How To Address Points Of Friction In Your Business

In many ways, your business is like your baby. You nurture it. You watch it grow. And you love it unconditionally. But also like your baby, you may view your business through rose-colored glasses, seeing it only in the most perfectly perfect of lights.

This is not realistic, however. Your business has points of friction (or things that get in the way of conversions), and your prospects and customers are aware of these points, even if you refuse to acknowledge them. Not everyone is going to like your business, or at least not right off the bat. But that’s something you need to accept, and sure, it can be a hard pill to swallow.
But once you get to that point, you’ll be able to identify people’s objections to your business and can then begin to address those concerns and better serve your audience.
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Taking A Heuristic Approach To Reduce Friction

First off, what is a heuristic approach? Well, it’s a problem-solving approach that’s practical but not precise and is used to quickly address issues when the best solution is unknown.

Neil Patel, the Co-Founder of Crazy Egg, created a heuristic approach to help reduce friction and improve conversion rates on your site, and the process is as follows:

First, you need to prepare by optimizing your website. Second, you need to split-test (based on real data). Third, you need to make changes according to the data-backed split-test results. Fourth, you need to repeat the process and conduct another split-test.

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In a nutshell, the methodology involves optimizing, testing to see what happens, and adjusting accordingly. Moreover, your site should embody the following characteristics in order to keep it as close to friction-free as possible:

  • It should be functional – no malfunctions or super slow loading times.
  • It should be accessible – meaning it should be search engine optimized and have zero navigation barriers.
  • It should be intuitive – your sales funnel should flow logically.
  • And, last but not least, it should be highly persuasive – focus on what your audience wants and then deliver.

What About Friction In Your Copy?

When people read your copy, they are going to have both conscious and unconscious objections to what you have to say. They are also going to have hesitations about taking action on your offer. This is normal.

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When making a sales pitch to a potential customer face-to-face, it’s relatively easy to unearth what his or her hesitations and objections might be by asking questions and then offering solutions. Online, however, it’s not that simple.

A more effective approach is to be proactive, addressing as many potential friction points as you can up front—before your customers have a chance to object.

Below, you’ll find a two-step plan for accomplishing this.

Peep Laja 1Peep Laja of ConversionXL“Step one – create a list of all the possible hesitations and objections your potential customers might have. Step two, add info to your sales copy to eliminate or alleviate those concerns. The list can contains things like

  • You don’t understand my problem (explain the problems your product solves)
  • Why should I believe you? (show off your credentials, experience, awards, etc.)
  • What if it doesn’t work on me? (have testimonials of all kinds of users that have benefited from your product)
  • It’s not worth the money, there are cheaper alternatives out there (explain your price, compare with the competition, prove the value your product offers)

… and so on. It’s important to come up with as long [of a] list as you can. Seek external input, do user testing and ask your customers to figure out what all they might be concerned about.”

What potential points of friction have you noticed in your business? What are you doing to address them?