The Problem

I often see clients who have perfected their sales pitch when discussing it one-on-one. They can dazzle, impress and have you begging to buy their product. Their terrific sales people, but their expertise is lost online. Some may argue this may be the difference between sales and marketing, but I believe it’s a message being lost in translation across two mediums.

Check out our post on Face to Face Marketing.

It’s true, a conversation on a website is much more one sided than a conversation in person. When planning websites, clients will focus on developing their message, and sales points, but don’t take into consideration of showing the face behind their company. The one-on-one personal contact is lost. Sales points and persuasion mean nothing when I’m looking, at best, a smiling stock photo that people have seen 1000 times prior.

Finding a Solution

How do you combat this problem and display who you are to your audience? It’s difficult to create that connection online the same way you can in person. There are several in the box methods of using graphic design to cheaply integrate a human element, but they typically lack in performance.

1. The first is by adding features such as twitter feeds, and requests to “like a company on facebook”, but users are usually bombarded with these messages on a daily basis that they’re often ignored.
2. Second is posting staff photo or adding a message from the president to a site. This seems to be obvious solution, however users usually respond with “who’s the suit, and why should I care to read what he’s saying”.
3. Third, I’ve seen an implementation of live chat features which can create an instant conversation, but once again relies on the user to be curious enough to ask questions.

A Great Example

The campaign created by DDB Canada for Knorr is a perfect example of how a company created a character that we can all appeal too. Watch the video below to learn about the campaign:

Although many small clients may not have the budgets for large campaigns as Knorr, it’s a perfect example of how they created an emotional connection, something unique rather than a simple “Like Us on Facebook” button.

From a graphic design standpoint, you may be thinking that these elements should be handled by a marketing department, and you may only have as much freedom as deciding which photos to use. But as creative types, don’t be afraid to push the envelope.

For small brick and mortar businesses, don’t be afraid to use that as a launching point. Simple ideas such as changing a call to action to “Let’s us buy you a coffee and talk about engagement” or “Talk to Richard about your indoor plumbing” might just open the door to dialogue in a 1 on 1 meeting. Taking advantage of videos may be a great way to introduce a client to your company and help establish credibility and trust.

How We’ve Achieved Success

At CategoryCode, we ran a similar test for and Edmonton-based real estate team – Robert F. McLeod Realty. Their existing landing page had no images of faces, or even who Robert McLeod was. To make matters worse, the images on the page were facing away from the users or headline.

The owner of the company – Robert McLeod, was the brand. We needed to showcase this, establish a connection with users, similar to the one he’d create in person.

With a few images and graphic design tweaks we were able to develop a new landing page that better showcased the company and most of all who Robert McLeod was.

The Result

The results were a grand slam for conversions. Without any copy changes, we were able to produce a 304% increase in quality leads.

If you are interested in learning more about what we did for the Robert F. McLeod Realty Team, please view our Case Study.