I’m sure you’ve noticed that many websites offer a free report of some sort.  I’m often asked why this is done, and if it helps to get more clients.

The answer is… well, it depends….

Why Have a Free Report?

Reports are great in that they can be a great lure to get people to opt-in for your mailing list (more on why a mailing list is important, below). If the title of the report is curiosity-provoking enough, the report will work really well. If the title is boring, or the report isn’t well targeted to the visitor, then no one will opt-in, and the report won’t have done any good.

Report topics (and titles) are harder to nail when you don’t know exactly why someone is at your site. For this reason, they are easier to write for a tightly focused site than they are for a more general site.

What Kind of Report Should I Write?

I create a lot of websites and do site promotions for therapists — the psycho kind . If a therapist specializes in couples counseling or marriage therapy, possible reports include:

• 3 Ways You’re Sabotaging Your Relationship (and How to Stop, Today)
  
• Miss Those Days of Feeling Close?  4 Easy Steps to Get That Feeling Back, For Good

(Notice that both of these titles are “problem-oriented”, and may sound a little like the cover of a woman’s magazine…  The reason they are written that way is because that is what works!  Really.  Study magazine covers!  Study the front page of newspapers.  These folks are masters at getting people to buy their words, and this is what you want, too.)

If I’m working with a therapist who is more of a generalist, we’ll have to work a little harder to come up with a curiosity-provoking report.  The focus could be on general unhappiness, or on self-esteem.  Anxiety is also a great bet, as most people looking for a therapist for any reason feel a certain amount of anxiety.  A great one could be:

• 3 Ways to Tell If You (or a Family Member) Really Need Counseling

This or other “assessment” type of reports appeal to our desire to know if we’re making the right decision.  We all want to feel that we’re doing the right thing.

Get Into Your Visitor’s Head

The bottom line is this:  Anyone at a therapy site is obviously considering counseling, or they wouldn’t be there.  You can rest assured that they are scared, as counseling is about vulnerability.  By presenting them with a report such as the title above, you are entering into a conversation that they are most likely already having in their head.  In your report, you can help them feel less stigma about getting help, and also give them permission to go ahead.  You can also show them a little bit of your counseling style, so that you increase their trust.

The same applies for any profession, or product.  People who have just been in an accident and are at a Personal Injury Attorney’s site will have certain questions and fears.  People looking into building a green home will have certain questions and fears.  Provide a report that will answer what someone MOST wants to know, regardless of what field you’re in.

Also, once someone engages with you (by giving you their email address) they are much more likely to take the next step to call you.

And, even if they don’t do it right away, then they may call you after you send them some thought-provoking articles you’ve written.  This brings us to the next… the mailing list.

What Do You Send Them After They Opt-in?

If someone opts in to your “list” then you can “drip” on them each month, continually reminding them of your presence, your expertise, etc. After so many exposures to you, they’ll just automatically think of you when they’re finally ready to take action. This could be a month, or it could be six months, or a year. But, no matter how long it may take, you increase your chances of being “the chosen one” 100 fold if you’ve been showing up with great tips in their email, over a period of time.

One of the most wide-spread misconceptions people have about building websites is in regards to “Duplicate Content”. People fear they’ll be penalized by Google if they have an article that appears on two different sites, or that if they have similar sites for two different cities in which they operate, one of these sites will be banned because it may have a lot of the same content as their other site.

Bottom line, there are a lot of rumors and wrong ideas floating around on the web, concerning duplicate content.

In the video below, you can get some clarification, straight from Greg Grothaus at Google.

Note -- unless you’re fairly technical, the first 6 minutes of this video will be enough for you.