Why You Want to Include an FAQ In Your Site

by: Nandang S Nugraha | Total views: 72 | Word Count: 673 | View PDF | Print View

 by: Richard Lowe, Jr.

Congratulations!
You've got a brand new site and it's doing pretty well. You check your
statistics every day and the hits and page views keep climbing, your
links are all in order and everything looks very good. On top of that,
your guestbook is filling with great comments and you're getting a few
emails now and then with praise and perhaps a question or two.

Now
is a good time to sit back and examine the subject (or subjects) of
your site. What is the theme? What are you trying to accomplish? Then
once you've got your site visualized, start to think about it from the
perspective of a new visitor. Put yourself in their shoes, and assume
you know nothing. What questions would you have? Write down these
questions or type them into a document as you think of them.

What
you are creating is a list of frequently asked questions (commonly
abbreviated as FAQ). These are questions that your visitors may have
about your site, the subject or theme, or even about you. Just about
any question is valid, as long as it is helpful to your visitors.

Let's
create an example of, say, a web site about model railroading. Now,
what questions would you have if you surfed to that site? You might
want to know "what is it?", "when did it start?", "how much does it
cost?", "why does this site exist?" and "who is the webmaster?".

That
last question is more important than it seems at first glance, as
putting a face behind a web site increases it's credibility and makes
it more likely that your visitors will (a) return, (b) tell their
friends, and (c) purchase something (if your site is commercial). Some
web guru's will tell you never to include information the webmaster -
these people simply do not understand human nature. In general, people
will trust another person far more easily than they will trust a web
site or a machine.

Once you've got your list of
questions, go ahead and create one or more web pages (create as many as
you like). Add the questions to the pages, along with the answers. If
you feel like linking to articles within your site go ahead. I would
avoid including external links at this point, as you want to get people
interested in your site, not someone else's.

Remember to
keep your answers short and to the point. You are not trying to
duplicate your web site. Your goal is to give your visitors some quick
answers to their questions to get them more interested in looking
around further.

As you are adding your questions and
answers, you will most likely come up with additional questions. By all
means, add those to your frequently asked questions as well.

Some
webmasters like to include a form at the bottom of their questions to
allow people to submit additional one's if desired. This is a great
idea, as it is an easy way to improve your web site's interactivity -
which is usually very good for getting people to return later.

I
would not recommend, however, doing what I've seen some webmasters do -
automate this function. I guess the idea is to get your visitors
involved in answering the questions. In this case, the FAQ becomes more
or less a moderated message board. I prefer just to receive my visitors
questions in an email, which I can then either answer directly or add
to the FAQ when I get the chance.

FAQ's are great for
answering simple questions that your visitors may have before they send
you an email. It is important to remember to include a link to the FAQ
in a prominent place on every single page of your website - you want
people looking at them when they have questions.

In
summary, FAQ's tend to pull visitors into your site and make them feel
better about it, which means they are more likely to return for more
again and again.

About the Author

Richard Lowe Jr. is the webmaster of Internet Tips And Secrets. This website includes over 1,000 free articles to improve your internet profits, enjoyment and knowledge.

Web Site Address: http://www.internet-tips.net

Weekly newsletter: http://www.internet-tips.net/joinlist.htm

Claudia Arevalo-Lowe is the webmistress of Internet Tips And Secrets and Surviving Asthma. Visit her site at http://survivingasthma.com

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