia currently accredited for .MOBI domains, and our development team are working on the implementation of .MOBI Top Level Domain in our system, which we expect to come online in Early May 2008.

With more feature-rich handsets flying off store-shelves daily, and our need to stay constantly connected, mobile phones will play a major role in our browsing habits and access to information in the years to come. .MOBI is a major part of that growth in Mobile Internet Usage - will you be ready for that growth?

Register domains today with PlanetDomain.

Like me, do you hate it when a sales assistant approaches you in a shop?

I’m quite capable of choosing items myself or asking for help should I need it. I don’t need someone who doesn’t know anything about me telling me what I should be trying on, driving or listening to. But sales assistants still try to influence my sale, encouraging me to try the more expensive shoes, the larger car, the bigger stereo to provide them with better commission.

So I leave the shop without buying anything.

Yet this behaviour isn’t exclusive to shoe shops and certain menswear emporiums.

Me, Me, Me!

If I were to ask you what your website is about, what would you answer?

If you would say your website is about your business and the products you sell, then you may have a problem.

If you would say your website is about providing a means for your customers to achieve their needs, let me shake your hand.

You may argue your business and your products are about the customer so it amounts to the same thing. But from a customer point of view, that relationship is not so obvious.

Every day, I see websites that attempt to bludgeon the reader over the head with their sales pitch with a complete disregard for the factors that motivate a sale. So many websites talk about how wonderful their company is or how fantastic a particular product may be without once mentioning how these things benefit the reader.

You may be the number one business in your industry, but unless you can articulate why that is important to the average customer, the only person who cares is you. Try to avoid centering your sales pitch on concepts that talk about your success and your business growth. A customer isn’t motivated to buy from you to help put your kids through college or win you another award.

Having pride in your company is important, and showing that pride on your website is great, but avoid using that pride to sell. These things are background details that can indicate reliability and trustworthiness but they are not the core of any successful sales pitch.

“How May I Help You?”

The most effective sales copy completely reverses this concept around. Instead, it refers to the customer, their situation and their needs.

Think of your target audience. Who is most likely to use your product and why? Avoid talking about features and mention how they meet a customer’s specific needs. Don’t use jargon, but write as if you were explaining your product to your mother. After all, I know I need a car, but I wouldn’t know my crank shaft from my carburetor. By describing to me the experience of driving the car, the handling, the tangible benefits or a decent stereo and airconditioning, I understand the benefits far better than I would reading a cold list of engine part specifications and scientific testing data.

By offering a scenario that the customer can relate to, it is possible to demonstrate how your product or service is the solution to their problem – thereby illustrating the benefit. Phrasing copy in these terms encourages the reader to picture the scenario in their minds. Immediately there is a positive association with your product. They are visualising them in your relaxing spa bath. They are enjoying the comfort of your luxury car. They are thrilled by the ease with which your time-saving gadget completes their daily tasks.

But don’t assume this visualisation. Expand on it. Saying your spa provides six jest of bubbles is not as evocative as describing how six jets of powerful bubbles create a more relaxing experience, soothing muscles and calming you after a long day at work.

By putting your mind in the customer’s viewpoint when writing your copy, you will find your sales pitch has far more vibrancy and immediacy. Your website will welcome your readers in, relating to their needs, their fears and their motivations.

Don’t force customers out of your shop. Show that you understand them. Provide answers to their needs. They will do the rest.

How do you know if your domain name registration quote is the best deal? With prices varying from $25 to almost $150 in Australia for one two year domain, what should a sensible business consider when deciding on the right price to pay for their online identity?

The importance of choosing the right domain name can’t be stressed enough. After all, it is the name above your shop, the first words your customers will see. But beyond registering control of the domain so you can point it to your website, what else is there? Why does the same domain cost so much more when registered with one company instead of another?

In Australia, for example, the wholesale cost of registering a domain name is a cheap $19.50 + GST for a .com.au or .net.au. For other forms of domain; such as .org.au, .com, .info, etc, the fees vary and may be cheaper still. These prices are set by the local registries responsible for each region. Some of these domains may come with other restrictions. For example, auDA (The Australian Domain Administrator) restricts the registration of .com.au domains to businesses with a tax ABN number.

But you or I cannot register domain names at the wholesale price. We need to use accredited companies with the authority to register and administer domains on our behalf. The wholesale domain name price forms only part of the fee charged to you by this company. With additional fees for service, these additional costs can blow this $19.50 +GST into very different prices.

So when considering which company to go with to register your domain names, you will need to consider a number of other factors to determine the best deal.

Do you want telephone customer support or can you work with email contact only?

Some budget domain name companies are able to afford to keep their costs so low by keeping staff levels to a minimum. This means no telephone customer support and all customer contact is done by email. May be fine in most circumstances, but when you need help with more complicated issues, an email conversation can be difficult. Also response times are much slower. You may be waiting hours for the email response you need.

Do you want support 24×7?

If you’re like me, you do a lot of personal web projects over the weekend. But if I hit a snag and have to wait until business hours on Monday to reach customer support, it can put my project back a week. If you think you may need support outside of normal business hours, you may need to pay a little more.

Are you hoping to keep all your website transactions in one place?

Granted, some of the budget domain name companies have cheap prices, but are they capable of dealing with all your other website needs? If you have your web hosting, web design, SEO and other services elsewhere, it may be worth paying that little but extra to have the same company look after your domain names too. Having all your website components in one place can make rebilling and administration a lot easier and that can save money in the long run

Do you want an easy but comprehensive online interface to administer your domains?

It is reasonable to assume that the cheaper the domain name, the less money the business has to put into other customer service features. If you will be using your online control panel to administer your domain names, make sure it is one you are comfortable with and capable of achieving what you need. Remember, if you hit a problem with your online control panel with a cheap provider, as mentioned above, you may not be able to get customer service support when you need it.

Once you know what level of service you want with your domain name, you can then decide how much that is worth to you. By comparing companies with the level of service you need, you will soon identify which one is providing the best deal and which one is relying on ignorance to fuel their high prices.

Of course, Planet Domain provides effective and unlimited telephone or email customer support with a proven online interface. Backed up by years of experience, we can honestly say we have one of the best domain name deals on the net.