I must have done something wrong... Traffic does not convert

Seb, just my 2 cents, but after glancing at your page it may be your approach. Rather than use this statement: "This is an introduction to a Gold members exclusive tutorial.", get rid of that and say something like "If you are interested in learning more about XXXXX, then "do this" or "go here" (make it more compelling than what I just wrote (it's 2 a.m. and I just wanted to give you an idea..." - but don't mention anything about a membership site just yet.

Then, the link they click should take them to a page that sells them on your membership site (if you're not a copywriter then you might want to invest in having a professional copywriter write it for you, so it converts well). But I think right now you lose your visitors as soon as they see the phrase "Gold members". You need to give them an an irresistable reason to join your membership site.

I hope that makes some sort of sense (considering my brain is mush at the moment!).

Thanks, I'll give it a try!

I think... the answer is the traffic is not targeted enough. Maybe people just found the link and click it without have a problem that your article provided.

I'll rely more on SEO and Forum Marketing, which will give me more targeted traffics, so the conversion could be higher...

Just my two cents Hope it helps.

I have notice one that phenomenon: getting a lot of traffic from stumble upon but the average time per visit was 9 seconds. To me it seems to be like a not true traffic ...because I cannot explain the fact that it happened just for some days and then natha...

Well, as I said it was totally unexpected...
As far as SEO goes I'm working on it but the website being only 1 week old, I'm not expecting results before a few weeks.

StumbleUpon traffic does tend to bounce. It's the nature of the traffic. Next site, next site, next site, stumble, stumble, stumble...

Suzanne

I wouldn't start the tutorial (whose headline tells me it is for Open Office) by telling your reader that it's written about another Office suite but they "should have no trouble following it with OpenOffice if this is what you have."

I see... These guys are just good to eat my bandwidth then...
There are other ways to build backlinks so I may just stop using it in that case. That'd be one script less on that page! Because all those social buttons are making it heavy...

@Rosetrees: true, but then I thought if they start seeing in my screenshots I'm using LibreOffice, since most people probably don't know what it is, it could trouble some of them... I don't know, maybe they wouldn't notice it at all!

Because my desktop system (OpenSUSE Linux 12.1) comes with LibreOffice and the two of them aren't any different so I had no reason to change.
LibreOffice or OpenOffice... Makes no difference as far as usage is concerned. The only real difference is... The keyword I've found a couple long tail keywords with a good search volume and not too much competition, and they're both related to OpenOffice.

The Bounce rate is do to your Click Here to access the rest of the article, then it sends them to
Why should I create an account? - Software Coaching

The Viewer is reading your content and you put the brakes on.
1. The reader gets lost
2. They jack out
3. They might jack out with an attitude

Hi Chris,

Actually no, most of them never reach that second page...
I had done this differently originally (see the 1st reply I got in this thread) and decided to change that sentence for something that wasn't directly talking about a membership.

Seb.

Yes I think I've just understood that
As I said above I didn't expect to get that traffic it's been a total surprise... And since the website's only one week old I nearly don't have any search traffic yet. This requires a little bit of time

At least this has pushed me to create this thread and then thanks to the answers I got, correct a few mistakes I had made...

Couple of things:

1. Stumbleupon traffic isn't very good, which several people have mentioned already.

2. You just have one small link at the bottom of your article and it is very hard to notice. Try using some sort of graphic or making the link a different color. (I also don't like the color scheme of the website, but that just might be me).

3. On your member area page, the links to sign up are barely noticeable. They blend right into the page.

4. The person has to sign up for an account, get the password by email, and then sign up for membership. That is a big no no. If someone wants to sign up, they should give you the money right away and then sign up for an account.

Hope that helps a bit. Good luck!

@Mike,

Thanks for the tips.
Regarding #4 I'm actually currently working on a way to let people subscribe and create their account at the same time. If it's not active yet it's because I have one last bug to solve (when you sign up this way your 1st login attempt fails but then the 2nd works, weird), but it's on my to-do list. I'd even like to output the signup form directly on that page if I can.

@Chris, you're welcome. I might still try to re-think that sentence once more.

The problem might be to do with the StumbleUpon
traffic. It might be that people are just not in
the mood to "buy".

Try to cross-test that with a different kind of
traffic, and see what kind of conversion rate
you'll get.

If it's not the traffic, it could be that you're
giving too many speedbumps, and you're
starting off in your customer's shoes.

Winston Tian

The gray background was a little hard on my eyes when trying to read.

The background problem wasn't something I was expecting but thanks, I'll change it no big deal.

@Robestrong - Apparently the very high bounce rate probably has something to do with the fact it was StumbleUpon traffic... There might be other reasons too but I guess I'll verify that when I start getting some natural SEO traffic.

I am not sure about this. But you should have atleast 4-10 conversions atleast. It might be the fact that the traffic was not good and sometimes stumbleupon users just dont convert. It seems they just open and skim over it and leave.

Hi,

Thanks for the reply.
I have done a lot of changes since my original post... So what you've seen on my website does not really match my original problem. Besides, as lot of people have said, it was StumbleUpon traffic... Which is mostly worthless.

Seb.

When I go to the link in your first post, I'm going to an SEO blog post instead of to the referenced tutorial. If other people are getting this, they'd leave immediately.

lol yes, I changed one of the permalinks and made a 301 redirect but made a mistake when doing it... Somebody's been clumsy Thanks for letting me know.

That's actually all part of my SEO strategy. To me, all these go together.

what is your bounce rate?

First thign that popped to my mind when I read your post - is, is that traffic targetted well? As an affiliate manager - I see my webmasters fall into the trap all the time unfortunetly...

Ok, maybe it's time we put this baby to rest

Once again: it was StumbleUpon traffic... And it was traffic I did not expect at all! I just woke up one morning and there it was and it look weird... Which is why I posted here about it.
I've since learned from some answers in this thread that SU traffic is mostly useless. Just people passing by and switching from one website to another... So my original question has been answered, I understand now what has happened that day. In the meantime I've been given some good tips on improvements to make on that new website so it hasn't been a complete waste of time

Seb.