Which is best?

G. Lasagne · Feb 10, 2010

Ive been running optimiser for over a week now and although im getting visitors to the 2 test pages im not getting any conversions, even though ive had calls, and i have carried out a conversion and it still hasnt registered.

Because of the nature of my business ive removed the phone number and replaced it with a banner (top right hand corner), which i dont want to leave on for too long.

I reckon most people looking for a plumber just want a phone number or a price and not lots of drivvle that they probably already could have guessed and thats the thinking behind the test home page.

so in a nutshell which page would you choose as your homepage.

p.s the banner on the top right will be replaced with a large phone number on both versions.

i would really appreciate as much feedback as possible.

original

test

Thanks

awebapart.com · Feb 10, 2010

G. Lasagne said:
Ive been running optimiser for over a week now and although im getting visitors to the 2 test pages im not getting any conversions, even though ive had calls, and i have carried out a conversion and it still hasnt registered.

How can you say you are not getting any conversions when people are visiting your site and calling the number advertised on your site? That sounds like a success story to me.

What is more important, new real customers, or a google conversion counter?

I think this in some way illustrates that using google stats to track conversions can be a somewhat flawed exercise depending on what the conversion is.

If you really want to know which version of a page a customer telephoned from, either:

1. Get more realtime and detailed stats so you can see who is visiting what page in realtime - this might still be impractical if you have a lot of multiple concurrent visitors,

2. Advertise different telephone numbers with each version, or

3. Ask the person what the web page looks like, to work out what version they came from

As for your current test, it looks like the first one redirects to the second one anyway. Your home page also redirects to the second one - have you considered that there might be some detrimental impact on your SEO doing this?

AaronB · Feb 10, 2010

I know its been superseded but are you able to use the corgi logo? A lot of people outside the industry still think its the "thing" to look for.

Aaron

Mystro · Feb 10, 2010

I personaly think you may be getting too in depth with your page, i have been here on these forums a while and always see you post about making changes here and there, you will never please everyone, so no matter what you do it will never be just right, i think your site is much more professional than any other plumber or gas fitters i have ever seen

One thing about the site i dont like is to get to the point of what your offering its click here or click here, i want a plumber and as you say not the drivvel i don't want to keep being directed here and there to find what i want,

prices can be a bad thing too as people may have a figure in mind and no matter what you put as your offers people may think expensive without knowing whats entailed.

The other thing i personaly don't like is the areas you cover again only my prefference North east should be all i would put as again it gives people a chance NOT to call you

better you turn people away because you cannot travel the distance than people think you may not cover because of the restrictions you have put in place

Anyway back to the original question I preffer the original site as the new one contains more links than text which can be annoying

G. Lasagne · Feb 10, 2010

Mystro said:
I personaly think you may be getting too in depth with your page, i have been here on these forums a while and always see you post about making changes here and there, you will never please everyone, so no matter what you do it will never be just right, i think your site is much more professional than any other plumber or gas fitters i have ever seen

I know what you saying, but a lot of its down to my own lack of knowledge, im on a steep learning curve, im more than cofident that theres loads of improvements that can be made, my visitors heve went from 150 - 1200 per month, but think theres scope to increase that to nearer 5000 and i also want to increase conversions, thus this thread.

One thing about the site i dont like is to get to the point of what your offering its click here or click here, i want a plumber and as you say not the drivvel i don't want to keep being directed here and there to find what i want,

so if directing them to what i believe to be the information they require i.e a phone number/service is wrong, then what would you suggest is the best way to "get to the point". i thougt " what i can do for you" is better than "what you can do for me" by just saying this is the offer it costs xxxx is going against that is it not?

prices can be a bad thing too as people may have a figure in mind and no matter what you put as your offers people may think expensive without knowing whats entailed.

I totally disagree, i ask every single customer where they found me and what they typed in, and the positive feedback i get is that they could find a price, most people searching for a product or service want a price, thats the feedback i get anyway, they dont want to be ringing around to get one. even british gas advertise there really expensive prices

The other thing i personaly don't like is the areas you cover again only my prefference North east should be all i would put as again it gives people a chance NOT to call you

This is for seo reasons, and the only areas i cover are the ones i have mentioned on the site, so if anybody calls outside of these areas i dont want the job anyway.

better you turn people away because you cannot travel the distance than people think you may not cover because of the restrictions you have put in place

Anyway back to the original question I preffer the original site as the new one contains more links than text which can be annoying

thanks, but the idea was to quickly get people to the service they are interested in, but your maybe right i may re-design it to be a happy medium of the 2.

Thanks again some good feedback

saxondale · Feb 10, 2010

G. Lasagne said:
i would really appreciate as much feedback as possible.

Thanks

get a copywriter on board

Cheers

G. Lasagne · Feb 10, 2010

saxondale said:
get a copywriter on board

Cheers

Something ive been "on the fence" with for a long time, i read some examples of sites that have had a copywriter work on and think to myself "i could do that", i know scott comes highly reccomended but again im not sure how much of an impact it would have, its not cheap and would the money be better spent on link building/seo, im still not sure.

saxondale · Feb 10, 2010

G. Lasagne said:
Something ive been "on the fence" with for a long time, i read some examples of sites that have had a copywriter work on and think to myself "i could do that", i know scott comes highly reccomended but again im not sure how much of an impact it would have, its not cheap and would the money be better spent on link building/seo, im still not sure.

just a quick example - to call us about any of our service please call 01 reads wrongly

your already getting hits - Ansoffs theory - google it

http://www.gasangelheating.co.uk/blog/

Mystro · Feb 10, 2010

G. Lasagne said:
Something ive been "on the fence" with for a long time, i read some examples of sites that have had a copywriter work on and think to myself "i could do that", i know scott comes highly reccomended but again im not sure how much of an impact it would have, its not cheap and would the money be better spent on link building/seo, im still not sure.

Thats a chicken and egg question, have you actually been quoted on the copywriting, i was actually surprised at the cost I was quoted, not as expensive as i originally thought, plus imagine from 150 visitors to 1200 visitors per month thats nearly a 10 fold increase has you work load gone up by 10 times?? I would imagine that as you are still working on it it has not even doubled if it had youll be happy i suppose,

Also bear in mind any change will take time to compare Months even as from what i have seen nothing in Seo land happens over night and you could be measuring a change you made yesterday was actually somthing different you did a month ago

G. Lasagne said:
thanks, but the idea was to quickly get people to the service they are interested in, but your maybe right i may re-design it to be a happy medium of the 2.

Thanks again some good feedback .

Again as i said were all different you will never please every one trust me.

Jay-UK · Feb 10, 2010

as a consumer this was my immediate thoughts

- far too much on the page

- not enough focus on the key areas

As someone suggested - either get a copywriter or maybe think about re-doing some of the texts and focusing on the key information that the user would want....

Matt1959 · Feb 10, 2010

Original page is much better IMO as more info is there in front of you (but perhaps it could be improved?). I too don't think people like to click everywhere to find basic information - I think this is really important. Is your home page looking so special that people will want to spend time on the site because arguably this is the one reason for people to dig deeper. For the record, I think the sites great and I echo what the guy said earlier - you cant please everyone all the time. Last thing - click for the phone number has to be a big no no surely???? if there was one thing on either home page I'd think a clanger, that'd be it!

stunning increase in visitor numbers I would say! Surely with that amount of visitors, some of the answers are in the GA stats?

G. Lasagne · Feb 10, 2010

Matt1959 said:
Original page is much better IMO as more info is there in front of you (but perhaps it could be improved?). I too don't think people like to click everywhere to find basic information - I think this is really important. Is your home page looking so special that people will want to spend time on the site because arguably this is the one reason for people to dig deeper. For the record, I think the sites great and I echo what the guy said earlier - you cant please everyone all the time. Last thing - click for the phone number has to be a big no no surely???? if there was one thing on either home page I'd think a clanger, that'd be it!

stunning increase in visitor numbers I would say! Surely with that amount of visitors, some of the answers are in the GA stats?

Hi mate, the "click for the phone number" is only there for the testing of the home pages, as if somebody just rings me then theres no way of google recording it, its normally a phone number (read the first post on this thread), it will be going straight back to the phone number at the end of this week.

if you look at the bullet points on my homepage

All our Heating Engineer's and Plumbers are fully Gas Safe registered

We have many testimonials from satisfied customers

We don't charge a call out fee, or charge for travel or picking up part's

10% discount to all Senior citizens

Special offer's on all servicing and installation work (call 0191 289 3464 to find out more).

We work on all makes of gas appliances including system and combi boilers, gas fires, back boilers and cookers..

apart from the 10% discount none of them are really selling points or gonna make people say "i have to call this company".
the testimonials link is at the top of the page and the bit about being gas safe is explained by having the badge on the site, and the others i think people would expect.
so im gonna probably remove all of them and replace that space with a banner saying 10% discount for senior citizens.

my other plan is to reword the first paragraph to make it more about meeting the customers needs than about the company.

something like:

" You have probably landed on this page because your heating bills are too high, and youre considering a new boiler installation, or maybe your looking at your old boiler or gas fire and thinking "that looks like it could do with a service" whatever your central heating or gas appliance query, concern or problem, we are confident that we have a soloution at a competitive price."

What do you think is it an improvement over this?

We at Gas Angel believe that a great quality service need not cost the earth. That's why our rates are far less than most of our competitors, yet we believe the service we offer to be second to none. Regardless if it's a new Central Heating system, your boiler needs repairing or your fire needs servicing, Gas Angel will take care of it with the minimum of fuss.

saxondale · Feb 10, 2010

mate, I just find all that a bit "spammy" - your selling a face to face product ............ a simple business card style site would give a lot better 1st impression.

decent logo page

decent product page (with link to manf, trade ass. etc etc)

vague price list

company history page

job done.

G. Lasagne · Feb 10, 2010

saxondale said:
mate, I just find all that a bit "spammy" - your selling a face to face product ............ a simple business card style site would give a lot better 1st impression.

decent logo page

decent product page (with link to manf, trade ass. etc etc)

vague price list

company history page

job done.

So should i bin the whole thing and get a £100 template site

i had a site lilke your tlking about when i first started it actually cost me £200 and returned around 2-3 calls per month, with my current site i have received as many as 12 calls in one day directly from visitors of the site.

i get loads of positive feedback about the site from customers who say thats the reason they called because of the professional site, people expect a business card site with a couple of naff bad resoloution photos, so when you come across a professional looking site, people automatically assume that you too will be profesional and do a good job.

Im surprised with that comment, i thought all tradesmen who are members of a business forum would think like business men and not tradesmen.

But thanks for your advice anyway, i will take it onboard and throw it stright over the starboard side

Seriously though as tradesmen we are in a better position than most to exploit online marketing, so take advantage of it until everybody catches on, i know im dedicating all my efforts and money in to it as i strongly believe that my website and blog within the next 5 years along with word of mouth will be responsible for me hitting my target(some people know what im talking about). jump in saxondale the waters warm and theres room for everybody.

saxondale · Feb 10, 2010

G. Lasagne said:
But thanks for your advice anyway, i will take it onboard and throw it stright over the starboard side

you obviously have ............ no worries

fact is your site simply doesnt convert, and you wont listen.

it looks like a bedroom build, the text is poor and three people I showed it to earlier took a lot of prompting to realise you were a plumber.

1) copy writer

2) proper site for the thing your trying to sell

but hey, what do I know.

Matt1959 · Feb 10, 2010

I think the one thing I would say is that personally I don't like being presumptious about customers ie "you have probably landed..."

but then I guess you are putting thoughts into customers minds - be interesting to see what others say about this style of copy.

Also, the original para at the bottom of the post comes across as slightly spiel like but thats just IMO. I think I would keep it factual and err on what Saxo is saying. With your original home page, I don't think the list of things is that bad perhaps rejig the bullet points to say "you" instead of "we" which is easy to do and completely changes the tone? eg "the boiler installation in your home will be carried out by a qualified fitter at all times"

edit
my quote re saxo was about keeping it brief and to the point not suggesting you should go for a one page site obviously

Matt1959 · Feb 10, 2010

saxondale said:
it looks like a bedroom build, the text is poor and three people I showed it to earlier took a lot of prompting to realise you were a plumber.

.

find that hard to believe, were the viewers looking for the braille button

Its really not that bad IMO and is pretty good, getting the visits, just needs maximising which what this thread is about is it not

saxondale · Feb 10, 2010

Matt1959 said:
find that hard to believe, were the viewers looking for the braille button

Its really not that bad IMO and is pretty good, getting the visits, just needs maximising which what this thread is about is it not

all they saw was the angel figure ............... any site can get visits, means nothing.

G. Lasagne · Feb 10, 2010

saxondale said:
you obviously have ............ no worries

fact is your site simply doesnt convert, and you wont listen.

it looks like a bedroom build, the text is poor and three people I showed it to earlier took a lot of prompting to realise you were a plumber.

1) copy writer

2) proper site for the thing your trying to sell

but hey, what do I know.

Im working on all those things, and how do you know it dosent convert, it converts really well, but i want to increase it further, nowt wrong with improvement, and nowt wrong with asking advice on a subject that im keen to learn.

i assume you have a site, can we take a look at it?

and as far as your friends saying that they didnt know i was a plumber, didnt the massive gas angel heating logo give it away?, i can tell there friends of yours

and in answer to "what do i know" the answer is nothing.

saxondale · Feb 10, 2010

G. Lasagne said:
Im working on all those things, and how do you know it dosent convert it converts really well, but i want to increase it further, nowt wrong with improvement, and nowt wrong with asking advice on a subject that im keen to learn.

i assume you have a site, can we take a look at it?

and in answer to "what do i know" the answer is nothing.

how do we know it doesnt convert? - you tell us it doesn`t (and anyone searching for your site)

""what do I know?" nothing" -yes, your another one doesnt actually read or ask.

Tej could probably tell you what that means.

AaronB · Feb 10, 2010

G. Lasagne said:
Im surprised with that comment,

????? from saxondale ?? you are surprised, I'm surprised as you are the only person who holds a conversation with him/her whatever.

Aaron

G. Lasagne · Feb 10, 2010

Mystro said:
i think your site is much more professional than any other plumber or gas fitters i have ever seen

and as far as your typical negative comment saying it looks like a bedroom build see above

saxondale · Feb 10, 2010

AaronB said:
????? from saxondale ?? you are surprised, I'm surprised as you are the only person who holds a conversation with him/her whatever.

Aaron

is it one of your sites?

saxondale · Feb 10, 2010

Mystro said:
i think your site is much more professional than any other plumber or gas fitters i have ever seen

G. Lasagne said:
and as far as your typical negative comment saying it looks like a bedroom build see above

thats whats called a "back handed" compliment - you could do well by following the links onto Mystro`s security site and blatently copying what he`s done.

G. Lasagne · Feb 10, 2010

Jay-UK said:
as a consumer this was my immediate thoughts

- far too much on the page

- not enough focus on the key areas

As someone suggested - either get a copywriter or maybe think about re-doing some of the texts and focusing on the key information that the user would want....

yeah i agree massively with too much on the page, thats the 100th time ive been told to get a copywriter.

Ok scott i give up, you win mate pm me a price for just the home page for now as long as its not stupid you can start straight away,

just so i dont have to hear "get a copywriter"

AaronB · Feb 10, 2010

There are lots of good sites to get ideas from, callback, and mailing lists on them. this is a spa site http://www.waterfallspa.co.uk/waterfall.php

Its quite a nice clean design. A similar design layout could work for you.

Aaron

G. Lasagne · Feb 10, 2010

AaronB said:
There are lots of good sites to get ideas from, callback, and mailing lists on them. this is a spa site http://www.waterfallspa.co.uk/waterfall.php

Its quite a nice clean design. A similar design layout could work for you.

Aaron

Yeah its a good site, but i dont think i need a redesign more of a tweak here and there, better copy etc.
higher rankings as well obviously

G. Lasagne · Feb 10, 2010

Keep the feedback coming its what i need

Mystro · Feb 11, 2010

G. Lasagne said:
Yeah its a good site, but i dont think i need a redesign more of a tweak here and there, better copy etc.
higher rankings as well obviously

100% agree, the design is very good, what you have done is good but to me it looks like your a bit stubborn can count numerous people telling you the same thing content. (If that last line sounds rude it's not ment to be)

I have no doubts you are a great plumber / heating engineer who like many here can turn their hands to most things like Seo and webdesign, your site clearly shows that, now with all that complete it just needs a slight fine tuning which you need a professional to do, looking at another site professionally written content and thinking i can do that wont work, i know 100% i could fit a boiler, but i love my family too much to possibly kill them to even try, i would call you (if you lived in my area) as thats your proffession and your good at it.

The point being get the site professionaly written by a person who does this for a living, that is all that is missing in my opinion CONTENT that is going to appeal to people, I bet whatever you get charged to write your page you will recoup back within a couple of months (I bet even weeks)

You was going to spend the money on Seo or advertising but with 1200 visits per month im sure this will help

G. Lasagne · Feb 11, 2010

Mystro said:
100% agree, the design is very good, what you have done is good but to me it looks like your a bit stubborn can count numerous people telling you the same thing content. (If that last line sounds rude it's not ment to be)

I have no doubts you are a great plumber / heating engineer who like many here can turn their hands to most things like Seo and webdesign, your site clearly shows that, now with all that complete it just needs a slight fine tuning which you need a professional to do, looking at another site professionally written content and thinking i can do that wont work, i know 100% i could fit a boiler, but i love my family too much to possibly kill them to even try, i would call you (if you lived in my area) as thats your proffession and your good at it.

The point being get the site professionaly written by a person who does this for a living, that is all that is missing in my opinion CONTENT that is going to appeal to people, I bet whatever you get charged to write your page you will recoup back within a couple of months (I bet even weeks)

You was going to spend the money on Seo or advertising but with 1200 visits per month im sure this will help

I agree i am stubborn, but i know what im good at and what im not, thats why i always turn to the pros for advice and ignore the likes of saxophone

As far as the content goes after much sitting on the fence i have employed scott to re-write my copy

I will keep you updated on the outcome and i have every faith in scott doing a good job, even if he is from the other side of the water

awebapart.com · Feb 11, 2010

G. Lasagne said:
As far as the content goes after much sitting on the fence i have employed scott to re-write my copy

I will keep you updated on the outcome

awebapart.com said:
As for your current test, it looks like the first one redirects to the second one anyway. Your home page also redirects to the second one - have you considered that there might be some detrimental impact on your SEO doing this?

At least your domain.co.uk default home page is not redirecting to indextest.htm anymore. That was quite worrying, from an SEO perspective, and I'm glad you sorted it out.

G. Lasagne · Feb 11, 2010

yeah and you will notice the phone number is back on, i have given up on optimiser for now, i must have done it wrong or something

Mystro · Feb 11, 2010

Just a quick question, at the bottom of your page you have a link into Compass Seo, are they doing any Seo on your site or did they design it,

The reason i ask is i responded to the reason i don't like drop down boxes with areas covered is it may put people off and they have done exactly the same as you have with the drop down box.

Now they don't have Essex in there so i am to assume they dont cover that area so ill go to the next company to get my work done and they just lost a potential customer, where as if they had covering all of the uk i may have called them, and i bet even within the tight areas you have listed some are missing...

Matt1959 · Feb 11, 2010

G. Lasagne said:
As far as the content goes after much sitting on the fence i have employed scott to re-write my copy

I will keep you updated on the outcome and i have every faith in scott doing a good job, even if he is from the other side of the water

be extremely interesting to see how you get on with this. Good for Scott putting his head on the block so to speak

I reckon, you'll see an improvement but I don't think it'll be spectacular (no reflection on the copywriter btw) I just don't think the site content was that bad but happy to be proved wrong. Keep us posted

saxondale · Feb 11, 2010

G. Lasagne said:
and ignore the likes of saxophone

even though i always "say it first and say it loudest"

Here`s something else to ignore - in less than 5 years you`ll be subbing to any plumbing firm that will give you a days work, make the most of what you`re getting now.

G. Lasagne · Feb 12, 2010

I will write this post down and remind you of it in 5 years, so again what is your website?

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