Customer Service Glossary
What Is Conversion Rate Optimisation?
Conversion rate optimization (CRO) is a business process focused on improving – or optimizing – the percentage of customer conversions on a website, landing page, or mobile app. Conversions vary based on the brand and campaign. They may include making a purchase, adding a product to the cart, completing a contact form, registering for a service, or clicking a link on a web page.
Conversion rate optimization often includes several elements, such as identifying web pages that need improvement, brainstorming best practices to guide visitors through landing pages or apps, and using A/B testing to determine which web design and app ideas customers prefer.
Conversion marketing professionals specialize in conversion rate optimization and may use a variety of methods to boost CRO on a landing page by generating returning and unique users. You can also use conversion rates to learn more about your consumer base. For example, conversion rate optimization data enables organizations to understand several points, including:
- What drives their website visitors through the purchasing process
- What website roadblocks exist to prevent users from purchasing a product, subscribing to a newsletter, or registering for a service
- Which digital marketing elements resonate most effectively with their audience
- How writing, images, and other web content and marketing strategies influence usability
- Where their user experience (UX) falls short of expectations and how they can improve the journey
By evaluating and applying the conversion rate optimization process in a client-centric manner, both in-store and online companies can enjoy more conversions and more revenue.
Why Is Conversion Rate Optimization Important for Businesses?
Conversion rate optimization has become an organizational goal for businesses around the world. However, with most companies focusing on the metrics behind conversion rate optimization, it’s easy to miss out on the most important factor: your user base.
Of course, the ultimate goal is to acquire more customers, increase sales, and convert more visitors into paying or subscribing shoppers in order to make more money. That said, prioritizing specific conversion percentages, industry benchmarks, and other averages can result in firms viewing their shoppers as numbers, not individuals, and conversions as nothing more than a form of series of mergers and acquisitions.
In fact, the conversion rate optimization process can lead to many of the same difficulties experienced during the search engine optimization (SEO) process. When businesses begin to base performance on headlines, keywords, and cost per click instead of providing value to their clients, they may not enjoy the growth and profit they expected.
Instead, consider your target market. What do they want, need, and desire? What are their priorities and preferences? What drives them to make a purchase or sign up for an offering? Alternatively, what makes them give up before they complete the conversion funnel?
With this in mind, you can begin to learn more about your target demographics and optimize three critical elements of conversion rate optimization:
- The factors that bring potential people to your website.
- The factors that make them abandon the purchasing journey and leave your site.
- The hooks and motivators that inspire them to complete the conversion journey.
Identifying these three drivers enables you and your team to take the first steps toward conversion rate optimization, as follows.
1. Reducing Roadblocks to Support
A study conducted by the Harvard Business Review noted that reducing user effort not only increases brand loyalty but supports the conversion rate optimization process.
Businesses can leverage an omnichannel strategy to streamline the outreach and engagement process and reduce the effort involved with their conversion funnel. Installing live chat options, phone assistance, and email widgets in convenient web page locations reduces the time required to contact a knowledgeable support agent. Further, using self-help content and customer resource portals improves the experience for tech-savvy shoppers who prefer to find answers for themselves.
Finally, consider A/B test methods to determine the best ways to generate and retain web visitors. For best results, consider hiring an expert conversion rate optimizer with experience in online shopping, unique user generation, and technological problem-solving.
2. Prioritizing Personalization
90% of shoppers are more likely to purchase or sign up when they receive a personalized experience. In comparison, organizations that prioritize UX enjoy 11% higher conversions compared to their competitors.
Based on the data, in-store and e-commerce success relies on more than a high-quality product. Instead, your business must evolve to suit the needs, preferences, desires, and priorities of its clients.
How to Calculate Conversion Rate
Businesses need more than a working knowledge of the definition of conversion rate optimization to entice their web traffic to purchase. Instead, they must understand how to calculate the metric and apply it to their website conversion marketing strategy.
To calculate conversion rate, use the following formula:
Conversion Rate = (Total Number of Conversions / Total Number of Visitors) x 100
It’s also important to understand that conversion rate doesn’t occur in a vacuum. Instead of comparing your CRO against an “average” number, consider how yours has changed in the past and how you can improve it in the future by focusing on competitors within your niche and patrons, not web analytics.
Leveraging Experience and Support for Conversion Rate Optimization
The conversion rate optimization process offers businesses the ability to scale their e-commerce operations and convert more users through easily accessible assistance, optimized web content, and shopper-centric policies.
By understanding and tracking your conversion rate data, you can shift the focus to your patrons, drive qualified web traffic to your site, guide followers through your funnel, and develop meaningful relationships that benefit your brand and your audience.