Five Top Tips to Increase Online Conversion Rates

With our recent release of The Last SaleCycle Remarketing Report, it’s clear that online abandonment is nothing new. And the trends show that shopping around is still a big issue for retailers, especially in the fashion industry.

Product Marketing Manager Katie Ash shares five top tips for getting your website traffic to stick around and improve online conversion rates.

1. Drive Qualified Leads

It’s not just about getting traffic, it’s about getting the right traffic. The stuff that converts.
Generic advertising will only help your click rate, not your ROI.
Considering an average 98% of visitors leave a site as soon as they arrive, you want to find the traffic that is going to stick around.
Creating targeted campaigns that resonate with your intended audience on appropriate platforms is extremely important.
Continual analysis of campaigns is the only way you’re going to increase the quality of leads. But don’t stop there. Analysis without action is wasted effort. Test and optimize and test again. Just because a campaign is working now, doesn’t mean it will continue to, or that you can’t do even better.
Until you’re converting 100% of the traffic that lands on your site, be obsessive with your traffic analysis, optimization, and testing.

2. Take a Personal Approach

Showing relevant and personalized content, tailored to where visitors are in the purchase process is a great way to encourage them through their online journey.
Personalization is not just about knowing their name. Remembering information about return visitors or existing customers as well as capturing behavioral trends during a session can be used to make the experience more relevant for a visitor.
If you present visitors (and worse, returning visitors) with generic content, you’re going to keep them at the same stage of awareness and at the same point in the purchase funnel.
Use behavior and searches to recommend products. Provide customer service options if they appear lost. And if they leave the website, having purchased or not, provide ongoing support to nurture the relationship and shape future behavior.
Follow up a purchase with information on how to use the product, cross-sell, or up-sell. And if the visitor abandoned a purchase, remind them of what they left behind, encouraging them back with relevant recommendations and offers.

3. Consider User Experience

Have you sat back to consider the end user of your website, and the reasons they are buying from you? The flow of your website must seem obvious and natural, without visitors searching for buttons or information they need to make a purchase.
Making sure a visitor has all of the relevant information to make a decision while on the site, results in less abandonment as they search for information elsewhere.
Condensing the purchase process to make it as simple as possible to get through is one of the easiest ways of increasing online conversion.
Don’t require visitors to register before they can purchase. This seems obvious, but so many companies are still using this as a way to grow their database, even though it delays a customer who wants to give them money.
Reducing the number of checkout steps, auto-populating fields, optimizing for mobile purchases, and reducing the information required, are a few other ways to make the process faster for customers.

Every time a visitor lands on your site is an opportunity. If you’re not consciously making it as easy as possible for a visitor to convert online, the opportunity is lost.

4 Make Online More Convenient

The truth is, online shopping is convenient. Consumers have access to everything they want and need in one place. But this is the exact reason that online abandonment rates are so high.
With so much competition online, how do you stop visitors from shopping around?
Providing customers with ample choice when it comes to the way they pay for and receive their goods is one step.
The option to choose delivery speed and method is a great start. Having limited delivery areas or times and hefty shipping and payment fees is a sure way to have customers heading off to buy elsewhere.

Provide customer service through live chat or obvious phone numbers, customer reviews, and guarantees.
Include detailed product specs and information, and sizing charts where relevant. These are all ways to support the customer while they’re on your website.

The trick is to make it simpler, and faster for customers to buy online, while ensuring they receive the same service they would if they headed in-store.

5 Use Customer Insights and Data

People inside a business are not the most objective when looking at the strengths and weakness of a site. You know it inside out, how it works and where things are. But for those who are not as close to the interface (the intended customers) it can be difficult to navigate.
Asking ‘why?’ of the people who did not complete a purchase is a great tool to gain knowledge of potential pitfalls on your site, and action any necessary changes.
What better way to learn where you can improve than by asking the people who wanted to buy from you but ended up walking away!
At the point a visitor is about to leave the site without completing the purchase, display a message asking them for quick feedback on why they’re leaving.
You can also email them the survey at a later time. It can be as simple as a one-click button of why they left with options such as price checking, poor delivery options, website layout, etc.

The more you learn about why people are leaving your site part way through a purchase, the better position you are in to influence their future behavior.

For more information, grab a copy of our Conversion Rate Optimization eBook:

If you’d like advice specific to your own site, request a demo from one of our experts: