Why did you create your website?
Even the sites you create for entertainment or learning purposes are made with a certain goal in mind– to entertain and to teach you website building. And in most cases, any website you build would have a more concrete mission – to sell something, to gather emails, to get feedback, etc.
When you build an online store, you want users to take some actions on it, not just observe the pictures, don’t you?
A lot of people starting out in the field forget about the most important thing in website creation. They could make an awesome website that excites users and work perfectly smoothly, but it will still be inefficient.
Your store has to convert. If it does not – it means you did something wrong and you need to fix it.
So, to help you run an effective website, let’s go through some basics.
What conversion is?
In plain words, conversion is transformation.
In terms of web, it is the transformation of a visitor into a client. It works like this: you want the visitor to do something (click a button, enter an email, write a comment, buy a product), and when he does it – he was converted.
The element you want the users to interact with usually is called a “call to action” or CTA. That’s because you write an authoritative call on it, like “Buy”, “Download” or “Get it!”.
When there are a few steps the visitor has to perform for an action you need, the conversion will occur when the last step is taken.
Conversion Rate and Other Indicators
There are several metrics that help you analyze and improve your website. Those metrics evaluate the efficiency of your pages and could bring to the surface the biggest problems with it.
Of course, these are metrics you should measure constantly and adjust your website immediately after you notice something is wrong. Let’s take a closer look:
Conversion rate
This is, actually, the most important indicator you can monitor.
This rate counts the percentage of visitors that ended up taking the action you wanted.
For example, 1000 people visited your website today, and 10 of them subscribed to your newsletter. It means that your conversion rate is 1%.
It might not seem like much, but depending on the circumstances, this might be a pretty good number.
This metric is more important than the metric of traffic (the number of people visiting your website for a period of time), because it indicates not only viewers, but also those who are ready to interact with your offers.
Bounce rate
There will always be some people who leave the website right after the page loads- some just click the wrong link, others don’t like the design, we can’t know the full reasoning behind each one.
Bounce rate measures the percentage of these people. If your bounce rate is low– that’s good news!
However, if it is high, that means that people don’t get what they were looking for. In this case, you have to check if pages with high bounce rates are clear enough, and if the content in them matches what customers arriving there expect to find.
Average time on site
As you can understand from the title, this indicates the time users usually spend on your website.
The importance of this metric differs for every type of website.
For example, it is good for a blog to have a high average time on site indicator, but for an online store, it could mean that users spend a lot of time searching for the things they want.
Average page views
In some cases, it could be important to know how many pages visitors to your website view before leaving, and this is exactly what this indicator measures.
If it is high, it could mean that your website is very interesting and engaging for visitors, or that it is too complicated and visitors have to spend a long time searching for explanations.
Conversion Optimization: Where to Start
Now that we’ve established the importance of Conversion Rate Optimization (CRO), let’s focus on how to fix the problem if you have it.
CRO is just as important as SEO (search engine optimization) and in a way they are connected- improving your CRO can help you improve your SEO, so it is more than useful.
The necessary actions could be different and are unique for every website – it might be enough to change the color of certain popup, while other times you have to change the whole layout to increase the conversion rate.
But how do you start?
First thing first, you have to define your general goals for your website- the very first step in the process of creating any website.
If you’ve done it when you first started working on your website that’s ideal, otherwise, we’ve got a few tips for you:
Mission- this is your final goal. If your website is a tool – what would this tool do? Help you make money for living? Collect fame? Build a community?
Problem- you should clearly understand what problem your website solves for your users. Offer helpful products? Give advice? Share information?
Action- what actions do you want visitors to take to help you achieve your mission? Buy your products? Write you a comment? Subscribe to a newsletter?
8 Tips to Increase Your Website’s Conversion
Defining your goals is a fundamental first step, it will help you know what you are optimizing for, but the next step is doing the work.
So here is some advice on what to pay attention to- some of the most common ones trouble spots.
1. Test
Yeah, it can be hard to understand what version of your website customers respond to best if you don’t have the resources to go through a complete A/B testing process.
But you can still test- build a few versions to your website and then ask your friends and family which one is more likely to make them interact with it. Try different layouts on your live website and monitor the change in conversion rate with time.
In the end – you will have the data to choose the best converting version.
2. Increase Loading Speed
We’ve all gotten used to a fast paced life, and your customers don’t have the time or patience to wait for your website to load- these days, even a few seconds delay can make us abandon any website.
Check your website with tools like GTmetrix, and if the loading speed is more than 10 seconds – you need to to do something about it.
If you don’t know where to start in finding out how to speed up your website, there are plugins that help you optimize your website speed, for example – Hummingbird Page Speed Optimization.
3. Make Navigation Simple
You need to make sure your customers are able to find what they want fast, making them search for the items for too long will get them leave the website pretty quickly.
Sort all the products on your website in themed categories and create a simple but clear menu. Mega menus can also help keep things organized – they help customers find what they want without the manu taking too much space on your website.
The SuitUP Shopify theme is a nice example of this kind of structure- there’s a mega menu module in the heading, the products are accurately sorted, and all categories are placed in the left-side menu, enabling customers who want to buy a specific item will be able to find it without any problems.
The template is a responsive website template, well-optimized for conversion and for mobile.
4. Use High-Quality Photos
You can’t afford to yourself to use bad pictures, trust me.
Using low-resolution photos makes your website seem unprofessional and not very trustworthy- visitors expect a higher standard and better investment before they even consider interacting with you.
So don’t make this mistake in your website. Go to the stock photos websites like Shutterstock or Unsplash and get free quality images there. If you can afford it, try some websites offering pictures in a bundle – they are usually cost-effective and hold less common pictures. For example, you can check out MasterBundles.
5. Add an Intuitive Search Bar
Search is super important for your customers’ experience on your website, but adding an intuitive search bar takes it to the next level.
Intuitive search completes the word the user is typing and offers him items searched according to that word, saving him the need to type the exact name of a product or page. This is very important, especially when the customer is not really sure what was the title of the product he wants is.
To take it further, offer a quick view of the products found by search, by listing them in a drop-down menu with pictures. It allows for a quick understanding of the results matching the search, and whatever or not it was what the user was looking for.
Multifly Shopify theme has a brilliant AJAX search bar, so if you use it for your online store – you won’t have to use any third party apps. In addition, the template has some great sorting options that make searching more specific and convenient.
6. Make Sure the Shopping Cart Is Convenient
The cart experience can be what makes or breaks a sale- make sure the shopping cart in your store is easy-to-use and not frustrating for your customers.
Ideally, you want the customer to have an opportunity to go through the products he already added to the cart without going to a separate page.
When The customer has to go to a new page to view his cart, you are taking him away from other products he might still be considering, which makes it hard to find them if he does decide to buy them in the end.
Kardone Shopify template, for example, has a perfectly working shopping cart, as well as a great wish list and comparison tool, which helps users to find the best products for them.
7. Mobile First
This should be obvious by now, websites not adapted for mobile are outdated and mostly irrelevant.
Customers shop more and more on their mobile, if you want your website to be highly converting, you need it to look good on both mobile and PC.
Shopify free themes are generally pretty good at being mobile responsive, but if you want to take it a step further, you can use the Shopy template, offering you a perfectly responsive layout, as well as cross-browser compatibility.
8. Hook the Users with Your Slider
The slider (the banner on your homepage) is the first thing your visitors usually see when they reach your website.
An attractive, eye-catching slider with a tempting promotion can be a great way to catch your customers’ attention and hook hook them to your website.
You just have make sure the photo and text are clear, appealing and eye-catching. If the theme you are using doesn’t offer a slider, you can easily find an app or plugin to add to your store to make it available, but most themes let you do that without any third party apps.
Conclusion
Your conversion rate is a metric you have to monitor constantly and carefully- most goals you set up will depend on that rate, so you can’t ignore it.
Luckily, if your conversion rate is low,it is not a catastrophe – you can fix the problem with some trial and error. Just go through the list I detailed in this post, and chances are that your website will increase its conversion rate with some simple tweaks!
About the Author
Lana Miro fell in love with beautiful web design. She likes to share her experience and explore something interesting in UX&UI design, affiliate marketing, eCommerce trends, etc.
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