When talking about web design and online marketing, it’s hard to overstate the importance of conversion rates. After all, the whole point of having a decent business website is for it to bring in customers. While with proper design and the right marketing you can achieve lots of traffic, that traffic won’t do you much good if your conversions rates are low. So, to make your web design and marketing efforts worthwhile, let’s see how you can efficiently increase your website’s conversion rate.
A thing or two about conversion rate
To fully understand the strategies we will outline, you first need to know what conversion rates are. Well, to put it simply, your conversion rate is the percentage of traffic that actually has a business interaction with your website. This, of course, includes people that will use your website like an online shop, but it also includes the people who will visit your website and use the services and/or products that you offer.
Why is it important?
The main point of you having a decent website is for it to bring in customers. If your website is solely promotional, and you do all of your business in person, great! You need not worry much about conversion rates. But, if you have any aspect of your business going through your website, which is becoming more and more common, you will need to keep track of your conversion rates and try to increase them as much as possible.
The more you can increase your website’s conversion rate, the more revenue you will get from your online traffic.
How to approach increasing conversion rates
Before we outline various ways to achieve this, is one thing you need to keep in mind. And that is that there is no single perfect way to boost your conversion rate. Accept the fact that having better conversion rates is a process that can take months or even years to properly handle. You will need to apply different strategies and keep a close eye on your customers in order to figure out what makes them interact with your website. Once you do that, you will need to carefully and tastefully implement your new-found knowledge into your online presence. Only then will you truly boost your website’s conversion rate in a significant way.
Different ways of increasing your website’s conversion rate
There are a couple of tricks that you can use that will increase your website’s conversion rate for a short amount of time. But, for now, we are going to ignore those. Instead, we are going to focus on how to increase and maintain your website’s conversion rates so that your business experiences financial gain from your website management.
Using data to formulate a strategy
The only way you can properly develop your online presence is if you track your customers’ behavior. And the only reliable way of doing so is by gathering data. Now, the basic way of doing this is with Google Analytics. But, depending on what kind of strategy you are going for, you can use different tools. Some of the most common ones are:
- Google Webmaster – With Google Webmaster you will have a better insight into customer intent data. This data is quite valuable if you plan on redesigning your website to be more intuitive.
- Facebook Audience Insight – Modern online presence is closely tied to social media. And one of the biggest social media platforms for businesses is Facebook. So, if you want a tool like Google Analytics, just for Facebook, Facebook Audience Insight is the tool for you.
- Crazy Egg – Knowing what your customers look at on your website can be a key part of increasing conversion rates. This is especially true if your website is heavy on images and graphic content. One of the ways in which you can track the interest of your customers is with heat maps. And of the most popular tools for heat maps is Crazy Egg.
Tools that we’ve outlined should give you a general idea of how to orient your strategies. They should also give you the necessary input on whether your conversion strategies are working, and which ones are more efficient in the long run.
Google Analytics will give you certain information regarding conversion rates. However, you should use at least one more tool to keep proper track of them.
A/B testing
Small details on your website can have a large impact on your conversion rates. However, due to other factors regarding the online presence, it can be hard to figure out what details are actually noteworthy. So, to figure out and properly manage those details, you need to use A/B testing.
A/B testing simply means that you create two versions of your website and test out which one produces a better conversion rate. This kind of testing is ideal for small details since those details can be the only difference between the two versions. If one is performing significantly better than the other, you will have a clear idea of how to organize your website. A/B testing is something that you should use often, especially during the developmental
Having a comprehensive conversion funnel
One of the steps you will have to tackle within your planning is the conversion funnel. This is a depiction of what your customers will go through once they visit your website. Now, there are many different conversion funnels with different layers depicting states in which your customers might find themselves. But, to keep things simple, we will outline a basic one that should give you an idea of how to organize it. So, imagine that your funnel has four layers. Each layer represents a new step towards conversion which your customer will take while they are on your website. So, in order to properly increase your conversion rates, you need to address each of these steps carefully:
- Awareness – Awareness is the first step, and it usually means that your customer is aware that your website exists.
- Interest – Interest happens once your customers know what you are about and consider your service worthwhile.
- Consideration – Consideration happens once the customers compare you to other websites (whether consciously or subconsciously) and decided that they are considering working with you.
- Conversion – Conversion is when they take the step to pursue your services and/or products.
Consider your customers
The most important and arguably the most difficult aspect of setting up your website so that it has decent conversion rates is to consider your customers. Of course, the whole reason why you are trying to alter your website is to give your customers a better idea of what your business is about and how they can benefit from working with you. So, by default, you are considering your customers, right? Well, not quite.
What we are referring to here is that you need to truly get a feeling of what your customers are going through once they visit your website. You can try to put yourself in their shoes and imagine their experience on your website. But, that will only take you so far. In order to truly see what a customer is experiencing on your website, you need to observe an actual customer. Ideally, you’d find a friend or an acquaintance and see how they surf your website. By tracking their behavior and getting their input, you are going to get a much better idea of what your customers’ behavior is like and how you can modify your website accordingly.
Proper website design
By tracking various metrics and following the behavioral patterns of your customers, you should have a good idea of how your website functions. Such information will be quite valuable in increasing your website’s conversion rate as it will give you a clear idea of how to orient your online presence. But the quality of your website will be equally important. No amount of research or clever online tactics can substitute the lack of a quality website. You can let professional companies such as WP Full Care take care of your website, but it is advisable that you at least familiarize yourself with website design and maintenance.
A well-designed, properly optimized website is easy to market.
Branding
There is hardly a marketing manager out there that won’t tell you that branding is the most important aspect of your online promotion. Without careful branding, there is simply no way that you will have a properly controlled and streamlined digital presence. So, trust us when we tell you that you need to create a brand for your company. Then you need to work with a decent web designer in order to incorporate your brand within your website. If you manage to do this successfully, you will make marketing a whole lot easier since your website will have a certain theme and feel to it.
Ease of use
One of the most important aspects you will have to handle for your website is the ease of use. Once you convince a customer that they should do business with you, they should be able to do so with as much ease as possible. The more clicks or verifications they have to go through, the more time they have to change their minds. So, do your best to make your website intuitive and easy to use. Also, remember to make it function as efficiently as possible. This will require that all updates handled by professionals are implemented properly and that your website has no safety issues. If you manage to do that, you are almost guaranteed to increase your website’s conversion rate.
CTA buttons
Most conversions come through CTA (Call To Action) buttons. These buttons should be an integral part of your website, and they should stand out. But, you don’t want to make your customers feel that you are pushing them to do business with you. So, be careful when designing and placing your CTA buttons. They should be easy to access, yet not at the forefront of your website.
Building trust
With a decent strategy helping you promote a top-notch website, you should soon increase your website’s conversion rate. But in order to keep those conversions going and to keep your customers satisfied, you will need to build trust. And, while you can let experts take care of your site, we recommend that you deal with customer trust on your own. The knowledge that you will gain from doing so will be quite valuable for creating strategies for increasing conversion rates.
Money-back guarantee
Having a money-back guarantee is a sure way to present yourself as an honest, trustworthy business. This is especially useful is you are just starting, as it is a clear way of showing that you value the satisfaction of your customers. You, of course, can and should outline the specific details of your money-back policy. But, at the very least, you should have one and make it clearly visible on your website.
Testimonials and reviews
Testimonials from satisfied customers are another way of breaking the ice and presenting yourself as a business worth working with. You can offer your customers a discount if they leave a video detailing their impressions from working with your company. Or, you can have an ongoing review blog on your website where customers can leave their comments. Such actions lead people to believe that you are an honest company, one that is not trying to take advantage of its customers.
Getting feedback from your customers will be useful for developing trust, as well as for further development of your website.
Ongoing communication with customers
Once you set up your reputation and build up your customer base, it will be much easier to increase your website’s conversion rate. By establishing communication with them, you can outright ask them what they want. And you also will be able to deduce how they feel about your current conversion strategies. Furthermore, you can employ social media influencers to promote your business. That way you will establish yourself within your customer base, which is a sure way of getting valuable traffic.
