March 9th, 2009 by David Poteet

Why your website is not an ad

About this post:

David talks about the fundamental differences between your ads and your website as entry points for your customers.

Let's get one thing straight. Your website is NOT an ad. It's your front door. With an ad, you start the conversation. The customer is listening. You hope they'll respond.

With your website, a person chooses to walk in the door for a reason. Every link they click is a chance for them to tell you that reason. Your site has to anticipate their questions and lead them quickly to success. Along the way you'll have opportunities to tell your story.

How you approach this question of "Who starts the conversation?" will change everything about how you view your site.

There are plenty of other places where you should start the conversation – advertising, direct mail and email marketing for example. But search marketing and your website are all about responding appropriately to the thing that brought someone to your site.

When a person walks in the front door (your website) they're asking one of 3 questions:

What would it be like to do business with you, go to your school, spend a vacation at your destination?
Do you have this particular product/service/experience I need? If so, how good is it and how does the cost compare?
I need help with something I bought from you.

How does your site respond to these questions?

Here's how an "ad" website does it:

A woman walks in your front door. She sees a salesperson and says

"Hi, I'm looking for…"

The salesperson interrupts her:

"Acme business products is the leading maker of
high performance widgets! Nobody does it better than Acme.
Every day thousands of…"

"Yes, but I was wondering if you have…"

"businesses choose Acme as their partner for…"

"Umm, SKIP INTRO."