Hello! Here is my struggle: I built a website called "The Business Database" destined to be the place where all businesses around the world could register in order to be found using search criteria such as "country", "city", "industry" or "products/services provided". My goal is to help businesses around the world to be found easily so they can sell internationally and grow faster. As soon as the website was ready (in may 2015), I began to send e-mail invitations to all the companies I could find on the Internet. I knew that a free registration wouldn't be enough so I decided to offer some free ad space on my website and free Instagram shoutouts for the first 1,000 members. Here is the invitation: www.thebusinessdatabase.com/invitation I cannot tell the exact number of invitations sent but surely several hundreds. Today, only 28 companies decided to register. I started to think that the people think it's a catch because everything is free (for the first 1,000 business to register only). What do you think about that? Samuel www.thebusinessdatabase.com
One of your problems is that you are using funky fonts with no contrast. Most of your content is very very light gray words on a white background, extremely hard to read. Further, your font size is way too small to read without zooming the page. I know that I would not waste my time registering my business on such a funky site.
@mmerlinn Thank you for your short review! Just to make sure, were you talking about the invitation, the website or both? When I noticed that this e-mail wasn't really bringing new members, I began to send e-mails like that: Subject: "Invitation to register your business for free (+ free ad space & free Instagram shoutout)" Body: "Hi there! Hold on, I won’t ask you to buy anything… Instead, I invite you to register your business on The Business Database (TBD) for free. TBD is a website meant to be the largest (international) business directory. WHY REGISTER? • First, because it’s free for the first 1,000 businesses to register. Who refuses something free these days? • In addition, you will be visible worldwide. A possibility to make more money without investing any penny, it can't hurt. EXTRAS • Free ad space on our website for the first 1,000 members. • Free shoutout on Instagram for each of the first 1,000 members. Click on the following link to register: www.thebusinessdatabase.com/register. Feel free to contact me if you have any question. Hope to see you soon on The Business Database. Samuel www.thebusinessdatabase.com " What would you change/say differently ? Samuel www.thebusinessdatabase.com
How about doing some survey work. Go back to some of those you invited and send them another email. Ask them if they would share with you why they did not take advantage of your offer. Tell them they would really help you out if they would respond. It may be a shot in the dark, but then if you can get some insight, it may help you to understand why so you can take appropriate action. Another shot might be, did you check to be sure your emails weren't hitting their Junk Mail boxes? Leilani
First impression for me is that the title is overly long and the greeting is not personalised. If I receive an email from someone who doesn't address it to me (my first name is in my email) then I will dismiss it as spam as it appears they have sent me a mass email, rather than address it directly to me. As for the title, I would leave out the bit in the brackets. You can go into detail further down in the email but combine it all together in one sentence, rather than breaking it up with brackets. Introduce yourself first. Explain who you are what what you're emailing about. I realise you're trying to be upfront but you're telling me something important before I even know anything about you or your business. There are quite a few grammatical errors in this email, along with a few half-finished points (highlighted in red) that would immediately put me off accepting the offer. I hope my criticism has been constructive and it will be beneficial to you. Good luck with the campaign!
@Leilani Sniffen, @ChazB, Your comments were very constructive and will help me a lot! Thank you very much!
Please do not take any of these points personally, this is just my opinion for you to improve. Your website does not have the professional sense and feel a person would hope for, to begin with it has a letter on homepage explaining what it does which screams of newbies. Why would companies want/need to register in your website to be found. They already have a website (you found them on internet) and Google helps them to be found. Business directories are old news now and does not work on a worldwide basis. If you have specific countries in your sight which search engines are not as popular or not all companies have websites, I would add another feature and that is to give 2 pages of website to each company to promote their business. In this case they do not need to have a website by themselves, but only in developing or under developed countries. You website needs serious design work, the colour way does not work, font are funky (not business professional), take a look at successful business directories and follow suite. Good luck
@Mehdi.b. Thank you for your review! I understood your opinion and this will help me. Although, in my opinion, I choose a font pretty basic... To me a funky font is a font like the ones on this image: http://creativeoverflow.net/wp-content/uploads/2013/05/fonts-20-funky.jpg. Anyway I will check what new feature I could add, completely change the letter on the home page and see what I can improve in the design. Thank you again!
Your site needs a few tweaks. And, by the way, 28 joins is not bad. In most cases you can expect a 1% - 2% return. Your volume should increase by word of mouth if your site delivers on its promises. I would add some color. Your page is drab using greys and black. I would widen the page. You are using a small percentage of the real estate available so why not use the same template as your main site. Since you are using Wordpress there are so many options available such as Gravity Forms for registration. I would put a link to your invitation page on the main menu as well...why not? I agree about the font color. go with #000000 and at leat 12 pt. Make it easy to read. I prefer Tahoma or Verdana for font type. I don't see an 'About Us' or similar page. People will be wondering who you are and why they should trust you so make it strong and give people a reason to trust. Google Analytics: Get yourself an account because there's no better way to find out why people are or are not using your services.
Hello, just visit your website as a merchant. You know, as a merchant, we need to look for many publisher to promote our website and product. But there no company or partner on your website, no visitor, how can i promote my web and product? If as a partner, there no famous or interesting company, why I chose you? Maybe you can invite some famous company to register firstly, then you will get more and more company to join in.There have many thing to do.
I only looked at your landing page and I did not see any invitation while there. Not saying it was not there, but the landing page was hurting my eyes so badly that I left post haste.
Why would they waste time registering on an empty site when they can focus their effort on getting found in Google, just as you found them? You are trying to so something that you simply do not have the scale to achieve. Find and pay for a business contact database of a million businesses and you might get some traction.
These types of sites are difficult to get going as it involves a follow everyone else type of set up, a catch 22 if you like. Companies won't join until other companies have joined. Like if you have to bars, one if full to the brim with people and quing and the other is empty everyone wants to go to the busy one. How i would do it is to list companies to get the site going and then send out invites, at the mo it looks a bit empty. I would also list featured companies on the main page, or even any new companies.