6 Marketing Roadblocks That Cost You Customers

Imagine if you had a long deserved holiday planned and you had to travel in the car for a couple of hours to get there. Now imagine if little things beyond your control started making the drive longer, unpredictable and stressful. You’d end up starting your holiday with a poor first impression that may even affect the whole vacation.

The same applies to your online experience. Customers are travelling to your site to enjoy your product. That journey to the product has to be hassle free, low stress and an easy ride.

That’s why you need to avoid the following 6 Marketing Roadblocks That Cost You Customers:

1. My Way or the Highway Logins:

Forcing customers to have a certain length and mix of characters as part of their logins and even worse, not letting them choose the reminder clues makes for a frustrating login.

 

What’s worse? Coding around customers writing their own reminder questions or having to constantly answer the same help queries? Allowing customers to create their own logins or not having them come back because they are fed up with your login process?

 

Let me choose the vehicle I can confidently drive.   

 

2. Cryptic Help Files:

There is a happy medium between 6 obscure drawings on a folded up piece of paper and a 170 page manual that is getting increasingly forgotten by technology companies and subsequently is now appearing on websites.

 

Nothing sucks more than trying to use something and being confused, going to find help and feeling like a moron because you can’t understand the help either. It’s insulting. How many people come back to get insulted regularly?

 

Give me a decent map in case I get lost.

 

3. Disappearing Offers:

This isn’t just about having offer codes expire, it’s about denying customers the ability to use your product the way they expect.

 

For example, if you want to give out a free eBook, make sure your customers can print it so the ones who like to read off paper don’t feel like you’ve mucked them around or if your loyal customer always buys the large coffee and you want to give them a freebie for loyalty, don’t sell that loyalty short by giving a small.

 

Meet their expectations otherwise you’ll disappoint them.

 

If you like the journey I’m on, don’t interrupt it.   

 

 

4. DNA Sample Registrations:

You know the type- the ones that give you social media as a way to login yet still ask for all your details after you’ve chosen it. Or they have 20 fields based around getting to know everything about you.

 

No one likes walking away from a login procedure feeling like they’ve given blood and been analysed. Keep it super simple!

 

Navigating shouldn’t be hard work.

 

5.       Hoop Jumping:

The average customer will respect policies but will loathe you if you make them dance around for no reason.

 

Archaic, self serving and “as if I care” policies are why banks, utilities and Telco’s have such bad reputations in Australia. They can afford to be jerks. You can’t. Simple first introductions, simple problem solving and simple web copy make for a happy customer.    

 

I’m not entering a challenge; I just want to get there.   

 

6.       TMI:

 

Just like a teenager not wanting a blow by blow of parental rumpy pumpy, a customer doesn’t want to know every buzz word you do or be pulled off course by too much information.

 

Break things down, use visuals, cap your word limits and don’t speak in terms only your industry know.

 

I’m a traveller, but I don’t want to feel too foreign.

 

 

Making your customer’s journey to your product so magical they’ll want to do it again or so seamless they don’t even notice they are journeying is what you should aim for.

Lose the marketing roadblocks and enjoy the ride!