Anyone who has an e-commerce website knows: conversion rates are key.
It doesn’t matter how many visitors you have, if you don’t have conversions then your business will not succeed.
Increasing your conversion rates is vital, so how then, do you go about it? Fortunately, there are many things that you can do to boost those conversion rates, and get your visitors to take action.
With this in mind let’s take a look at some things you can do now to improve your conversion rates.
Identify Your Target Audience
There’s no point drawing in visitors if they’re not likely to convert in the first place! Before you start creating content, or even before you set up your website or develop your branding, you’ll want to make sure you’ve taken the time to identify your target audience.
Then, go one step further and look to create customer personas, or avatars. Having someone in mind that you can speak to will enable you to reach them far more effectively, and help you to refine your messaging so that it resonates with them better.
Have Clearly Defined Goals
Having clear goals for each of piece of content, and your website in general, is important. For instance, if the goal of your site is to simply attract visitors –you will never have conversions. Instead, get specific. Which action do you want your visitors to take? Make sure you’re clear on the goal for each of your website pages, blog posts, and marketing materials. Then, design your pages or ads to draw your prospects in, and guide them on toward conversion.
Create Your Funnels
What? You don’t have any sales funnels in place? Don’t worry; it’s easy to neglect this step. But implementing funnels can be a great way to help prospects who might still be on the fence about your product (so, most people) take that crucial next step. So take the time to sit down and strategically map out your funnels. Try to think about the steps that you’ll want them to take, to help warm them to your product. Maybe you could create white papers or have a testimonials page that they could check out? Mapping out your customer journey, and having CTAs that are effective and not too much of a stretch can help to direct warm prospects on toward buying. See: Tips for creating sales funnels to get started.
Create Strong CTAs
Speaking of CTAs, don’t forget to include them on each and every page –and piece of content! A strong CTA will show your shoppers, or readers, which step you want them to take next, urging them on to the next stage of their journey. Create a strong CTA and then run some tests to see how your visitors respond. You might be surprised to discover what works and what doesn’t –simple changes in color, wording, and even button size can generate different reactions, so be sure to A/B test different variations to see which one lands best.
Use Dedicated Landing Pages
Likewise, if you have visitors coming to your website from referral pages –like ads, make sure you use dedicated landing pages. Don’t simply direct them to your home page. Nothing will drive away a prospect more quickly. At this stage of the game, if they actually clicked on your ad or a referral link, there’s a good chance that they’re lower in the sales funnel, and looking for your product –not your company. So give them what they’re after, and make sure there’s a dedicated landing page there to greet them.
Make It Mobile-Friendly
There’s a good chance that at least half of your website visitors will be viewing your site on their phone. In 2018, 52.2% of all website traffic worldwide was generated through mobile phones. You have a limited time to capture your audience’s attention, so don’t lose them with clunky pages that don’t load, or won’t work on mobile. Often, it’s hard to use websites on phones. Invisible chunks of code end up covering up buttons –and navigation can be a challenge. Instead, make sure your website is optimized for your mobile visitors, and features a sleek, easy-to-use interface.
Recommend Related Products
Looking to increase your conversion rates? Why not recommend related products? Showing related products that are “often purchased together” can be an effective way to boost sales. This is something that Amazon does, and with great success. Better yet, consider offering a discount for bundling. Even “save on shipping” may be enough to entice an interested prospect to take action and add the additional item to their shopping cart. Offering products that complement the products your customers are already buying can help improve their experience as well.
Build Trust
Helping to build trust is something that I’ve found works especially well. Shoppers are looking for assurance, and having security badges on your website can help to give them the confidence that they need to complete their purchases.
Personally, I found that adding the Norton security badge to my website’s shopping cart pages increased revenue by 18% increase in revenue and boosted completed carts by 23.9%! So this is one change that might be worth trying.
The shopping cart before and after. The updated page has the Norton badge.
Another way to build trust is by providing testimonials from other satisfied customers. Include testimonials on your landing page as well as relevant reviews or testimonials on your product pages themselves. You’ll also want to include money-back guarantees. And don’t forget to remind your visitors that they can return the product within 30 days if they change their mind.
Simplify the Purchasing Process
Overcomplicating things is a surefire way to lose visitors. This is especially true when it comes to the purchasing process. This is devastating, considering that you have brought them all the way to checkout, only to lose them at the point of conversion!
Don’t make this mistake. Look to make the process simple as possible to help increase your conversion process, and when possible, leave the input fields optional –the fewer fields your visitor has to complete, the better. You can always ask for more information later if you need it. You might also consider ditching the idea of mandatory registration and instead offering guest checkout. Not everyone is going to want to be a lifetime member and the thought of applying can be daunting.
You’ll also want to offer multiple payment solutions. Instead of just one processor –look to incorporate PayPal, Apple Pay, and more to give your customer a choice. Plus with multiple providers, you can reroute your customers to an alternative payment provider if their transaction is declined.
Don’t Offer Too Many Options
On the other hand though, you’ll want to avoid giving people TOO many options. In other words, don’t overwhelm them with choices. When faced with too many choices, people may experience decision paralysis, and may become overwhelmed or even give up on the task. Whenever possible, seek to make the decision process as easy as possible for your customers. Consider highlighting best-sellers with “Most popular choice” or “recommended for you.”
Create Urgency
Why should your visitors buy from you –now? Give them a compelling reason to; otherwise they’ll leave –with the intent of coming back “someday.” Which, as we all know, will more than likely never happen. How can you inspire your visitors to take action? With limited time offers! “Free shipping today only!” “Buy one get one free: 12 hours only!” Another idea is to highlight a product’s scarcity. “Only 2 left in stock!” Or, “Limited edition.”
Test, Test, and Retest
A/B testing should stand for “Always Be Testing.” Because that’s exactly what you should be doing as an e-commerce store owner! A/B testing matters –more than you might think! You should constantly be testing to find out what is working and what isn’t; and then change it up, retest and run again.
What should you be testing? Your price point, you terms, the way you phrase your offers, bonuses, CTAs, and more.
Your conversion rates are crucial to your business and the only way to determine if your website is really performing at its best is to test. You might be surprised at how changes, especially small, often seemingly insignificant ones can make all the difference. Not sure where to start? See what you should be testing.
When it comes to increasing your conversion rates, don’t forget to continually test your changes. What worked at one point might stop working after a while. What worked for one brand, may not work for yourself. Likewise, and most importantly, what you THINK will work best, isn’t always what will, so make sure you verify your hunches with A/B testing in order to keep your conversion rates high.
Have you increased your website’s conversion rates? Share which tactics YOU’VE had success with!
