Almost all modern-day websites contain an FAQ section answering their customers’ most burning questions. Sometimes the section might not be named ‘FAQs’ but instead could be named Help Center, which pretty much serves the same purpose.
A study done by UPS indicates that nearly 47% of online shoppers are unsatisfied with the information available to them before checkout. Having an effective FAQ section should solve this issue.
Your customers could frequently be inquiring about
- Details on the product’s ingredients
- How to use the product effectively?
- What happens if the product breaks?
- Is there a warranty period?
- Queries on pricing and which package is most suitable for them
- Shipping, return and refund policies
- Unique services such as subscriptions and loyalty programs
Of course, the above list would vary drastically from industry to industry. If your customers ask such questions, they are showing interest in your product but have certain queries to determine whether this product is necessary for them.
Your sales and customer service team will spend hundreds of hours answering these questions if they are not directed towards an effective FAQ section. This would cost your company thousands of dollars, and your teams could have instead used that time and energy to perform higher-value, growth-focused tasks.
This is why most companies have an FAQ section on their home page, usually right above the inquiry section or displayed on the menu itself either as FAQs or as Help or other related term.
Below are some examples of how big companies have displayed their FAQ section
YouTube FAQs
McDonald’s FAQs
Wikipedia FAQs
Microsoft FAQs
New Egg example
Looking at this precedent, it is quite evident that ‘FAQ’ is a must-have section on your website. If you’re still not convinced, here are some other benefits of having an FAQ section on your website.
1. Helps build trust with your customers
If you’re answering all their pressing questions even before they ask those from you, it shows your customers that your brand is transparent and honest.
2. Helps improve SEO on your website
Your FAQs section could answer questions your customers search for on Google. Search Engines favour the Q & A format.
3. All customer queries could be found in one place
Your customers don’t have to browse from page to page to try and get answers to their burning questions, as they have been presented in one place.
4. Address common objections
Research shows sales teams can increase close rates by 64% if they can successfully defend their buyers’ objections. Having an effective FAQ section can help automate the object-handling process to a large extent.
Alright. Now that we’re more convinced on the importance of having an FAQs section, let’s look at some steps and tips on writing an effective FAQs section.
- Speak to your sales and customer service team and record the most asked questions from each of them.
- Compile a list of all these FAQs. Don’t assume what these are, instead select FAQs based on the records of your sales and customer service teams.
- If they’re less than 10, then you can put them all together in one section with the most asked questions at the top.
- When writing answers for those FAQs, find the shortest possible way to answer the questions effectively.
- If longer answers are required, you can provide them with a link for them to read more on that matter.
- Be brave enough to keep your FAQs fun while sticking to brand.
- Your FAQs section should be easy to navigate. It is advised to only present the questions in bullet forms and for the answers to appear when your customers click on those (Collapsible windows). They should also have anchor text.
- If you have a large set of questions you can consider adding a search feature for customers to type out the keywords of their questions to find their answers much faster.
- Your FAQs section are most likely not going to be comprehensive, so have a section where your customers can input a unique inquiry which your sales or customer service team can then attend to. You can also capture their email address in the process.
- For better Search Engine Visibility, mark up your page with FAQ Schema. FAQ Schema is a code placed on your site that tells the search engine that the content is in Q & A format.
- It could be possible that there are questions not being posed to your sales and customer service team but are prevalent in your industry. You can find what those are by using platforms like Reddit, Quora or Google Trends.
- Track user traffic, session time, and clicks on the FAQs section to monitor how useful that section is for your customers and optimize the FAQs section as and when necessary.
- Make sure your FAQs section is fully updated with the latest information regarding your products, company and policies. Record how many times you have had faulty FAQs.
Remember, the faster your prospects are convinced beyond doubt that your product or service is for them, the faster they’re going to become paid customers and even recommend your products to their colleagues.
If your company does not have a FAQs section on their website, reach out to us for a free consulting session on getting your FAQs section written and added to your website.