Lead-losing Web mistakes

You work hard to get people to visit your site—don’t scare them off once they get there.

by Stephen M. Canale   You’re probably used to reading about ideas that can enhance your Web site and methods to generate more leads from your Internet presence. Perhaps as important are tactics to avoid in order to achieve the same results.

With that thought in mind, here are the top four "lead- killer" tactics that are too commonly employed on real estate Web sites.

Multimedia introductions

While multimedia Internet experiences may be enjoyable to first-time visitors who have broadband Internet access, they are a huge turnoff for those on dial-up connections and for just about everyone else who has already seen a half-dozen of these presentations.

If you absolutely must include all the whistles and bells on your site (usually done in Flash format), make sure that such a multimedia presentation is not located on your site’s front page (the page visitors will typically first see).

Viewing such slow-loading displays should be strictly optional and only accessed voluntarily by the visitor. Offering the viewer the ability to skip the introduction is often not enough, as it can take an unreasonably long time for enough of the presentation to load to even allow the viewer to make this choice.

The greatest attraction of the Internet is convenience, and Flash introductions are directly opposed to this benefit. The cost of ignoring this advice is lost Web-site traffic from those prospects who never made it in the door.

Music and sound

While including music (and other sounds) on Web sites might have been novel and entertaining several years ago, that time has passed. Again, such media can take a considerable amount of time to download and play and can be trying on a visitor’s patience. Regardless of how much you might like the music on your site, you need to realize that many visitors are coming to your site from computers connected at work or other public places, or they might be browsing the Web late at night while others in the home are sleeping.

In many of these situations, the sounds produced by your site can be an extreme annoyance and even an embarrassment for the visitor. Imagine the likely reaction of a potential buyer visiting your site from a cubicle at work (at a company that discourages personal Web use on company time) when your home page plays that song you like so much. Nothing will drive a potential customer off your site faster.

Pop-up windows

While there are proper uses of pop-up windows (windows that open in addition to the main window displaying your Web site), they are few and far between.

Pop-up windows have become associated with unwanted advertisements. They can confuse those with limited Internet experience and also consume an additional amount of system resources, slowing down the visit.

When you feel you must use a pop-up window to convey information, make sure it is only in response to a user choice or action as opposed to implementing an automatically loading pop-up window. Additionally, it is often best to warn the viewer that a new window will open if they select a hyperlink, so as not to take them by surprise.

The ultimate misuse of pop-up windows are those that load automatically when the visitor views your home page. This action immediately annoys visitors and may drive them off of your site.

Even if some people continue on, you’ll likely lose them at some point, because every time they reload your home page—often as a result of clicking on the home button—the same pop-up will re-deploy, forcing them to close this same window again and again. Forcing a visitor to close the same unwanted pop-up window several times during just one visit to your site will almost guarantee the absence of a second visit.

Forced forms

Another highly valued benefit of the Internet, from the visitor’s perspective, is the ability to remain anonymous until they are ready to share personal information with Web site operators.

While the use of Web-based forms for collecting prospect information can be implemented successfully, too many real estate Web sites ask for too much personal information, and they request it too soon.

Visitors to your site will typically provide personally identifying information only when they have perceived your Web site as highly useful and have had their basic expectations met. Even then, they will only offer personal details in exchange for information that is not readily available elsewhere.

Thus, if you provide a great deal of useful content and are offering something extra in exchange for the visitor completing a form, you’ll likely be successful in gathering useful prospect information.

However, when you present a comprehensive form to a prospective buyers and insist that they complete it just so they can search your site for homes, you’re missing more leads than you can imagine.

Searching for listings on a real estate Web site is no longer perceived as a valuable extra service but instead as an expected feature. And, since so many other sites will provide listing information while allowing visitors to remain anonymous, most buyers will likely go elsewhere. Those who stay may provide bogus information if you force them to complete a Web-based form before allowing them access to such basic features.

Asking for too much information too soon explains why the single most common name entered into Web-generated databases is Mickey Mouse.

When it is appropriate to use a Web-based form to collect information about the visitor, you should ask for as little information from them as possible. Rather than asking for too much and risk turning them off, ask for only what you really need at that moment.

Realize that a Web-based form is only the beginning of the relationship with this person, and that you will have plenty of time and opportunities to collect more information as the online dialog progresses.

Just as you wouldn’t use an open-house registry with 20 questions and refuse entry to the property until every line was completed, you shouldn’t demand too much information this early.

While there are countless strategies on how to build an effective Web site, avoiding these four common mistakes will likely do more for your online lead generation results than all of the good ideas combined.

Stephen M. Canale, CRB, CRS, GRI, RAM, (Canale.com) is a speaker, educator, and trainer from Ann Arbor, Michigan. In addition to having instructed GRI programs for several state associations, he offers a wide variety of seminars on sales, technology, and marketing.

Photo © PictureQuest.

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