Читать книгу Do the Web Write - Dan Furman - Страница 16

I mentioned a visitor taking an action — but what exactly is an action? Well, it’s whatever you need your website to do. For example, on my main website, at this writing, I don’t sell products. Thus, I measure “actions” by how many emails and phone calls I get inquiring about my service. To me, an email or a phone call is a successful action. If someone comes to my website and then contacts me because of it, well, that’s the result I was looking for.

So if you have a service-type business (which could mean local plumber all the way up to an enterprise-level software developer), your “action,” in terms of a conversion rate, is generally how many people contact you for your service (or for more information or pricing). And, obviously, if you have a site that is selling a product, your “action” will generally be a product order.

It’s entirely possible to have two or more conversion rates on the same site as well (because, as I just pointed out, what defines an action is entirely up to you). For example, if you have a site that sells a product, and you get an email from “Mega-Store Conglomerated” asking about placing a giant order, isn’t that a measure of how effective your website is? Of course it is. It’s totally up to you. If you wish, you can track your conversion rate for sales, contacts, bookmarks, etc.

Now, I’m mentioning actions and conversions, but I don’t want you to get too wrapped up in it. Knowing your conversion rate(s) is useful, and we’ll discuss how useful it is in a moment, but it’s also not an exact science. For example, all “actions” are not created equal. Take me for example: To me, an email from a wealthy, ready-to-spend corporation regarding web copy is MUCH different than an email from a broke college freshman offering me a six-pack of his roommate’s home-brewed beer to write his term paper. (This has really happened. I refused, but I must say, the beer sounded really good.) Yet, in terms of defining an action, I count both the corporation and the freshman as the same (I just don’t have the time to quantify the “good” actions from the “I’ll buy you a beer” ones). So your conversion rate should really be regarded as a loose indicator of success, and not an exact one.