Selling web hosting: How to avoid information overload

One of the most important features of any online business is the presales information, and reseller hosting is no different. Hosting is a difficult concept to explain at the best of times, and when you simultaneously need to explain a service, outline the features, convince your visitors to choose you, and consider SEO, it’s a big task. Multiply that by the number of products and services you have, and it’s an even bigger task.

But it’s also one of the most rewarding and profitable things you can do for your business, and everyone can benefit from reviewing and refining pages over time, regardless of their website theme or structure.

Make a plan

Rather than going straight into your file editor, take some time to plan out your pages outside of your website. Concentrate on one product at a time, and use sketches or wireframing tools (Mockflow is great) to come up with different concepts. Playing with different looks and spaces gives you a lot of opportunity to display information more creatively, rather than starting out with huge chunks of text and trying to fit them in accordingly.

Don’t underestimate the power of wireframing tools later on either; after you’ve written all your copy, it’s good to revisit the elements on your page to see if any need moving around or reformatting.

Use different formats

The best presales pages present information in a wide variety of formats. Bullet point lists, tabbed boxes, tables, lists with icons, buttons and demo videos are all great ways to stop visitors becoming overwhelmed with large blocks of text.

Reduce the amount of information on display

Another way to help your visitors process information easily is to reduce the amount visible at any one time. This means you can still provide a lot of detail and include everything you (and they) need as well as encouraging them to interact with your website.

Hover overs, tabbed boxes and collapsible tables/information work really well for this – particularly the latter two as they save on page scrolling as well.

Tabbed boxes are great for complex products.

Hover overs are ideal for explaining features or defining terms.

Be selective

Remember you don’t need to explain/cover everything in the world. To cut down on the information you’re providing, tailor it specifically to your target audience; for example, if you’re targeting existing web businesses, you most likely don’t need to explain what web hosting is.

Your primary aim should always be to provide the exact amount of information your visitors need to make a buying decision. Too much and it becomes a nightmare to find the key features. Too little and they won’t know if you’re going to provide everything they need.

Get feedback

We say this a lot, but it’s crucial to get feedback on your pages. For web hosting presales pages, ideally you want a guinea pig who is fairly familiar with hosting in general but not familiar with your website. Twitter can be a good place to ask for feedback if you have lots of design contacts; if not, there are plenty of forums around with members that will do a good job.

Make sure you set up Google Analytics and use heat mapping software to track where your visitors are looking and clicking – larger scale feedback is also essential for improving.

Make checking out easy

Once your visitors head into the order process, make sure you continue the good work. Keep it simple (only ask for the information you really need), and avoid long pages. Multiple short pages tend to work better than one long order page, which can be overwhelming.