WEBSITE CONVERSION STRATEGIES
What Is A Website Conversion Rate?
Let’s start with the definition itself.
Website conversion means succeeding in driving your website visitors to your business goal. This goal may be a sale, downloading an e-book, signing up for a newsletter or a webinar etc.
So, if Mr. X visits your website & registers for a free webinar (your goal), then we can say that Mr. X converted on your website.
Whereas, website conversion rate is the percentage of your website visitors that converted.
The formula is a simple one: (Number of users that converted / Numbers of visitors) * 100
Hence, if 100 users visited your website & out of which 5 users converted, then the conversion rate comes to 5%.
Industry Average Conversion Rate
As per a statistics, the average conversion rate for various industries varies from 2% to 10%. The lowest being for non-profit & the highest being for professional/financial services.
Why Is Website Conversion Rate Important?
Simple. Because, website conversion rate drives real sales. More conversion means more sales. More sales means more money.
And, who doesn’t want money?
Why Do Most Businesses Struggle with Low Conversation Rate?
As per a survey (2016), only about 22% businesses were satisfied with their conversion rates.
As per MarketingCharts, getting the attention of target audience is the 3rd biggest challenge.
Most businesses have low conversion rates because they don’t understand audiences’ needs.
But, the good news is that you can improve your conversions by following some time-tested principles listed below. If unicorns can, then why can’t you.
So, let’s dive in.
TABLE OF CONTENTS
WEBSITE SPEED
WEBSITE DESIGN
- Page Builder
- Call To Action (CTA)
- Customer Reviews
- Security Seals
- Live Chat
- Contact Information
- Checkout
- Free Trial
- Video
- Product Description
- Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)
CONVERSION FUNNEL
COMMUNICATION
WEBSITE SPEED
How would you react if I say that 1 second of delay in loading of your site means 7% reduction in conversions?
A study by HubSpot reveals some jaw-dropping facts relating to website speed & it impacts. Have a look.
A slow loading website can negatively impact key conversion drivers like pageviews, sales, orders etc.
The equation is simple: Fast load time >> Happy visitors >> More conversions.
And, if conversions are not enough then let me inform you that page speed impacts your SEO rankings as well.
Ideally, for best user experience, you would want your site to load within 2 seconds. In fact, as per Akamai, if your website takes more than 3 seconds to load, you could be losing nearly half of your visitors!
Use a tool like Pingdom or GTmetrix to measure & analyze the speed of your website quickly.
Following are the step by step guide to improve page speed:
Hosting
No speed optimization techniques will work if your web hosting server is slow.
So, you need to check your web host server’s performance before doing anything else.
This website(bizain) is hosted on Siteground & I recommend the same to everyone in online space.
Also, from customer support point of view, they are simply the best.
Already hosted on some other server? No worries, you may request Siteground for a free professional website transfer. Now, that’s cool!
For an eCommerce store, a combo of WordPress + Woocommerce + Siteground would work.
Or, try the self-hosted solution provided by Shopify ( recommended for beginners)
Theme
Once you are ready with your host, time to change the theme of your website.
Ideally, you should choose a theme that’s:
- Cleanly coded
- Light
- Fast
- SEO-friendly
- Allows customization
I recommend ThemeForest marketplace or StudioPress to anyone looking for a speed-optimized theme.
Content Delivery Network (CDN)
A CDN refers to a geographically distributed group of servers which work together to provide fast delivery of internet content.
In simple terms, to reduce a gap between a user’s geographic location & your website’s host server, a CDN caches your website content & stores across multiple geographic locations.
A CDN reduces page load time & hence provides great user experience to a website’s visitors.
I recommend using Cloudflare CDN for speed & security of your website. If you are hosting with SiteGround, you can install Cloudflare CDN directly from the control panel.
The other CDN which you may consider is MaxCDN which comes with some advanced speed features.
Caching Plugins
If you’re using WordPress as a CMS then you’ve got the luxury to use some powerful caching plugins.
Some of these are:
- WP Rocket: Feature-rich & easy to install
- W3 Total Cache: Comprehensive & difficult to set-up
- WP Fastest Cache: Simple & easy to setup
What these aforesaid plugins do is cache your website’ content into your visitor’s local hard drive. So, when the visitor visits your website again, most files would be served from his/her local hard drive.
Image Size Reduction Plugins
There are some useful plugins (for WordPress) that can help you reduce image sizes on your website.
Reduced image size makes website pages load faster.
I recommend using Smush which is free & easy to set up.
WEBSITE DESIGN
Now, comes the next important part of this article: Website Design
Speed alone won’t help you win the online race. You’ll need to couple it with an awesome design.
A good design is a design which helps you sell.
“38% of people will stop engaging with a website if the content/layout is unattractive” – says a study by Adobe
So, what are the key characteristics of a well-designed web page?
- Convinces with a strong value proposition
- Pitches an offer that visitors can’t resist
- Tempts with a clever call to action button
- Shows progress (if it’s a checkout page)
- Builds trust with customer reviews
- Has Minimum fields (if it’s a checkout page)
- Showcases product demo (preferably in video format)
- Multiple payment & login options
- No unpleasant surprises (like shipping fee)
Look at this checkout page from CrazyEgg
Let us discuss how you can build a beautiful web page that sells.
Page Builder
Page builders are applications which help in creating beautiful landing pages without coding.
If you are serious in your online endeavors, then a page builder application is a must.
Few features that you must look for a page builder:
- Drag & drop interface
- Pre-installed templates
- Conversion elements (like countdown timers etc.)
- Loading speed
- Mobile responsiveness
- Integration with popular 3rd party apps
I prefer using LeadPages because they are the best among all that I have tried.
Call to Action
Call to action means inviting visitors to initiate an action (your goal).
It, generally, can be in a form of text link or button. Example: Buy Now, Order Now, Download Now, Start Your Free Trial Now
Take care of the following to make your call stand out:
- Tempting words
- Bold font size & color
- Distinct button color (a sharp contrast with background color)
- Repetition of the call to action (don’t over-try this)
- Strategic placement of button (preferably should be complemented by a strong value proposition)
One of the best examples of an ideal call to action button is from TreeHouse’s landing page:
The value proposition here is “Change your career, Change your life”. And, the call to action button is further tempting with a phrase like “Claim your free trial”.
Customer Reviews
Collect genuine feedbacks from your best customers & place them on your landing page.
This simple set up can give a huge boost to your conversion rate because customers want some kind of trust before converting.
Ideally, customer reviews should be placed near to call to action button or link.
Make sure that you include:
- Full name of reviewers
- Company name (B2B review)
- Rating
Security Seals
Just like customer reviews, security seals increase visitor’s confidence.
Ideally, they should be placed on the checkout page or near call to action button (if your conversion involves payment).
Live Chats
Live chats can help address concerns of your website visitors.
Faster resolution of queries means faster conversion. Bingo!
I recommend Kayako for setting up a live chat on your website. Or else, you may try out an innovative chat bot solution like MobileMonkey
Contact Information
“51% of people think ‘thorough contact information’ is the most important element missing from many company websites” – says a survey conducted by KoMarketing
A good example of a contact page is below:
Make sure to include the following elements on your contact page:
- Map
- Full Address in text
- Phone number
- Contact form
- Social media links
The intention should be to make yourself accessible on various channels.
Checkout
On checkout pages, include only those fields that are necessary to process an order.
Look at the checkout page below as a good example:
Minimum fields result in lesser cart abandons & faster conversion.
Free Trial
A free trial is the easiest way to capture qualified leads & let your product speak for itself.
Offering free trial is one of the best ways to improve conversion.
Look at the following free trial offer by Norton on its checkout page:
Video
Video enables visitors to better understand your product & therefore assists in conversions.
A study by eyeviewdigital.com says that using video on landing pages can increase conversions by 80%.
Have a look at the following landing page which incorporates a product video:
Product Description
Don’t let your product description be boring & obvious.
The following needs to be taken care of while writing product description:
- Focus on user benefits, not features
- Educate about technical specifications
- Use your own unique style (matching your brand)
- Talk about your return/refund policy clearly
- Supplement with some professional images/videos
Look at one of the good product descriptions that we found:
If you suck at writing, then outsource the same to a freelance content writer.
Frequently Asked Questions(FAQs)
Answer questions that visitors would want to know before buying or trying your product.
These questions can be anything ranging from subscription cancellation, return, refund, free trial to some more advanced questions like features or technical specifications related to your products.
Apart from assisting in conversion, FAQs also help in reducing the number of pre-sales support tickets.
How about the following FAQ page of Vimeo?
CONVERSION FUNNEL
The conversion funnel is a path that visitors take before reaching the conversion event.
Example: If conversion event is paid consultation then a basic funnel may look like:
Offer free live webinar à Visitor opts in with email address à Start valuable webinar à Offer paid consultation at the end of webinar à Conduct consultation for converting visitors à Schedule emails to convince non-converting visitors
These kinds of funnel are quite common in SaaS companies which offer a free trial at the start. Thereafter, they expect free trial customers to upgrade to paid plans. Those who don’t upgrade are sent periodic emails (some companies even offer discounts to non-converters!).
Have you noticed that some dental clinics offer free check-ups? That’s a starting point of their conversion funnel.
Even we have a free website check-up service here at Bizain. That’s the tip of our website conversion funnel.
There are various kinds of funnels that can be made depending upon the objective:
- Optin Lead Capture Funnel
- Sales Funnel
- Webinar Funnel
- Membership Funnel
- Launch Funnel
Conversion Funnel Builder
If you are serious about building your business, then a conversion funnel is a must.
Among all funnel builders, I have found ClickFunnels to be the most robust in terms of features. It can easily be integrated with your WordPress website using a plugin.
They have got a ton of funnel templates to start with.
An intelligently crafted funnel can take your conversion rate to the roof. So, make sure you plan & invest in it.
As a thumb rule, a high converting funnel should have the following features:
- Crafted with the industry & audience in mind
- Helps visitors climb the value ladder steadily
- Offers free value at the first stage
- Builds more trust at each stage
- Smart & personalized stages (based on the behavior of visitors)
COMMUNICATION
Regular & frequent communication with your prospects/customers helps build strong relationship. Such business relationships not only impact conversation rate but also act as savior in case of business downturn.
A business which has build strong relationship with its customers has more chances of survival than the one that hasn’t.
As per Wikipedia, there are various methods of communication:
- Web-based
- Video conferencing
- Reports
- Presentations
- Telephone meetings
- Face-to-face meetings
Email Automation
At some part of your journey as a customer you must have got emails like a birthday wish, welcome email, thank you email etc. (from brands).
Well, these are nothing but automated emails.
Automated emails are emails triggered automatically based on certain event or behavior of the customer or prospect.
As per an article on MarketingLand, automated transactional emails have an open rate of 52 %!
So, if you are not using automated emails that mean you missing out on one of the best opportunities to convert.
Email, itself, as a marketing channel, outperforms its peers with highest website conversion rate.
Now, how to configure such emails with your website?
I prefer using GetResponse. You can easily integrate it with your WordPress website using a plugin.
Blog
Blogging is a great way to showcase your talent or experience related to your industry.
So, naturally, this builds trust & confidence in the minds of the visitors.
To make your blog stand out & help in your website conversion, focus on the following:
- Solve real problems
- Provide tips & tricks
- Add call to action buttons
- Add a subscription form
- Avoid jargon words
- Structure with heading & sub-headings
- Make social sharing easy
Social Media
Social media is one of the most under-estimated conversion channels. Generally, its considered as a traffic generator & not conversion.
Engaging on social media gives an impression that you can care about your customers.
Some prospects may like to check your social profiles before committing to a purchase.
Few social media tips for businesses:
- Track your brand mentions actively
- Reply to each & every query with enthusiasm
- Create a professional-looking profile
- Don’t just talk about yourself, talk about the industry as well
- Try posting a variety of stuff like quizzes, videos, tips, links, quotes etc.
- Post regularly & frequently
Conclusion
So, to improve your website conversion rate, you’ll need to focus on 4 major areas: Website Speed, Website Design, Conversion Funnels & Communication.
Some bonus tips to further boost your website conversion rate:
- Aim for targeted & qualified traffic
- Tweak your product as per the market need
- Pitch new products to existing customers first
- Collect & work on feedback
- Offer referral commission to existing customers (for referring new customers)
What is your website conversion rate? How do you plan to improve it?
What are your thoughts regarding the aforesaid strategies? Comment below.
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