CRO, UX, UI – there are so many factors in turning that bog standard site visitor into a valued customer it can all be a bit overwhelming. Everyone thinks they have the right answer and I am here to tell you…I don’t and neither does anyone else. But that doesn’t mean you should not try, test and learn!
WHAT IS A CONVERSION
In short a conversion can be many things. It depends on what you are selling. If you are selling £2 fidget spinners online then a conversion is a visitor buying a spinner. If you are offering a free ebook then guess what? it’s when someone signs up to get the ebook. It is basically an action a visitor takes that is the end result of all the other marketing work.
CRO
When you hear the term CRO, it is referring to a practice known as Conversion Rate Optimisation. For many this is even more of a black art than SEO and it is used to hide many a mis spent hour by less than scrupulous agencies. However, it is real and it is a very useful thing to consider. The really fun thing with CRO is that anyone can do it! Yes…even someone who has literally just read this and learnt what it is.
HOW DOES CRO WORK?
Think of CRO like the process supermarkets use to get you to buy things. We have all seen the TV shows where they tell us about the smells of baked bread [umped into the shops or the end of isle loss leaders to make us stop so they can sell us something else we do not want. Well CRO is the website version of this….but it should be more about helping people do what they want rather than forcing them.
If you land on a website and like what they are saying you may want to get in touch. But what if you can’t see an e mail or enquiry form? What if you find a form but the button says “sign up” rather than “Get In Touch”. You may simply feel like leaving, perhaps you didn’t want to sign up to anything you just wanted some advice! The list of this type of thing is endless it even goes as far as the colour of the buttons on your website, the position of images and even the use of business owners in images rather than stock images etc.
SO HOW CAN I DO IT?
Think! That is pretty much it. Change the way you look at your site and think how people might view it and feel about it. If I am booking a service like a plumber and I am an older person on my own, do you think I would prefer to see an image of the person coming to me or not? Do you think I would be more likely to call if I see a friendly face? Yes I would. It’s the same with anything, if I can see how to quickly get in touch I will go elsewhere, if I can see how to enquire but not buy I might leave.
MONITORING AND MEASURING
Here comes the tricky bit. You can, of course, ignore the issue of measuring if it works or not. I mean, if you are busier than you were before you made some changes than that might be enough. There are lots of tools out there like Lucky Orange and HotJar that offer heat maps and real time video of people on your site. This information can show where people go, what they click on and when they leave. But don’t forget good old Google Analytics! You can set up tracking on your enquiry forms, your shop items and much more. Then you can easily see if things are going up or down! If you need any help with this then drop us a line.
When I said no one has the answers I meant it, but there are lots of people with good ideas. So have a read around, Google CRO for you sector or business type and see what you can find. Try a few things….you might be shocked by the results.
CAN 427 HELP?
Honestly, you do not need us! But if you really don’t have time or you would just like some to get you started then by all means drop us a line. We may have more experience in doing this but you are a user too and so are all your friends and family and their opinions are important.