I ignore the top paid listings for now and focus on the first four. Understandably Apple is the number one result but Amazon.co.uk is right below Apple at #2. Hmmm that title tag for Amazon is pretty ugly-looking and the description is even worse. Apple's title tag however is exactly what I'm looking for--an iPod nano. The description is perfect so I click on that result.
The home page looks promising--it's sleek looks cool and offers exactly what I want:
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I get excited about making my purchase and scan for the price. But wait a minute:
Dollar signs? Bloody hell! The prices are totally U.S.-centric! Lee Fresh Egg's SEO director agreed; other than hearing Madonna's crap faux-British accent nothing turns a Brit off more than seeing a site offer only American pricing. As if that's not bad check out the customer service phone number:
Customers in the UK will have to pay to use that number because it's a 1-800 number and not 0-800. Apple you've just lost a sale. I hit the back button and re-examine the search results.
The two results listed underneath Amazon's are advertising iPod accessories which isn't what I want. It looks like Amazon.co.uk will be my best bet so even though it was a less attractive-looking result than Apple's the fact that they're on a UK domain probably means that they specifically cater to UK users and thus they earn my trust.
You're probably thinking "Oi Rebecca! But Apple had a paid listing at at the top of the page that pointed to apple.com/ukstore!" That's true but how many users are blind to the top and right-hand side of the screen because of the fact that they're paid ads? Probably a lot. "Okay" you're thinking "but why doesn't Apple just create apple.co.uk and optimize (optimise hehe) that?" Well that's a good idea. The only problem is that apple.co.uk is already registered to Apple Agency an illustrating company.
So what should Apple do? Probably serve its UK page to the appropriate IP addresses. Until then it's doing a bang up job of losing out on potential sales.
