E-Commerce - Conversion rate Optimisation

What is a conversion?

Doing business is not as simple as finding a potential client and then taking the contents of their wallets. There are gaps between being found and the transaction. So, you must build the bridge. Email inquiries, telephone calls, Online quotes, Data capture, Facebook “likes”, Twitter followers, blog post comments, and anything else.

The Conversion funnel

Visitors enter the funnel at the top, pass through, and leaves the bottom as converted customers.

Tips

The smaller the top, the fewer visitors will enter, and therefore the less will fall out the bottom as paying customers. Wide funnels mean more opportunities. 

How long is your conversion funnel? The conversion funnel needs to be ‘just right’ to enable a visitor to collect all of the necessary information but without having to travel a long distance to get it.

Determine The Conversion Rate

Establish what your goals are for each page

The objectives vary on different pages. On the home page, you may be trying to push them through to that sales page. 

Powerful Calls to Action* (CTA’s)

CTAs range from huge banners that cross the length of the page to small buttons or even just text links. A link that says “Click here for more information” is weak. Use powerful statements like “Buy online and save 30%” or “See the impact service X had on businesses like yours”.

Less is more

Don’t distract them with too many other options. 

Sitewide CTA’s

The reason you want these site-wide is that ultimately you don’t know when the visitor may choose to make contact, and you need to make their life as easy as possible. 

Use of video

Depending on what you are offering the user, you may need to convey the benefits before they are willing to take the next step. 

Remove the leaks

Use Google Analytics to monitor user behavior and spot opportunities to tighten up the funnel.

Navigation

Allows users to navigate to any page from any page. To provide accessibility and prioritize key services. Users may be able to go to the services page in one click but to get to the pricing page for a particular service it takes 3 or 4 clicks. 

No priority in the navigation

Nearly every page is listed and users just get confused. Confusion leads to exits and exits lead to no sales.

Split Testing Sales Pages

A split test is the process of creating two different options and allowing data to gather to see beyond doubt which performs better such as two different CTA buttons, two different videos. You can set up split tests with Google’s Website Optimizer(www.google.com/websiteoptimizer)

Online Quote Forms

If you have an online quote process then there are probably several different bits of information you are trying to extract from the customer:

• The product they are interested in
• Details of the product – size, shape, color
• Quantity
• Their address details

Two really powerful tips when structuring this process:

1. It is better to break it up into several pages rather than requesting all info on one page.
2. Leave the boring address and personal information on the final page.

*Bear in mind:

Offer them the option of signing up so that you can store all their details for future purchases.

Help users to recognize your brand.

Enables faster checkout in the future and exclusive member only offers.

Reference

Pateman, N. & Holt, D. (2011). Inbound marketing. Bookboon.

E-Commerce - Email Marketing

Email marketing is traditionally considered very outbound. However, inbound marketing is just a frame of mind, doing things on the customers’ terms rather than your own. 

Buy relationships rather than databases

Instead of purchasing your data from a third party, enter into a transaction directly with the client. For example, offer a video tutorial series that users must receive via email. 

Qualify your leads

If you offer a range of products or services, you can offer a few different options. 

Automate the process

Be managed by an auto-responder system. 

Keep it personal

The language in the email, the format of your video, and the wording of your emails must all be at a level they can understand. Consumers buy into stories much faster than they buy into facts and figures.

Strike while the iron’s hot

A strong call to action. The opportunity to move them into a commercial relationship.

Actions for Inbound Email Marketing

Prioritise

The relationships, trust, and credibility, an inbound email marketing campaign in your strategy. However, it will NOT help them find you in the first place. Address your SEO and Social Media first.

Begin at the end

Before you start constructing your giveaway, know precisely what the call to action is going to be at the end, as that will affect how you shape the giveaway itself.

Reference

Pateman, N. & Holt, D. (2011).  Inbound marketing. Bookboon.

The Search Engine Optimisation

Search Engine Optimisation is all about ranking at the top of Google or Yahoo for terms relating to your products and services. It is the epitome of inbound marketing. 

Google has to improve the user experience, to ensure that the search results are always the most relevant results are returned.

The Benefits of SEO

Targeted traffic

The people that SEO connects you with are those that are actively hunting out your products and services. 

Free

The Search Engine Results Page (SERPs*). 

Credibility

It’s the online equivalent to having a big shiny shop in the centre of a busy high street.

Developing an asset

SEO does not stop when you stop. The website retains its organic value and your business can continue to reap the benefits for years to come.

SEO has its rules, competition, uncertainty, winners, and losers. It can be divided into two halves, Relevance and Authority.

SEO = Relevance + Authority

Relevance

The relevance has to be built across the website, not just the home page. By adding the right content to each landing page, you can ensure your website is in with a fighting chance of ranking the front page for all relevant terms.

Authority

Google intends to give the user the best result, not your result. So, you need to make Google believe they are the same thing. It is achieved through developing authority for your landing pages. 

The Google Keyword tool

‘Local Monthly Searches’ are the number of searches made each month within the country you have listed. Monthly searches can be misleading, the monthly search volumes are calculated by Google based on a 12-month average.

Facebook Estimated Reach (http://www.facebook.com/advertising/ )

Search Trends (http://www.google.com/trends)

SEO Quake ( http://www.seoquake.com/ )

PageRank

PageRank is the number that Google places on any given webpage to roughly indicate how authoritative that page is. PageRank has a scale of 0 to 10 with 0 being the least authoritative and 10 being the highest. The higher the PageRank the more value that the website has in Google’s eyes. 

Number of pages indexed by Google

A website that continually pushes out large numbers of high-quality pages is going to get significantly more traffic than one that does not.

Mozbar (http://www.seomoz.org/seo-toolbar)

Page Authority

This is Seomoz’s analysis of the authority of a page based on a wide range of measurements. It will give you a good indication of how easily that page will rank for any term that it targets.

Domain Authority

The analysis of the authority of the domain as a whole will give you a better picture of the overall strength of a website and how quickly new pages will rank.

Domain

The search engines attach great value to the name of your domain, so if you own www.pinkfluffyslippers.com, you are going to be at a massive advantage for ranking for the term “pink fluffy slippers”. 

However, long ugly domains that match an important search term like www.cheap-widescreen-tv’s-for-sale.org. the UK is slowly being eroded by Google so these exact match domains.

URL structure

Just don’t make it too long as it ends up looking spammy, impossible for users to type, and gets fewer clicks in the SERPs.

Keyword density

Just write naturally and use lots of synonyms as this will provide a much nicer read for the user but still help build relevance for the target terms.

Tags

These are the things that the search engines read to interpret information on the page. Ensure to match the titles to what you believe people are searching for when you add content to your site. This is why FAQ sections can be so powerful for generating traffic because it just like asking Google questions.

Link building

The on-page stuff is really useful to help Google understand what your website is all about but for Google to decide where you deserve to rank.

In 2011, Google made some huge changes to the algorithm that were aimed at devaluing the manipulative links. 

Tips for link building

Guest blogging

Find blogs relating to your market that has a “Guest blogging” section which allows you to include a link back to your site if you write a really good quality post for them. 

Leveraging relationships

To offer our help to charities free of charge in return for a nice link.

Linkbait

Link baiting is achieved by creating unique content that people just have to share through their own sites and blogs.

Internal linking

Through linking intelligently within their site itself. Google treats these links in just the same way as external links. Identify your primary landing pages and link to them from all other relevant pages. But, don’t overdo links that have no SEO value.

Linking outwards to other content

A good website SHOULD link outwards. 

Social Media

Twitter links have been incorporated into Google's algorithm, and you can probably expect other social signals to follow suit very shortly. 

Google Places ＆Map

For any small business that is looking for local custom, location is ALWAYS a factor, and therefore Google Places is a seriously big deal. 

SEO Action

The basics

With the very basics of SEO (relevance and authority).

Market research

How many people are searching for your products and services?

Delivery

Decide who is going to be delivering the campaign. If you work with an agency or a freelancer then prepare some tough questions. If they come unstuck then move on.

Develop an asset and future-proofing

Ensure whoever takes the reins is aware of both short term and long term goals. You should see some positive movement in traffic and rankings within 1-3 months but also signs that they are enhancing the quality of the site in a way that will set you apart from the competition in years to come.

Reference

Pateman, N. & Holt, D. (2011). Inbound Marketing. Bookboon.