Audio can be a highly effective sales tool and it’s well worth considering adding it to your site if you’ve not already done so. But, be warned, it doesn’t work for every type of web site and the way you implement it can impact your site in a negative way if you get it wrong.

The truth is that you won’t really know how your market will react to audio until you test it. For some topics it can work incredibly well and be a massive hit with visitors both in terms of retention and revenue generation. However, there are other niches where it’s completely frowned upon and can make people click their back button faster than you can say "World-Wide-Web".

Not only do you need to test whether audio itself has a positive impact on your site, but you also need to test how the audio is used, particularly whether the audio starts playing automatically. Some visitors really despise audio that plays automatically whereas others love it. Often this will be dependent on the niche in which you are working. For example, the reaction to audio that starts running automatically is likely to be completely different for a site specializing in serious legal matters, populated by legal professionals, than for a site specializing in jokes and populated primarily by younger people.

During your initial testing phase you might try having audio on your site that users must start by clicking a ‘play’ button. If users respond well to that, you can try having it start automatically and see how well that is received by your visitors.

If you’re going to use audio on your site, it needs to be the highest quality audio you can manage.

Make sure the sound isn’t too loud or too soft as audio that’s too loud will often cause visitors to leave your site immediately, particularly if they are in a work environment. Equally, audio that’s too quiet will just frustrate visitors as they’ll have to either turn up the volume to hear it or will have to put their ear closer to the speaker, neither of which is conducive to impressing your visitors.

Of course, you can’t control the volume the user’s computer is set to, but you can control the volume at which you record the audio. You’ve seen those television commercials that are much louder than the others, right? You’re watching television, and suddenly a commercial comes on and screams at you. The audio is twice as loud as the TV program was. If you don’t want your visitors jumping out of their chair, try to record at a volume that is appropriate for the vast majority of your visitors. Kids screaming and dogs barking in the background are complete a complete no-no, so do whatever you can to make sure any audio you record is done in a location or at a time that is appropriate.

Another thing to keep in mind is your own voice. Although most people aren’t overly-critical about voices or accents, if you have a voice that is very harsh, or have an extreme accent, people may have trouble understanding you. If you think your voice isn’t acceptable consider hiring voiceover talent to record your audio. You’ll find lots of voiceover artists offering their services on the Internet and a lot of them are very reasonably priced.

Above all else, your audio should have a bit of entertainment value. If your audio is boring, and your tone is monotonous, your visitors aren’t going to listen for very long. Visitors respond to dynamic personalities, interesting narrative, and enthusiasm. If you don’t check all those boxes seriously consider getting someone to do it who does check those boxes as few people want to listen to several minutes of a droning voice going on and on about product features.

Done right audio can give most sites a real boost and has been known to increase response rates by double digits, so it’s well worth thinking about. If you’re interested in adding audio to your website, give us a call to discuss your project at 415-462-5676 or 866-829-4557.