Think about it for a moment…
What are the reasons for creating, updating, and maintaining your business website?
On the top of that list should be one important goal – acquiring qualified leads and customers.
Because let’s be honest, if your business website fails to generate qualified leads and customers, it will have a negative effect on your success.
Not only do you need to build a great website, but you also need to constantly optimize the design, the content and the usability of your website in order to convert more of your visitors – and achieve more of your business targets.
When you consider that the average website conversion rate is 2.35%, every website could do with a boost to improve results.
In this blog post, I’ll be sharing 7 things you can start doing immediately to boost your website conversion rates.
Without further ado, let’s see how your business can capture more leads and customers through your website.
1. Track your conversion rates effectively
If you want to boost your website conversion rates, the first step is actually having the knowledge of your current conversion rates. That’s why you must put a system in place to track it effectively.
While tracking your conversion rates, you need to be tracking against your goals. What are your conversion goals? 5%? 100 sign-ups?
A popular tool you can use is Google Analytics. To see how well your landing pages are converting visitors, you can set a goal in Google Analytics to track actions that are considered conversions.
For instance, a conversion goal could be your ‘thank you’ page after a visitor signs up or makes a purchase:
Once a user gets to that ‘thank you’ page, it means that they’ve taken an action that counts as a conversion – and you can add them to your funnel.
When you’re able to track conversions effectively, it becomes easier to implement new strategies and see their effect on your results.
2. Build quality landing pages
Let’s be clear about this – most of your conversions will be on landing pages. Whether you’re trying to capture qualified leads or make sales, you need to build quality landing pages that can convince a visitor to convert. The more landing pages you have, the better – so ideally, you need to constantly create new landing pages, as well as optimize them regularly for better results.
Now, the concept of a quality landing page is subjective. But most quality landing pages have some common traits. These include:
- A simple and attractive headline
- Clear copy showing the benefits your ideal audience wants
- An obvious call to action button with words displaying your offer
- Social proof such as testimonials, case studies, number of users, etc.
- Visuals supporting your page offer
Apart from increasing the quality of your landing pages, you also need to increase their quantity. Because having more landing pages also means more opportunities for conversions.
And this is supported by a HubSpot study where companies increased their lead acquisition by 55% when they increased the number of their landing pages from 10 to 15.
To create quality landing pages, you need the right landing page builder. And, of course, the right landing page builder for you will depend on your needs.
If you use WordPress on your website, one of the best solutions is Elementor; one of the best parts is that you can use it to design your landing pages directly in your WordPress dashboard.
It provides a simple drag and drop builder to help you create your landing pages even with few (or no) design skills:
You can also easily add forms, create pop-ups, ensure your landing pages are mobile-ready, amongst other features; plus, the fact that it’s built-in to WordPress makes it much easier to create new landing pages regularly, as needed.
3. Go for simple page designs
It’s hard to go wrong when you have a simple, easy to follow landing page. Whatever offer you’re trying to make to your audience, you need to do it in the simplest and clearest way possible.
A Google study found that visitors can form an impression of your page after viewing it for just 50ms. Pages with low visual complexity (VC) and high prototypicality (PT) appeal more to visitors.
Keep in mind that having some elements on your page will distract landing page visitors from converting – even though they might seem useful or they make your pages look better.
Two common examples are outbound links and navigation bars. These provide opportunities for visitors to leave your landing pages without performing your intended action.
Despite this, only 16% of landing pages are without a navigation bar. By removing navigation bars, AmeriFirst increased their landing page conversion rate by 40%.
See an example of a very simple landing page from QuickSprout:
It’s basically just a form; and the form only features the basic fields you’d need to get a lead’s information, plus a field asking about people’s marketing budget, which is quite useful for qualifying leads if your service is high-cost.
It’s not just links and navigation bars that you need to consider, but also the actual design; this too should be kept simple, with lots of white space and little content or visuals, as too much can overwhelm and confuse visitors.
4. Use lead magnets and content upgrades
Before visitors will release their personal information to you, they want to get some value for it. What value can you provide for your readers in return for their details?
A lead magnet is a piece of content that solves an immediate problem for your audience. Examples of lead magnets are:
- eBooks
- Whitepapers
- Webinars
- Checklists
- Videos
- Discounts
Content upgrades are a form of lead magnet that is more targeted. This means you’re trying to attract your audience with a piece of content that is highly relevant to the page they’re currently viewing; and that in turn means they’re more likely to convert.
See an example where Brian Dean offers a content upgrade on his popular Google ranking factors post:
Amazingly, the content upgrade led to a 785.01% increase in conversions within a month.
A tool you can use to deliver content upgrades to your page visitors is Optimonster. It also provides the option to deliver exit-intent pop-ups to visitors about to leave your page, plus you can use it to create pop-ups and forms, as well as track your analytics, easily:
5. Carry out A/B tests on web page elements
Since there’s no perfect landing page, A/B testing is an activity that you must engage in during your campaigns. As a matter of fact, testing should go on for as long as a page exists – you’ll keep learning what makes your visitors convert so that you can continue to boost your landing page conversions, time and time again.
Having said that, what are the page elements you have to test on your landing pages?
- Headline
- Page copy
- CTA button color
- Page background
- Visuals
With these tests, you can optimize conversions for your page. To make your tests accurate, it’s vital that you only test a single page element at a time. This way, you’re able to pinpoint the changes responsible for your results.
A tool that can help you carry out effective A/B tests is Crazy Egg. It allows you to set the elements you want to test on your page and for how long.
Added to this, you can see heat maps of your visitors’ activity and eye movement to see which regions of your page get more eyeballs. So, for example, you might notice that a lot of people aren’t looking at your call to action – in which case it’s imperative that you change the location or the colors used so that you can get more eyeballs on the call to action.
In a test, 160 Driving Academy tested a stock image against a unique image of their student in front of a truck. This simple test led to a 161% increase in conversions for the company:
6. Use social proof to convince visitors
Your potential customers might be skeptical of your intentions when you market your product yourself. But they find it easier to believe your message when it’s coming from your satisfied customers.
After all, your customers have little or nothing to gain from marketing your products. Communicating social proof is a way of showing prospects that you’ve already provided the solution they’re looking for to other businesses and other customers just like them.
Some ways to demonstrate social proof, include:
- Testimonials
- Case studies
- Number of sales made
- Number of customers
- Glowing customer reviews
Social proof allows a prospect to convince themselves that they can get the solutions they want from your service. See an example from Sumo where they featured Pat Flynn’s endorsement of their product.
7. Carry out competitive analysis
Every business has competitors. And it’s better to follow up on them before they run you out of business.
First of all, there are many things you can learn by spying on your competitors. A few elements of their website that you should study, are:
- Design
- Page copy
- Offer
- Product or service features
- Social proof they use
- Payment platforms they use
- Call to action
A reality you need to face is that potential customers will go through different websites before they make their choice on where to buy. So how do you gain an edge on your competitors?
The first step is knowing your competitors and their strategies. The second is finding ways to gain an advantage over them – and build better, higher-performing landing pages.
A tool like Crayon uses artificial intelligence to monitor important competitor activities and provide valuable insights to help you follow up on their moves. With this, you can take more proactive actions on your pages and convert more visitors:
Conclusion
Increasing website conversion rates is a continuous activity for your business. Because converting more of your visitors means more customers and increased profits – which, after all, is almost any businesses’ main objective.
What are you doing to help increase your website conversions? What tactics are you using?
Guest author: Lilach Bullock is highly regarded on the world speaker circuit, Lilach has graced Forbes and Number 10 Downing Street. She’s a hugely connected and highly influential entrepreneur. Listed in Forbes as one of the top 20 women social media power influencers and was crowned the Social Influencer of Europe by Oracle. She is listed as the number one Influencer in the UK by Career Experts and is a recipient of a Global Women Champions Award for her outstanding contribution and leadership in business. Check out her site Lilach Bullock or connect with her on LinkedIn.
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