In today’s ever-changing digital environment, the only given is that traffic is inconsistent. So, conversion rate optimization is your savior as you are maximizing the traffic you already have.
It’s important to keep in mind that every business is human-centred And what better way to amplify the number of visitors who take desired actions on your website than by tweaking your website to offer them a top-notch user experience?
With this user-centric approach to conversion rates, you will gain an understanding of what drives or stops users from converting.
Are you ready to optimize your website’s conversion rates? Don’t give up on reading this article!
What Is A Conversion Rate?
When a prospect performs a desired action on your website, whether it is a click, a sign-up, or a purchase, a conversion happens.
Desired actions may be too diverse to be compiled in a list, but here are some examples that illustrate how they can vary from micro-conversions to macro ones:
- Filling a form
- Creating an account
- Clicking on a link
- Downloading an e-book
- Signing up for a service
- Making a purchase
Although desired actions vary, the way that conversion rates are calculated is the same.
That being said, if you want to calculate a conversion rate, you’ll need to divide the number of conversions by the number of visitors and multiply the result with 100 in order to get a percentage.
For example, if your web page had 100 visitors last month and 40 of them filled in a form, your page’s conversion rate is 40%.
The average conversion rate may vary from industry to industry, but the global average website conversion rate is 4.31%
However, you should not pay particular attention to this benchmark, as every industry and audience is different. Besides, desired actions and conversion goals vary not only from industry to industry but also from business to business.
What Is Conversion Rate Optimization?
Conversion Rate Optimization (CRO) is the process of optimizing your website based on user behavior insight so that the chances of visitors conducting desired actions in the future increase.
Contrary to its name, CRO is not just about optimizing conversion rates, it’s about understanding your visitors better and constantly tweaking your web pages to improve usability and to meet user experience goals.
When you optimize your conversion rate, you are lowering customer acquisition costs as you are gaining more value from the visitors you already have, the returning ones.
Therefore, rather than spending money on paid advertising and attracting new visitors, you are optimizing your web page to increase the chances of your current visitors converting.
That being said, it’s crucial to understand that conversion rate optimization is an ongoing process. No matter how user-friendly and well-designed your website may be, there will always be room for improving user experience.
Similarly, it’s important to adjust CRO in relation to your objectives and KPIs (key performer indicator) as they change over time.
CRO In A Few Easy Steps
While the goal behind CRO may seem pretty simple, conversion rate optimization without smart goals or informed decisions is useless.
Like any other digital marketing process, CRO only works if it’s backed up by an airtight strategy.
1.Establish Goals and Conversion Metrics
Optimizing your web page without setting some goals beforehand would be pure chaos. Similarly, setting SMART goals will make your job easier because if your goals are measurable, your progress will also be easier to evaluate.
Still, there is no such thing as a “universal successful conversion metric” as goals vary from business to business.
Here are some common micro and macro conversion goals that illustrate how goals vary from industry to industry.
- E-commerce: purchasing, adding to cart, subscribing, leaving reviews or ratings, signing up for an e-mail newsletter
- Media: subscribing, sharing on social media, engaging with recommended content, page views, time per session
- Community: creating a profile, leaving comments, submitting content, social shares
- Travel: booking conversions, leaving reviews, social shares
- B2B: closing deals or generating leads
2. Do Your Research
Once you have figured out your goals, you need to establish what’s stopping your web pages from performing as well as you want them to.
The most effective way to identify which areas to optimize is Google Analytics, as it will help you identify what works and what doesn’t.
Not only can you distinguish discrepancies in conversion rate between devices, but you can also discover which blog posts or web pages don’t perform as well as desired.
However, while analytics is an effective method, you need to go more in-depth. This is possible through qualitative data, as you are gaining insight into what your visitors think.
Qualitative data is not just about interviews or surveys, you can experiment with it through:
- User testing: give users tasks and ask them to complete them on your website, while they record themselves and talk you through their user journey. This way, you can identify the obstacles that users encounter.
- Customer service analysis: gain a better understanding of visitors’ pain points and curiosities. By analyzing customer service messages, you will also learn what additional information you should add to your website.
- Live chat analysis: similarly to customer service analysis, thanks to live chat analysis you gain an understanding of how you can make your website more informative
- Pop-up surveys: they are different from in-depth surveys, as users can only answer with ‘yes’ or ‘no’. However, if the answer is no, you can ask the user to provide more information. You can adjust your message and who you are targeting based on your goals thanks to advanced targeting. For example, you can target people who abandoned items in their carts.
3. A/B Testing
See how different variations of your website perform with A/B testing. From headlines to calls to action, layout, or navigation, A/B testing is great for reducing bounce rate and increasing conversion rate.
With A/B testing, you can make data-driven decisions when solving user pain points and optimizing your website.
For example, A/B testing helped China Expat Health increase their lead conversion rate with 79% just by choosing the value proposition headline title, “Save Up to 32% on Your Health Insurance in China” instead of the former one.
4. Implement a Conversion-centered Design
Your website may look cool, but if it’s not driving your visitors to convert, it still has a long way to go.
From simple tweaks or additions to game-changing alterations, here are some modifications that will upgrade your website game.
- Add text-based CTAs in blog posts to avoid banner blindness
- Use a different color for your CTAs and make them look like buttons
- Remove unnecessary options from forms
- Use action-focused words
- Organize information based on hierarchical order
- Add directional cues
- Form a sense of urgency to persuade users to convert, right away
- Add testimonials on your landing page to increase credibility
- Humanize your ‘about us’ page to
Make CRO A Priority, and You’ll Soon Reap The Benefits!
Increase conversions while not spending money on attracting new visitors? Doesn’t that sound like the dream of every digital marketer?
Well, capitalizing on your current traffic is possible thanks to Conversion Rate Optimization.
The team here at CadenceSEO can make this whole process easier and more fun.
Eager to start? Book a free consultation with us today!
