The key point of any business is ultimately raising the number of sales from the people who visit your store or brand.
In the new age world of E-Commerce, the strategies and processes behind getting conversions have fundamentally changed and will continue to change.
For those just starting their stores, or new to E-Commerce as a whole, it may be tempting to focus only on driving traffic to your website and brand. With the ever-increasing popularity of using paid ads on Instagram and Facebook, or utilizing influencers for promotion, one might think that the only thing standing between you and a consistent wave of sales is enough traffic.
While traffic is undoubtedly a crucial aspect of driving sales, it’s only half the battle.
In this short guide, we’ll be discussing the concept of conversions and conversion rates, and a few pro tips that you can start implementing right away to start increasing sales and revenue for your e-com brand.
What are conversions and conversion rates?
The concept of a conversion is simple:
A conversion is the desired action that a visitor takes after landing on your website.
Now, depending upon your type of business or store, what counts as a “conversion” could vary. However, in most situations, a conversion represents someone going from just a visitor on your website, to a customer having purchased your products or services.
Other examples of conversions could be an appointment booked, an email signed up for a newsletter, or a sign up for a free trial.
On the other hand, conversion rates are just as simple. They are the rate of people who visit your website that takes an action perceived as a conversion.
Before you start implementing changes, it’s important to determine what your goals as a business and website are, as you’ll be updating your strategies accordingly.
For the sake of this guide, we’re going to assume that the conversion goal is the sale of a product. Here are 5 tips you can implement to your store this week to start reaching your goals:
- Feature Your Products Effectively
Once you get visitors to your site, the hard part should be over. You’ve already intrigued them enough with your solution to their problem that they’re willing to learn more.
At this point, they want their beliefs that your product is the solution they’re looking for to be reinforced.
This starts with featuring your products or offerings effectively. They shouldn’t have to look hard to find your main offerings after landing on your site.
Whether you choose to feature images or a video creative, it should be one of the very first things that they see, ideally with relevant product info or customer reviews very close by.
- Make The Buying Process Dead Simple
One of the biggest reasons why visitors don’t turn into customers is that the buying process is too hard or complicated.
How many times have you been on the verge of buying from a website only to have to go through three separate sales funnel pages, sign up for an account, and fill out a lengthy checkout form?
This is the type of site layout that will not only prevent your visitors from buying the first time they land on your site, they probably won’t return again.
After landing on your site, a visitor should be able to purchase your product in less than 5 clicks, and please for the love of all things good, do not force customers to make an account or sign in to purchase your product.
Unless you’re Amazon, it simply won’t work.
- Be Transparent, Develop Trust
Visitors can be put off on websites where there seems to be a lack of security or transparency.
This can mean not having a FAQ section, not listing your company’s contact information on each page, not featuring any real customer reviews, etc.
The more you can make your visitors feel comfortable on your site, and can put their cautionary buying side at ease, the more you’ll be able to get them to convert.
Customers like to know that one, there are people who will actually answer them if they have a problem, and two, other people have gotten the product for the same reason as them.
Show transparency, show social proof. The rest is done for you.
- Utilize Chatbots/Instant Resources
In today’s buying process, people expect almost instant answers to any questions they may have.
And while it’s not realistic to have real customer service representatives on call 24/7, there should be resources available instantly for your visitors and customers at any time.
Utilize live chat plugins when your employees are available, and when they’re not, consider implementing a chatbot to answer and handle the most popular customer service requests.
Getting a quick answer to a question while a visitor is still on your site, and not having to google it and potentially find other solutions, is one of the easiest ways to increase conversions.
- Lower Abandoned Carts
While the main focal point of this article is to figure out the ways to increase conversion rates for visitors just landing on your site, what about for the people who have already added products to your cart, are ready to buy, then poof, gone.
Where do they go? Why didn’t they go through with the purchase?
This can be a frustrating problem for online business owners, but usually, the answers are quite simple.
You weren’t upfront about some information before a customer got to the checkout, shipping prices or times are too high, or they needed to create an account.
Offer free shipping. Always. It’s practically the standard nowadays, and people are much more willing to spend a few more dollars on the product itself rather than cough up shipping costs.
Always be transparent. With your shipping times, with your product materials, fees, anything at all that could influence a buying decision should be featured upfront with no surprises.
Conclusion
Cracking the code to increasing conversions on your e-commerce site can seem like a confusing puzzle at times, but it doesn’t have to be.
By clearly positioning your product as the solution to your customer needs, being transparent and open, having a simple buying process, and a good value, you’ll see sales skyrocket.
Remember, it doesn’t matter how much traffic you can send to your store if the visitors don’t take any conversion actions.
