Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ) pages represent a crucial component of the customer conversion funnel. Anyone who lands on this page has already identified the need for whatever you’re selling and is now entering the consideration phase of the purchase process.
Your FAQ page can provide them with the information required to finalize their buying decision.
However, I see so many websites that overlook the importance of this landing page. I read lots of FAQ pages that sound more like an afterthought, as opposed to a page that’s been designed to drive conversions.
FAQ pages must have a purpose. Don’t just add one to your website because you feel like it’s a requirement and you want to fill up space. Instead be intentional about it.
I want to show you how, by covering how to:
- Ask the right questions
- Simplify the navigation
- Keep the answers short
- Offer added support
- Optimize for SEO
- Understand your audience using quality customer research
How to Build a Great FAQ Page for Your Website
While most websites should have a FAQ page, yours could be doing more harm than good if it doesn’t have any clear intentions.
It’s possible that your page is driving people away from buying, as opposed to drawing them in. This can happen, for example, if the questions your visitors commonly have aren’t actually answered on the page.
Obviously, you don’t want that.
For those of you who are currently neglecting your FAQ page, it’s time to make changes. The rest of you might not have an existing page and want to add one from scratch.
Regardless of your situation, you’ve come to the right place. By avoiding a few common problems—as we’ll show you in this article—you can turn your FAQ page into a potent tool for converting leads and prospects.
Ask the Right Questions
I’ve seen plenty of FAQ pages that have a great design, layout, and optimal user experience …but the questions are awful.
Somewhere along the line, so many sites have lost the meaning behind frequently asked questions. They treat these pages as a perfunctory and unimportant addition to their websites.
Anything related to where your company was founded, how many employees you have, or where your CEO was born does not belong here. You can include details about the history of your company on your “About Us” page.
I have a separate guide on how to create an impactful about us page on your website.
But adding irrelevant or useless questions and answers to your FAQ page is just going to confuse your visitors. They’ll end up having a more difficult time finding information that will answer their actual question. So you need to have questions that are more related to conversions.
To do that, you need to truly and deeply understand your audience. Without the knowledge of who they are and what they want, you won’t be able to craft a good FAQ page. Most of the questions you come up with will likely be useless to them.
If you’re still unsure about how to ask the “right” questions, just see what your customers are actually asking. Take a look at questions and comments from:
- Submission forms
- Customer emails
- Live chat
- Social media comments and messages
- Phone support
Check out some of the questions on the Allbirds FAQ page. Some context: They’re an online shoe store offering high quality, sustainable footwear for men and women. The company used customer feedback to find the right questions for their new and current customers.
They have questions related to how the shoes fit, sizing, returns, exchanges, refunds, and shipping. All of these are important to the consumer buying decision—and help drive sales as a result.
For example, you might be flat footed and want to know if their shoes are right for you. They have a question under “Products & Fit” that answers just that. When you find out that they do, you’ll be more likely to purchase from them.
Do they offer half sizes? Will the shoes stretch? Do the shoes fit a wide foot? All these are answered in the “Do Allbirds run true to size?” question.
These are all logical questions that someone would ask before buying. You want your customers to feel confident when they’re shopping.
Buying a product, such as sneakers, online can be a challenge. Customers don’t get a chance to try on different sizes, walk around, and see what feels good like they would in a store.
But Allbirds alleviates any uneasiness by asking the right questions on this FAQ page. They’re asking the right questions.
Make sure you’re identifying the right ones for your company as well. Keep a database to track all of these questions and group similar ones. If lots of people are asking the same thing, it definitely belongs on your FAQ page.
Also remember to regularly update your FAQ with any new questions your audience might be asking as you add new products, services, and innovations.
Simplify the Navigation
Like the rest of your website, Your FAQ page must be frictionless and give your users a straightforward and intuitive experience.
You might have great questions and answers, but if your site visitors can’t find them, then your FAQ page is going to fail.
Do your best to try and emulate an in-person shopping experience. If a customer was in a physical store, all they would need to do is find an employee and ask their question. Sure, sometimes that employee might direct the customer to another department or something like that. But in the end, the question is answered directly and in a timely fashion.
Don’t make people hunt for answers on your website.
If the format of your FAQ page is just questions followed by answers repeating all down the page, visitors will have to keep scrolling to find what they’re looking for. This is not ideal. They might even overlook their question, which wouldn’t solve their problem.
Take a look at how Microsoft simplifies things on their FAQ page for software downloads.
Right away, you’ll see that there are two categories to choose from.
Visitors can narrow down their question using these two categories. Any Office questions won’t have irrelevant Windows questions that need to be sifted through.
When a user clicks on one of the options, the menu expands, without redirecting to a new page.
Here’s what it looks like if I click on Office.
All 12 questions can be read without having to scroll. This makes it extremely easy for people to find exactly what they’re looking for.
Now, imagine if there was an answer directly below each of these questions. It would take up probably four or five times the amount of space on the page.
That layout would be much more challenging and require additional scrolling and text to read through. But this approach by Microsoft is clean and simple.
If you want to know something specific, like how long it takes for software to download, just click on the question and the answer will expand below it.
Frictionless.
If a site visitor has multiple questions, it’s still easy for them to navigate and find answers to everything.
If a site visitor has a question and it does not get answered, they aren’t going to convert. It’s that simple.
So make sure your navigation is optimized. Your visitors will have an easier time finding what they’re looking for.
You want the experience to be like a helpful in-store employee who is there to answer shoppers’ questions about products and where to find things. That all starts with knowing your customer and what they’re looking for.
Keep the Answers Short
Another common mistake that I see made on FAQ pages is the length of the answers. Everything needs to be clear and concise.
For the most part, your FAQ page should be fairly broad. This helps ensure you help the most people possible.
You don’t have to jump into super-specific questions that require in-depth explanations. If customers do have more specific questions, give them an option to reach out to you via a customer support line, live chat, or email address to get help.
But even for a general question that most people would ask, you still need to keep the answer concise. You don’t need to answer everything. But give simple answers to the questions that are most asked by your audience. .
I’d rather see FAQ pages with 30 questions that have short answers, as opposed to 15 questions with long answers. So if you currently have long paragraphs on your FAQ page, see if you can take one question and break it down into two or three.
This will provide a much better user experience. Visitors shouldn’t have to read through an essay or short blog post to get a simple answer.
Let’s say that a website visitor is able to locate their question and ends up reading through a long answer. They might end up having additional questions, based on the length and details of that answer.
Or worse yet, they might see the big chunks of text and decide they don’t want to read it at all.
You don’t want that to happen.
So sharpen your writing skills and only include the most important information related to the question.
Check out this example from the PayPal FAQ page.
Look at the first question—what is PayPal?
Talk about a loaded question. PayPal is so many different things. They offer services for businesses, consumers, and websites. They could probably answer this question in 50 pages if they wanted to, going into details comparing PayPal and Stripe for ecommerce.
But no, they take a much simpler approach. The entire answer is just three sentences.
If they got into all of the specific details of PayPal, what it is, what it does, and who it’s for, it would only confuse the reader. The answer above is clear, concise, and still answers the question.
Challenge yourself to take the “PayPal approach.” See how you can sum up your business in three sentences or less.
Offer added support
While a FAQ page should be written to help most of your website visitors with broad questions, sometimes it’s just not enough.
No matter how good your questions are, how great the answers are, or how simple the format is, some people will still need additional assistance. That’s OK.
If it’s going to take a little bit of extra support to get people to convert, then give it to them.
Just make sure that all support options are available. Here’s how Samsung approaches this on their FAQ page.
The first thing I noticed when I landed on this page was the list of categories. Samsung is a huge company, so it makes sense for them to start this way.
But as I stayed on the screen without making any actions for a while, this pop-up window appeared, prompting a live chat session.
They obviously have this triggered to appear whenever someone doesn’t scroll or click since the implication would be that they can’t find what they’re looking for. I love this approach.
It’s much better than forcing the site visitor to go back and find another support page or make them go through countless questions manually until they find an answer. That’s just too many added steps. Instead, Samsung gives you three discrete ways to contact them for help.
Furthermore, Samsung has a phone support button in view at all times as well, as I pointed out in the screenshot above. So the customer has options.
Can’t find a solution on the FAQ page? No problem. Just pick up the phone or speak with one of our live chat representatives. Or put a live chat window directly on your FAQ page.
This strategy should be incorporated if you want to drive as many conversions as possible. The extra effort will go a long way.
Optimize for SEO
To craft a high-converting FAQ page, you need to keep the big picture of your website in mind. Nothing screams big picture louder than optimizing for search.
For the most part, FAQ pages are designed with the idea that a visitor will land somewhere on your website, have a question, and then navigate to the FAQ page. In many cases, this very well might be the case.
However, you can set up your FAQ page to get traffic directly from organic searches as well.
Not all your questions need to be brand-specific. For example, let’s say your website offered web hosting plans for small businesses. Your FAQ page could ask, what is shared web hosting?
This question isn’t exclusive to one of your products or services. But it’s definitely something that one of your prospective customers will search for online. Your question could end up in the search engine results pages (SERP), driving more traffic to your website, and ultimately leading to conversions.
A great tip for finding SEO questions is to just use Google.
Let’s say you sell sneakers. Type in keywords that you’re trying to rank for, like “sneakers for travel,” and then scroll to the bottom to view related searches.
Based on these search suggestions, you can get SEO-inspired questions for your FAQ page. Maybe add questions related to shoes for walking all day or stylish shoes for Europe.
Answering these questions can give you a boost in the search rankings, while giving your visitors the information they need to the questions they have.
How to Understand Your Audience Using Quality Customer Research
As we’ve said, building a high-converting FAQ page starts and ends with your audience. You need to answer the questions relevant to them. Only then can you set them on a path to turning into satisfied paying customers.
As you can imagine, there are tons of ways you can do this. However, we have a few quick tips to get you started. Later, we’ll give you our best resources to let you do an even deeper dive into customer research.
Create a Survey
This is one of the most common and powerful ways to understand your customers. A survey is a simple form that asks your customers questions and gives them an opportunity to give you answers.
There is a lot of theory that goes into how to craft survey questions. But it’s a great opportunity for you to learn more about the types of questions your customers have about your products and services.
Go deeper: Want to learn how to craft great surveys? Check out our articles How to Use Surveys to Hook More Customers and How to Better Understand Your Customers and Write More Compelling Copy for more.
Conduct 1-on-1 Interviews with Customers
Perhaps the best way to gain insight into your customers questions and pain points is by directly talking to them. This involves setting up a video, phone call, or physical meeting with them to talk.
Physical meetings aren’t feasible for most online businesses, but video and phone calls can be just as effective.
During these interviews, you can talk to them about any questions they typically have or—if you really want to learn a lot—have them walk you through how they purchase a product or service from your store.
No matter what you do, it’s always good practice to compensate your participants with money or store credit for their time.
Go deeper: Want to learn more about leveraging 1-on-1 interviews to understand your customers? Check out our article How to Improve Your Customer Service with These 8 Ways to Get Feedback
Add a Comment Box
This one’s easy. Simply add a customer feedback form onto your website where people can share their thoughts and opinions. Here’s an example of one from BuildFire.
You don’t have to collect their name and contact information. However, I highly recommend you do in case you want to follow up with the commenter for a 1-on-1 interview or in-depth survey.
These provide a great, low-pressure way for your visitors to leave you comments, questions, and concerns they might be experiencing. You can then use the questions they send you to get a sense of the ones that occur the most—and add it to your FAQ.
Conclusion
FAQ pages are critical resources for your website visitors.
Anyone who lands on this page has a chance of converting. Sometimes getting a question answered is all it takes for them to finalize a decision.
So stop wasting time and space with FAQ pages that don’t add real value to your site.
Focus on questions that are related to conversions. Keep the user experience in mind by simplifying your design and writing concise answers. Offer additional support options for people who still have questions. Go the extra mile and optimize your FAQ pages for SEO
Remember: These pages should be made with intention. When done correctly, they become potent drivers for leads and conversions. They also give your visitors a much better experience with your brand when their questions are answered.
And it’s not enough to set-it-and-forget-it. You need to continuously update your FAQ page to answer new questions as your visitors experience your products and services.
If you follow the tips covered in this guide, you can turn your FAQ page into a conversion machine.
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