In real estate it’s ‘if you build it they will come’, but on the internet it’s just the opposite. This is also why it’s so hard for so many small business owners to get the true potential out of their websites. As a small business owner, I understand their pain. For many small businesses it’s tough to compete with the big budget major corporations out there both online, and offline. Thankfully however, with smart search engine optimization, any business can compete. On the web, if you build it, you must make them come, and to do that, they have to be able to find your site. This is the whole premise behind SEO.

Why Does it Even Matter?

The case for small businesses to create a web presence only continues to be presented with more and more proof that it is a must. Over 75% of consumers will research a company online before doing business with them in person. Whether you are an auto mechanic, a real estate agent, hairstylist, or florist, you have to have a solid web presence if you want to be able to continue to compete in today’s world. Most people have a couple old phone books laying around that never got thrown out. If you do, take a look at a phone book that is 2-3 years old, even 1 year old. You ‘ll notice that they shrink year, after year, after year. Why is this? With the evolution of smart phones, mobile internet, a most importantly Google, it simply takes more time to locate a phone book, search for the category, and select a listing. In less than 20 seconds, Google will give me a list of local florists and links to their website so that I can check them out before I visit their shop, or buy online. The current generation of consumers simply are not looking in the phone book. This is why small business search engine optimization matters so much these days.

SEO Basics for Small Businesses

For those who are starting from square one, search engine optimization, or SEO, is the process of optimizing your website to appear at the top of search engine results when someone searches for a term related to your website. It can get a lot more complicated than that but, we’re trying to speak English here. For any given search term search on Google, there will likely be over1 Million search results returned. For example, at the time of this writing, a Google search for ‘car stereos’ returned 1,420,000 results.  So here’s the bad news first. If  you own a local car audio shop, the chances of you ranking up highly for this term isn’t very high. You’d have to beat out several major car stereo manufacturers, and major retailers such as Best Buy, or Amazon who have a crazy number of back links pointing to there sites (more on why this matters later).

So what’s the good news? The good news is that you can still compete. You do this by optimizing your website for long-tail keywords, and local keywords. As a said before a simple search for car stereo returns 1,420,000 results. Now, we add a local qualifier to our keyword and search ‘car stereo Dayton’. Now that we’ve added our local qualifier, the number of results dropped drastically. Google now returns only 121,000 results. For local car stereo shop, this allows them to more easily compete for searches in their area. As Google quickly replaces the phone book, the need for local business to show up on the first page when someone searches for a local florist, mechanic, or any other local business. So we can see the importance of optimizing your site for your locale, but what if you’re a small business operating nationally via the internet, but you still don’t have the marketing dollars to inundate the web with pay-per-click ads? This is the part where long tail keywords become your best friend.

Long tail keywords target small market, less searched keywords such as, ‘Jeep Grand Cherokee parts’, versus ‘jeep parts’. A current search for ‘jeep parts’ returned over 4 Million results whereas, a search for ‘Jeep Grand Cherokee parts’ returns under 2 Million. We’re already narrowing down the competition. Now we need to get even smarter. Instead of trying to rank your Jeep auto parts website for the term ‘Jeep auto parts’ initially, focus on ranking your product pages for their relevant keywords. A search for ’1998 Jeep Grand Cherokee spark plug wires’ returned only 26,000 results. Now you’re pulling in qualified traffic that is absolutely looking for your specific product. This not only increases the chances of someone finding your website, but more importantly, it increases the odds of you converting that visitor into a customer.

In the upcoming articles in this series on small business search engine optimization, we’ll dive deeper into the specific aspects and techniques that you need to get your site ranked higher, and your traffic increased.

1. Myth #1: A potential web designer should show me a visual mock-up of the proposed site that they will design for me. This is one of the most frustrating myths that many web designers face. It is a partially self imposed frustration because many website design companies do offer visual mock-ups when pitching their services to potential client. In the end however, the client is the one who loses. If a web design firm shows you a proposed site design before you’ve hired them and you don’t hire them in the end, their cost of sales has risen because they still have to offset the labor costs of designing a website that was never sold purchased. As their cost of sales rises, so must their cost of services in order to maintain profitability. These increased costs are passed on to the clients that do hire them. So in the end, hiring one of these designers will leave you either overpaying for their services, or they’ll just be selling you a pre-designed, non-custom website template that they’ve tried to sell to countless other people.INSTEAD: The best way to determine the quality of work that a potential web design company can offer you is to look at their portfolio of past projects. A design firm’s resume is their portfolio and any potential web design company should proudly display their past projects to you. If they do not, or will not, then run away as fast as you can.
2. Myth #2: A web designer with previous design experience in your particular industry is better than one with no previous experience in your industry. This myth is near and dear to our hearts at Sparxx Design because we’ve been burned by this one on several occasions. Why is this not important? We approach every project with zero assumptions. This means we never assume that one auto mechanic need or even want the same design solutions that another does. Industry experience is for one size fits all designers who specialize in offering the same thing to every client within a particular industry. We specialize in designing customized solutions to every business, with any budget, every time. When interviewing a potential design company, they should be asking you detailed questions about your business, your industry, and your goals for your website. A website should be designed to solve problems, meet objectives, and encourage customer action. Industry experience doesn’t tell a design firm what problems your business is facing. We’ve worked with two different photographers simultaneously and one was trying to expand, while the other was just getting started. While these two businesses shared an industry, they had completely different needs for their websites.INSTEAD: When it comes to web design, individual needs trump industry. It’s important to look for a web design company that asks the questions that addresses those needs, not simply one who has designed several other websites for businesses in your industry. At the end of the day, the graphic design elements used in website design are basically the same and do not change based on the industry that we’re designing for. So before you even interview with a designer, make a list of goals and objectives for your website. Give this list to your designer and ask them how they can help you meet these.
3. Myth #3: The best designer, is the cheapest designer. This myth takes on several forms.The fact is, website design isn’t the cheapest thing you’ll ever pay for, and for good reason. A properly designed website should be designed in help your business increase sales, profitability and customer retention amongst other things. For this reason, website design costs should be viewed as an investment in your business. However, many business fail to see the value of a website and so while they’ll quickly shell out $4,000 for direct mail equipment, they often shudder when told that their website could cost just as much. Many businesses however, are lured into do-it-yourself for $4.99/mo. design services, and designers who offer a complete website design for only a couple hundred dollars. There are several reasons not to choose a do-it-yourself system the biggest being the ‘you get what you pay for’ rule. Believe it or not, when you design your own website, it’s obvious, and it doesn’t convey a good message to your customers. I believe that no website is better than a cheap looking, one-size-fits-all, diy website. That’s because having no website is less damaging to your company image than having a poorly designed one. Studies show that more than 75% of consumers research a company online before doing business with them. If your online appearance shouts run of the mill, then that’s the impression you leave on your clients. You also ‘get what you pay for’ from extremely cheap designers. Remember from myth #2, a website is supposed solve problems and meet objectives. A cheap designer is only going to sell you a scaled down web solution that has no solutions to your problems.INSTEAD: Don’t get the wrong impression. Every website shouldn’t cost $4000. Many will cost much less and many will cost much more. Everything comes down to addressing the needs of the client. The cost of the design should be based off the amount of time that it takes the designer to complete the project. Flat rate designers are a mistake because if your project needs exceed their anticipation, they’ll be tempted to cut corners in order for them to limit the amount of work they have to do for that flat rate. If you’re worried about the pricing of your project, ask your designer to detail the costs and decide if you need everything included in that price. If another designer can meet all of your needs at a cheaper hourly rate and their portfolio quality is acceptable, by all means choose that designer if cost is your main concern. Just remember, a properly designed website can always be added to for a fraction of the cost of the original design so there’s nothing wrong with designing your website in stages if you want the Rolls Royce of websites.

The best advice that I can give regarding choosing a website designer for your website is get the facts, and then trust your instincts. It’s important to have a good relationship with your web team, and you also want to make sure that they are accessible. If you ever need help or have a problem, find out upfront if they’ll help you for free, or if there will be a charge. Armed with these tips and a little intuition, you should be ready to choose your next designer. If you’ve benefited from this article, we’d love the opportunity to explore ways that we can help your business through the art of design. Check us out at http://www.sparxxdesign.com.

If you know anything about blogging then you’ve definitely heard of WordPress, but you may not have thought about WordPress as  a CMS. The of the matter is, WordPress is one of the most powerful content management systems available. We absolutely love and for several reasons. Here are our Top 10 Reasons Why We Love WordPress As A CMS:

1. Templating for WordPress is simple
   Every website starts out pretty much the same graphically speaking. The hard work comes by way of transforming a graphic design into a template for a CMS. With WordPress, a basic template is almost just a static HTML layout with a few PHP template tags added in. The greatest benefit? Because designing for WordPress is so simple, designers can do more in less time and that means a more impressive site for the client at an affordable price.
   
2. WordPress has a rediculously large plugin database
   WordPress is a lot like the iPhone. What type of website are you looking to create? What type of functionality do you need from your site? Well it really doesn’t matter because “there’s a plugin for that!” You can’t help but love the number of plugins available for WordPress. In website design, reinventing the wheel only adds cost for the client. By using WordPress plugins, you remove the bulk of the programming work regardless of whether or not you customize the plugin. Sometimes creating your own plugin is necessary, but regardless of your needs, WordPress offers an easy platform to design for.
   
3. WordPress’ developer community is excellent
   If you are a member of the web design community, then WordPress’s large developer community is a great positive to you too. If not, you should still be impressed. Why? A large developer community essentially means that the WordPress project is backed by tons of people who are constantly working to make it better. Asa result of this, WordPress is often one of the cheapest systems to have design work around.
   
4. WordPress is easy for clients to use
   One of the most common hidden costs of website design are the costs of training a business’ employees on how to use their new website. Many of the clients that we deal with are  not as tech savvy at all and so operating the admin section of their CMS can be difficult for them to learn. By using WordPress, they’re able to maintain their own website without having to a complicated system. As their website grows, WordPress can grow with them and we that means it’s less work for us to rework their website, and less money for them.
5. WordPress makes SEO simple
   This could possibly be the single greatest reason for using WordPress as a CMS. If no one can find your website, it doesn’t matter how nice it looks or how great your products and/ or services are. WordPress allows us to offer self managed SEO services as well as our professionally managed services. Clients with a desire to be able to manage keyword implementation on individual pages can do so without ever touching the code or meta tags.
6. WordPress is easy to manipulate
   In the beginning it was a blog. Now, it can be whatever you imagine. I can’t tell you how many different creative ways that I’ve seen WordPress used. From blogging to lead capture to eCommerce to corporate websites, WordPress will adapt to your project. All you need is a vision and a competent coder and you are well on your way to creating your dream site with WordPress.
7. WordPress functions as a top blog and CMS simultaneously
   Did I mention that WordPress is a great blogging platform? Well actually, it may be the best blogging platform around. That means clients who use WordPress as a CMS, to also have the world’s greatest blogging platform in the same admin panel. This allows us to add a blog to any clients website at any time without a ton of additional work, and they still only have to learn one system.
8. Updating WordPress is easy
   One of the most overlooked components of any CMS is often the ease of updating. Many CMS solutions require extensive work to update them. With WordPress, updating is as easy as clicking one button. Clients can manage updates themselves without fear of damaging their websites.
9. WordPress is FREE!
   The best thing of all! This directly affects the price that businesses pay to have their websites created. This also eliminates the monthly, quarterly, and yearly fees that many people pay for using commercially sold content management systems.
10. What’s your reason?
    The previous nine points are why we love WordPress so much at Sparxx. Now it’s your turn. Tell us what your favorite reasons are for using WordPress as a CMS?

If you’re in need of website design considering using WordPress as your CMS, and consider Sparxx Design for all of your design needs.

With that said, let’s focus on the reasons why web templates are bad for business:

Web templates poorly represent your business.

Life would be excellent if competition didn’t exist and you were the only business around offering your products and services. However, we know that isn’t life and businesses have to communicate to potential clients what differentiates them from their competitors and why the potential clients should choose them. Web templates don’t effectively communicate your brand and competitive advantages due to fact that they are pre-designed and have no association with your business. One of the best ways that I’ve heard this put is like this, “Template web sites are designed to be sold to you and not to your customers, and many business owners get into the trap thinking that if the template looks good to you it will look good to your clients.” The problem with this thinking is it’s too singular. The point of effective website design is not only to look good, but also to look unique. If you’re working from a template that has been resold to thousands of other businesses, you complete lack uniqueness and regardless of the number of times your web template has been resold, a web template will never set your business apart from your competition. Period!

Web templates are often over done to make them more appealing to you.

Remember, the he designers of website templates are designing a product to sell to you. That’s why they over pack them with flash, sounds, graphics, icons, and bullets which may in the end actually detract from the usability of the website. Yes, all of these things seem cool and they may lead you to believe that the template is going to make your business look great but think again. You don’t need your website to be the most graphically designed website on the web. You need your website to be functional first, and then professional. 90% of the time, anything other than is simply excess.

Speaking of flash, what’s with all that flash?

Once again going back to the the idea of web template designers designing them to sell to you and not your customers, they often jam pack their templates with tons of flash design elements. I mean, who wouldn’t want their website to be a super cool flash site? That’ll impress your customers right? Well, not if they can’t find your website. We only recommend flash website to well established companies who have no need to be found. Everyone knows who Pepsi is and there aren’t many people searching the internet trying to figure what Pepsi is. Bottom line, flash animation is not good for search engine optimization (SEO) and the often most often flash animated sections of web templates is the navigation menu which is a crucial SEO component. So by choosing that beautiful flash animated website, you in the end could be costing yourself traffic to your website.

The Logo Space

It’s actually pretty easy to spot a web template when you see one by the logo. The logo believe it or not, is one of the most critical parts of your website design because of its branding power. You can always tell when the logo design and placement was an afterthought which it is in a website template. The design was not created for your logo, and your logo most often won’t fit in without it being resized, the colors changed, or done away with and replaced with text.

For a free custom website design proposal click here

How big of an impact is the Internet playing in this industry?

According to a study conducted by AIS Media, 89% of consumers who they have researched a restaurant online before dining there, and of those 89% of consumers, 57% indicated that prior to selecting a restaurant they view the restaurant’s Web site. And 33% view other consumer’s reviews online prior to dining.

The restaurant industry isn’t unique in these statistics. These are the same issues that businesses are facing across all industries. Your success is greatly dependent on your ability to adapt, and your ability to brand. More and more consumers are turning to the Internet and it adds a new element to your marketing strategies. Today, consumers can research virtually any and everything online, and they do! The economy is still a wreck and fear is preventing consumers from spending in the same ways that they were before. Unfortunately, one of the first places people look to cut their spending is on dining out. That’s why it is so much more important that your restaurant website is a dominate force in your marketing area.

So what are the ingredients that make a powerful restaurant website presence? It’s simply a combination of usability (accessibility or ease of use )and visitor experience. Yes, the same very ingredients that keep your loyal customers coming back to your will help you gain new ones via the Internet. It’s not as easy as it sounds though. It is six times harder to attract new consumers than to please your loyal consumers. Your current customers already know how good your food is. Your mission is to convince those near 90% of consumers who are using the web to find their next dining experience that your restaurant is the one they should choose.

An effective restaurant website should combine enough ingredients to allow potential diners to gather an idea of the atmosphere, and also offer the consumer incentive to visit your restaurant. Reward consumers for visiting your website and they will reward you with their business. Whether you offer a low cost appetizer or even a entrée or desert free of charge for anyone who presents a coupon off of your website, you’re pulling the visitors in. Be creative though, there are several methods for making your website a money making machine. Metrotainment Cafes, an Atlanta, Georgia based company offers a customer loyalty program via their website. While most of their customers hear about their loyalty program inside the restaurant, they have to sign up on their website, and it has resulted in a 10% increase in  new business since it’s inception according to owner Jeff Landau.

The numbers don’t lie and you can’t argue with facts. The restaurant industry is more and more being drawn into the digital age; and for good reason. D0n’t get caught on the outside of this trend. Now is the time to update your restaurant website and Sparxx Design is the company to work with. We know restaurant web design and we would love to show you the numerous ways that we can help you take your restaurant website to the next level! Contact Us today to learn how.

Now it’s even better because of the new BlackBerry app for WP. If you’re anything like me, and a lot of our clients are, I’m always on the move and my BlackBerry is my connection back to the office. Now you can write and manage blog posts, pages and comments right from your phone!

Ok now for the link… Go to blackberry.wordpress.org and download the new app. Or, visit us at www.sparxxdesign.com. We’ll post a link on the homepage. I’ve been testing it in beta mode and it’s absolutely great! You’ll love it.

My worst enemy is the web design firm that talked some unsuspecting business into shelling out a few thousand dollars for a website 5 or 6 years ago and now 5 or 6 years later that website not only looks the same, but it hasn’t generated one dime of business for the owner. It’s useless! Their website is nothing more than a glorified $3,0000 – $5,000 yellow page ad that no one will ever see and this makes my job exponentially harder when I try to explain to them why they need to have their website redesigned.  If I were them I’d be opposed to repeating this process all over again as well.

What they don’t understand is that their website doesn’t have to be a money pit. A well planned, well designed, and well marketed website can quickly become a revenue boosting component of your business. That’s why it’s so important to work with a web design firm that understands your goals for your website and can help you get there (That means that there is more to consider in this process than  simply finding the cheapest designer in town). Last week I working away in the office around lunchtime and decided to order pizza so that I wouldn’t have to stop working to go get lunch. Now I’m not picky when it comes to my pizza and so living in a modern metropolis, I have more places to order from than I have fingers. So how did I choose? For me, this was all about getting lunch ordered quickly so that I wouldn’t have to stop working. I chose Papa Johns because their website allows me to order a pizza and drinks in less than 3 minutes. I don’t have to find a number, call, be placed on hold, recite a credit card number, and verify an address. All that info is already in the system so just a few clicks and I have a pizza at my door in 30 minutes.

Sadly, 20+ other pizza chains lost my business because they don’t offer online ordering. They may all have websites, but I don’t surf the web to look at pretty pizza pictures. These chains just don’t get it, but  Papa Johns gets it. This is a great example of a using a website to generate business. No one uses phone books anymore, they use Google. So if I’m already searching Google for your phone number, why not allow me to order right then and there?
MORAL OF THE STORY: Having a website isn’t nearly good enough. You  have to use your website to interact and impact your customer base. Whether it’s ordering food, or offering coupons, or contests online, you can use your website to generate new and repeat business. How long are you going to miss out on your share of the billions of dollars generated online every year?

If you’re looking to get more out of your website, contact Sparxx Design. We’d love to help you discover new ways to make money from your website. Contact Us Today!

Here’s our list of the top reasons why every business need a website now more than ever:

Reason #1: It’s the cheapest way to advertise

A very basic web presence can be created for around $1500, and a standard website for $3,000-$5,000, and complex database driven websites for $10,000+. Let’s compare these costs to a standard brochure. Completely custom and properly branded brochures can range from $2000 on the low end to $10 – $20,000 for multi-page brochures. Some of the factors that affect costs include: 1) Number of pages, 2) research, 3) writing, 4) photography (stock & custom), 5) custom artwork, and 6) logo design work. Bear in mind, these are only the costs for a professional design firm to design your brochure. So as you can see, the initial costs of brochure marketing are comparable to getting a website designed, but now we have to market our brochure.

Once a website is designed, it can be advertised on the web through Sparxx Web Hosting for as little as $3.99 per month, and whether 1 person or 10,000 people visit your website in a month, it’s still only $3.99. You don’t need to know these people, and they don’t have to be anywhere near you geographically. You immediately have an advertisement that can be accessed by anyone in the world, a one flat rate. Most brochure printers will require a minimum of at least 100 pieces, but to get the most cost effective pricing, you’ll need to get 1,000+ pieces printed. The printing alone on 1,000 brochures will run you another $100-$300, and once you’ve distributed you’re brochure to 1,000 people, you have to pay another $100-$300 to distribute it to another 1,000 people. This doesn’t factor in your distribution costs. Even if you have no distribution costs, brochures offer you only a limited amount of distribution and once you’ve reached that limit, you have to spend more money, while your website remains advertised for just $3.99 per month.

Reason #2: Remain open 24/7

We’ve all been there before. There’s some task they you need completed, some product you want to buy, or some sort of information that you need,  yet the company offering these products or services doesn’t have hours that fit into your daily schedule. The fact is, every business would remain open 24/7 if they knew that they could do so cost effectively, but the cost of hiring a 3rd shift employee just doesn’t make economic sense for most businesses.  Your website can fill this gap. Our office hours are from 8am t0 5pm, but we’re open 24/7 on the web. Our website offers many of our products and services to our current and prospective clients all day, everday. I can’t tell you how many product/service information requests, invoice payments, requests website analysis and product purchases that we recieve on our website in the evenings, early mornings, weekends, and on holidays. This is business we miss without  a web presence.

-CASE STUDY-

A mortgage company came to us with a problem. We had recently provided graphic design and printing services to  them for a direct mail campaign that they were using  to generate leads. Through a telephone call tracking system, they could tell that they were recieving telephone responses to their direct mail campaign in the eveneings and  on weekends when there was no one in the office to take those calls. Far too often, these missed calls, amounted to missed business opportunities. The solution was a website that served as the response center for thier direct mail campaign. Now, when a potential client recieves a direct mail piece from them, it directs them to thier website for more information. Once they’ve arrived at the website, they are taken through a sales funnel that ends with them filling out a contact form. Now, when the loan officers come to work in the morning, and have a list of qualified leads that would have been otherwise missed awaiting thier follow up. An information seeking consumer may not leave a voicemail requesting a call back, but a well dessigned sales site, can continue the sales pitch and capture these leads 24/7.

That’s it for part one of this series. Come back soon to see more ways that the internet can transform your business. Can’t wait for the next installment? Contact us here and one of our web design experts will contact to discuss how our web design solutions can make you more money!

People shouldn’t judge a book by its cover, but they do, of course. Which is why, healthy economy or not, restaurateurs better have an eye for strategy when it comes to their menus.

“Quality menu design isn’t a switch that can be turned on and off,” says Kevin Moll, president of National Restaurant Consultants, a Denver-based consultancy. “Menu creation should be an evolutionary process, with constant fine-tuning.”

Moll charges clients between $500 and $1,000 for menu-consulting services, but he was willing to share a few fundamentals for free. (As for pricing strategy, we will address that in greater detail in later articles.)

First, think about layout. If the menu is just one page, readers typically start at the top, then look at the bottom, and end up somewhere in the middle of the page. On two-page menus, diners start at the top right, and then go to the top left, then to the bottom right, and land in the middle. Don’t argue with human instinct–put your best stuff where customers are likely to find it.

The second element to great menu design: writing. Hyping hard the benefits of an item’s appeal goes a long way with hungry diners. If you charge a whopping $8.95 for a BLT sandwich, the words better linger on the naturally raised pork and the certified organic tomatoes. At Stuart Anderson’s Black Angus Steakhouse, a 51-location chain that trades on the allure of beef from black-haired cows, the menu doesn’t just say “steak”; it waxes on about how the beef is aged a minimum of 21 days and goes heavy on superlatives like “center-cut” and “full-flavored.”

Moll’s third tip: The menu should complement a restaurant’s brand image. Take the menu at The Palm, a high-end steakhouse with locations in just about every major U.S. city. The menu design is clean, classy and consistent with the Palm’s buttoned-up atmosphere. At Organixx, an environmentally conscious “fast-casual” outpost in Denver, the menu is printed on recycled paper with soy-based ink. Homaro Cantu, executive chef at Chicago-based Moto and famed evangelist of experiential dining, went so far as to offer edible menus. (Cantu’s minions sign confidentiality agreements so as not to let the actual recipe slip.)

Bottom line, says Moll: “Don’t be cheap with your commitment to a well-engineered menu. It will generate profit, lock in your brand and make your restaurant worth more.”

We Make Menus Better!

Sparxx Design offers consulting services on all aspects of restaurant  menu design. Our approach to menu design incorporates top marketing, branding and sales strategies to deliver an effective menu for your restaurant. Our team of designers will work with you to develop a menu that fits your brand,  is aesthetically pleasing,  and most of all sells!

Click Here To Learn More About Our Restaurant Menu Design Services.

Back in 2004, Jim Noble bought a $140 laptop case from eBags, a luggage retailer in Greenwood Village, Colo. He wasn’t pleased, and he wanted the retailer–along with any other unsuspecting customers–to know it.

First, he posted an unflattering review on eBags’ Web site. That let off some steam, but it didn’t solve the problem of finding a case that fit his needs. Then he sent an e-mail (with photos) to the company outlining all the ways the bag could be improved, including a sturdier zipper that moved over a more rounded, forgiving path. Ebags paid attention, made the adjustments and the case has since become a best seller.

Five years later, eBags is among the only 50% of online retailers that offer online ratings and reviews, according to the latest figures from Forrester research. Meanwhile, 80% of Web buyers troll reviews when shopping online. The lingering fear: Negative reviews will send customers running the other way.

Looking to add online reviews to your website? Sparxx can help! We offer several web solutions that allow you to improve your sales both on and offline through a customized product/ service review system. Click Here for more information about our product/service review systems.

Forbes Article Continued:

It’s misplaced. Barely 25% of online shoppers report that they are unlikely to purchase a product after reading negative reviews, and most take those reviews with a bowling ball of salt. Truth is, negative reviews probably won’t hurt your business–and they ultimately may help boost customer conversion rates.

Continuous Improvement

When Peter Cobb launched eBags.com 10 years ago, he had a straightforward vision. “It had to be better than a brick-and-mortar store,” he says.

That meant taking advantage of the effortless feedback loop afforded by the Web. Cobb can recount 10 situations in which dissatisfied customers suggested changes and eBags acted on them.

Sticking to that strategy isn’t easy when you’re selling other brands, such as Samsonite ( SAMC.OB – news - people ) and Nike ( NKE – news - people ), who would rather not invite the criticism. “Our [suppliers] sometimes call and ask us to have customer testimonials removed from the Web site,” says Cobb, but he won’t cave. And if customer complaints aren’t addressed within a reasonable amount of time, he’ll drop the offending brands.

Nearly 1.8 million reviews are now on eBags’ Web site. According to BizRate, online reviews are one of the top reasons customers choose eBags over “50 sites they could find on Google selling the exact same product, often at the exact same price,” says Cobb.

Negotiating Leverage

The same wisdom applies to more subjective realms, like food products. “Food is like music or art,” says Tim Harris, co-chief executive of La Tienda, a Williamsburg, Va., online retailer of gourmet items from Spain.

Harris feared that negative customer reviews would hurt sales, and only this June mustered the courage to let customers post their opinions. When a pre-cooked paella dish got panned, Harris went back to the vendor and asked about the ingredients. Turned out the rice wasn’t up to snuff, and the vendor agreed to change it.

Says Harris: “Instead of [the vendor] thinking it’s just me and my opinion, it was: ‘Look, this is what the customers said.’ “

Building Trust and Loyalty

It’s not enough to let customers post reviews–you have to let them truly speak their minds. Bryan Eisenberg, founder of Future Now, Inc., which helps businesses optimize their online marketing efforts, says he sees the same mistake all the time: “Businesses put up reviews, and they’re all positive.”

Take Evogear, a ski-equipment retailer in Seattle. When the company began posting reviews three years ago, it chose to “moderate [them] conservatively,” says Nathan Decker, director of e-commerce. That meant posting only reviews with the highest ratings. Customers didn’t buy it. “It was kind of screaming at you,” says Decker. A year later, Evogear decided to post “99.99% of negative reviews that end up on our moderation desk.”

Prompt replies to negative reviews go a long way to building a loyal fan base. La Tienda’s Harris says people are thrilled when he offers them a refund or another shipment of the same product: “These people are your best cheerleader and your customers for life.”

A final, powerful psychological aspect to bad reviews: According to studies by Bazaarvoice, provider of customer-review software, exposing a product’s weaknesses sets realistic expectations, thus reducing the number of product returns. Publicly traded companies play a similar game when they manage security analysts’ earnings expectations downward to stave off sudden declines in their share prices.

If the big guys can do it, why can’t you?

Incorporating online reviews into your website is a great way to help potential customers get better acquainted with your products! Click Here to get more information on how Sparxx Design can help you increase your sales through the power of online product/ service reviews.