Over the last twenty years, attention has been slowly shifting towards online. This has been reflected in a number of trends online – a shift to getting your information online, to shopping online. Then a wide adoption of Mobile devices happened.
The shift to internet has been slowly expanding over time. Since 2020 this trend has only accelerated – with many restaurants and event spaces closed, whole industries had to integrate online.
In the overcrowded online world, it’s getting harder and harder to compete for the prospects online. That’s where Conversion Optimization comes in.
Conversion Rate Optimization – is a process of enhancing your website in order to generate more Leads & Sales from your website.
Why A Pretty Website Is a Little to No Use?
Pretty is good, but not good enough. You may have the most beautiful website, but it’s a little to no use if it’s not optimized to generate Leads.
In our Internet Marketing System Process Conversion Rate Optimization (CRO) is a part of web development process. Because again, why do you need a website if it does not generate Leads.
Skills you Need to Conversion Optimize Your Website
Various degrees of Conversion Optimization for your website require different skills from you – the CRO Specialist.
To make things easier we organized potential approaches to Conversion Rate Optimization into three buckets below:
- Implement Best Practices – requires general knowledge of Consumer Behavior online and is reflected in the general best practices. We will discuss this in-depth in this article.
- Ongoing Experimentation – requires a proficiency in Web Analytics and an in-depth knowledge of tools like Google Analytics or Adobe Analytics, Hot Jar. All this is used to understand consumer behavior on your website and create experiments, in which 50% of your audience will see an improved version of your website.
- Personalization – a whole other level of Conversion Optimization. This type of Conversion Optimization is largely automated and User Experience is modified based on past pages they visited,
Website Browsing Process & How CRO Fits In?
The goal of CRO process is to generate Leads. In order to become Leads, prospects go through a standardized process:
- Find your website (online, through referrals etc.)
- Get to your website – first impression is formed right away – does this website look good or trustworthy? Clean website design like Korean Ginseng Corporation has it on KGC website is the way to win online.
- One Minute Rule – an average attention span of a website Visitor is one minute. During this time you have to tell your story and get that “yes, I want to talk to this company”.
- Actively Convert Visitors – despite all of the above, some website Visitors won’t convert right away – if you want them to convert, you need to incentivize Visitors to reach out.
General Rules of Conversion Rate Optimization
When it comes to Conversion Rate Optimization, there is a number of standard elements that you need to get right on your website.
These elements are standard, so we organized them in a checklist below:
- One Page – One Purpose - when designing your pages, keep in mind that the recommended approach is to have one purpose for each page. If the purpose is to generate a Lead, focus on that. If the purpose is to get email sign up, make this front and center of the page. About Us and Awards pages should focus on telling your brand story etc.
- Calls to action – we recommend every info block on your website to have a Call to Action. While this may seem like an overkill, it is not. In fact, today, most of the websites have CTAs after every info block. Welloona – has an additional call to action placed in the header offering free shipment to all website visitors, who spend a certain amount of the website.
- Prominent Contact Information – it seems like website Visitors can easily go to the Contact page to find your phone number and email, but this is often not the case. That’s why recommend having email & phone number in the Header, Footer and right on the screen on your mobile version of the website.
- Bright Websites Convert Better – bright websites create that necessary space for contrast on your website. If used wisely, white space will make your website easy to read.
The One Minute Rule – How to Tell Your Story Fast?
If you only had 60 seconds to talk what would you say? Would you tell a prospect about your company, your awards, reviews or perhaps about your experience and pricing?
The good news – you don’t have to guess.
As a part of Conversion Optimization process, your website will be build in a way that tells your story, at a glance.
- Build Separate Pages – many companies create one About Us page that is very, very long. An approach we often use is to create separate pages instead – About, History, Philosophy, Press & Media, Reviews, Past Projects, Awards – we recommend creating separate pages for each of the elements. This way a website Visitor can get a favorable impression of your brand by simply visiting your website.
- Prominent Statement on Home Page – most website Visitors will go to the Home page of your website. And so if there was something you wanted Prospects to know about, talking about it on your Home Page is a good idea. For example Citadel’s home page says “3,000 Happy Customers, But we Will Treat You Like Our First”. This is an easy way to communicate that the company has a lot of experience on the market.
- Showcase Awards – One of the key elements that some companies miss, while others hide it in the footer. If you received an awards, or work with prominent partners or there is something special about your business, make sure to communicate it on every page of your website. You don’t know how long a prospect will stay on your website or how deep they will scroll, so don’t take chances with positioning your brand properly.
How to Get More Leads?
One of the main reasons why prospects don’t reach out to your business is anxiety. Maybe tomorrow, later, or after I finish my tea. And then they forget and never reach out to your company.
In addition, over time prospects came to expect incentives in order for them to reach out – Free Consultation, Décor Offers, Discounts and more.
All these serve one purpose – give an incentive for a prospect to reach out to your business. We call these offers – Hand Raisers, as they incentivize interested prospects to raise their hand and show that they are interested.
Once they have the offer they are now one step closer to becoming your client – you can give them a call or follow up via email.
Texting Over Calling – most website Visitors (especially from Mobile) prefer some form of text to emailing & calling. That’s why another element we recommend to have on your website is a website chat.
As a part of the chat, we recommend implementing a Lead Capture form, that will automatically capture Visitors contact information and will generate Leads for your business, while you can focus on other things.
Summary
When it comes to Conversion Optimization, there is a number of elements that need to work together in order to tell your story, make it easy for Visitors to reach out and incentivize interested prospects to “raise their hand” on your website. Working together these best practices can help increase the number of Leads your website generates.
Bio
Sasha Matviienko is an entrepreneur, author of Internet Marketing System, public speaker, and a founder of growth360 - Digital Marketing agency, located in Toronto.
