A business needs a website – it’s a fact. Without a site, a company will miss out on a huge amount of consumer potential, a potential that their rivals will snap up with glee. The future of business is online, and firms need to realise this simple truth if they want to succeed.
However, success isn’t inevitable just because your business has a website. After all, plenty of companies have sites, so there is plenty of competition. No, any old website won’t do – yours has to be special to take advantage and persuade customers to make a conversion. Once they do it on a consistent basis, it is possible to start counting the money. Until then, the business will never be secure. Do you want to ensure your business’s future? Do you never want to worry about sales and revenue again? If yes is your answer, it is time to do something about it. It is time to start making more conversions. Here are the traits of the best converters on the web.
Clear USP
A customer shouldn’t have to decipher why they should use your services or buy your products. They should be able to tell why they should do business with you as soon as they land on the homepage. Although it sounds obvious, it’s amazing how many companies don’t hit this target. Instead, they concentrate on sophisticated marketing methods that they think are the flavour of the day. With a clear USP, the customer can clearly and quickly see what separates you from the pack. It might be that you are cheaper than the competition, or you might provide a better service. Whatever it is, a site has to clearly present the message in a language that is easy to understand. A clear selling point is your foundation, and then you add to it afterward.
Image Change Their Call To Actions
Calls to action are words and phrases that compel the visitor to make a definitive move. For example, the phrase ‘proceed to checkout’ is on almost every e-commerce site on the internet. The three words together almost force you to make a purchase once you have all the items you need. The problem with some calls to action is that they don’t work. ‘Proceed to checkout’ is effective because a customer has no other choice – they have to go if they want their items. ‘Try now’ or ‘find out more’ are examples of weak calls as they have nothing to offer. An interested browser might want to find out more, but only because they are biased. What about the people on the fence? What will make them act more decisively? Using words like ‘free’ is a good place to start as the word ‘free’ adds value. Quite simply, they know they can get something for nothing so will give it a try more often than not.
And Test Them
Changing a call to action is all well and good, but there has to be evidence the change works. Making an alteration based solely on gut feel or other businesses is flawed and dangerous. Gut feel isn’t scientific, and your company is different to your competitors, so both are bad ideas. Instead, try modifying individual web pages and analysing the results. On one page you can keep your old call to action, and on the other, you can change it to something new. If Analytics shows that one page works better than the other, you know which call to action is more effective. Always test a new idea before you pull the trigger as good ideas don’t always work.
Use Of Analytics Services
Speaking on analysing the results, it is a good time to mention that you need to analyse every aspect of your site. Visitors that land on your site might not like what they see, and they will let you know with their hands. That’s to say; they’ll click away from your site and go elsewhere. The best sites understand that a small problem can escalate into something massive, which is why they track every possible detail. After all, a consumer is more likely to buy something from a site they like than from one they hate. Services like Google Analytics are perfect for the job because the software collates all the information and relays it back to you, the boss. As long as you can read the information, you can make the necessary changes to boost your conversion rate.
Image Good Formation & Simple Navigation
There’s a reason people businesses read up on posts like ‘how to structure your online store for eCommerce SEO.’ The reason is due to the importance of structure. As the title of the example post suggests, the formation and structure of your site can affect everything from navigation to SEO. It does sound a little far-fetched, but it is true. The right keywords and phrases have to be in the right places, or else searches become redundant, and that reflects in the rankings. Just as importantly, the structure of the site affects the usability of the person browsing the site. If everything is out of kilter, the site becomes much more difficult to use because it’s unpredictable. For example, your domain name should lead the customer straight to the home page. If they land anywhere else, the site will confuse them so much they won’t know where to go to find what they need. Structure and navigation are imperative to increasing conversions.
Quick Load Up Speed
One thing that annoys consumers more than anything is a lack of speed. Society dictates that everything happens quickly because no one has time to wait anymore. Well, websites are no different. If a site is slow to load, that site is pointless. Before it finishes loading, your traffic will bounce to a rival to get what they want because they know they have so much choice. A site with quick loading speed always has a better conversion rate than a site with low speeds. Test your site and see what how the different pages perform. Any pages that don’t perform to the necessary standard need changing quickly.
Short Sign Up Forms
E-commerce sites like yours have a problem to solve. You need information from the customer, but you also need them to make a purchase. The problem is, they won’t if they have to provide lots of info. Sometimes, a purchase is just not worth the hassle of typing in a name, a number and address. The perceptive ones among you will know what to do – shorten the forms. The trick is to keep the vital information like delivery address and card number, but drop the not so important info. For example, there is no need for a mobile and landline number as well as an email. Most of the time, an email is all you need to communicate and provide the customer with the relevant facts.
Image They Promote Security
Online shopping might be one of the biggest industries on the planet, but it still has some grey areas. The biggest grey is security. It is possible for hackers to steal sensitive information that puts online shoppers at risk, and shoppers know this fact. That’s why a vigilant customer will only buy a product or service from a site they trust. There are numerous ways to instil trust, but the easiest by far is to promote security. Any customers that see a green bar with a lock before the domain name knows the site is encrypted. Well, they might not know that, but they know the green bar means their details are secure. Another option is to provide the option of paying with PayPal. PayPal is synonymous with security, so customers might feel safer using their account rather than card their details.
Provide Customers With Reviews
What do security and customer reviews have in common? They both focus on trust. Just like a green lock tells customers the site is safe to use, do does a review from a previous customer. People are always wary of businesses because there is no trust. They want to use you, and you want them to buy your products, and there is very little middle ground. What reviews do, however, is tackle the lack of trust. They make it hard for a customer not to trust you because they come from an unbiased source. As soon as they see it, they will think ‘this person didn’t get scammed, so it must be safe.’ Ok, it isn’t quite that easy because they know you will pick and choose your reviews. But, you can use a comparison website widget to tackle the issue like you would a social media one. As soon as they feel a degree of trust, they will make more conversions.
Any site that uses a mixture of these features will see a sharp incline in conversions. They work for the sites with the best conversion rates, so they should work for yours too.
