How to Use Scripts

Scripts are small pieces of code you install on your website
to do very specific tasks, following a visitor's actions.
The most common scripts for Webmasters are Javascripts
and CGI scripts. Though they can perform many other useful
functions, they are used best to gather information about
the customer's shopping habits.

For example, you can have a script that will pop open when
visitors first arrive at your site inviting them to join
your newsletter and receive a fr'ee course on a related
subject.

You can have a script come alive asking your customers why
they didn't purchase when visiting your sales landing page.
It can make a fallback sales offer or give them a fre'e item
for telling you their main reason not buy.

Scripts can also be used to give you a more personal way
of contacting your customer by activating a sound file with
your voice. You can show your customers an up-front,
human presence that will make them closer to you. They'll
feel they know you better going by the sound of your voice.

Care should be taken with scripting such as not to over
do it. Most folks will not come back to your site if they
have to tango with 3 or 4 scripts just to leave! Scripts
shouldn't ever be used as "nag screens."

The speed and delivery action you set to the particular
script you're using will have a bearing on the response rate
you harvest. For an entry script, it's best if you let your
visitor settle in and then g-e-n-t-l-y offer it to them.
The point is not to startle and irritate them!

The use of some scripts can also have a negative effect on
your business, such as the scripts that constantly reset
the clock on a time sensitive offer. You visit a particular
website and are introduced to an offer telling you it's
only good for that day until midnight. Should you come back
the next day, there it is again! Perhaps it should be called
an "auto-lie" script!

The drop-dead worst offender is the "countdown" script.
It works like this: When a visitor goes to the sales landing
page and doesn't buy, the script comes on and makes a
fallback offer good only for the next 5 minutes or whatever.
It will then proceed to remind you every few seconds of the
approaching END of the countdown!

If at all possible your scripting should be cookie driven
so that your returning visitors don't have to deal with the
same thing again. You can setup your script to only
activate once per visitor, using the identity of the cookie
in the customer's computer.

Good scripting applied in a strategic way can increase your
sales and give you more meaningful information about your
customers, giving you an edge on the competition. It should
be used with restraint on key areas of your website to
enhance your relationship with your customers.

Scripting can be considered a specialty. Should you feel
it's more than you can handle, it's best to pay a seasoned
Pro to do it for you. It's not all that expensive and will
pay for itself in no time.

Here are sources of scripting I use:
http://www.javascript.com/
http://www.scriptarchive.com/

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by Francisco Aloy

(C)2004 Francisco Aloy
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