What Is Conversion Rate Optimization (CRO)?
Conversion rate optimization (CRO) is the process of increasing the percentage of visitors to a website who complete a desired action. The desired action could be anything from making a purchase to subscribing to a newsletter to scheduling a consultation. In other words, CRO is all about turning more website visitors into leads and customers.Â
Definition Of A Conversion
A conversion is just a broad term for a website visitor who completes a desired action or goal. As noted above, the goal of a website will vary widely depending on the specific business. However, regardless of what you are trying to accomplish with your website, conversions can be broken into two general types: micro-conversions and macro-conversions.
What Is A Micro-Conversion?
Micro-conversions are the smaller actions that a website visitor takes on their way to completing a macro-conversion. For example, a micro-conversion could be a visitor signing up to receive alerts about new blog posts on your site.
What Is A Macro-Conversion?
A macro-conversion is the primary desired action that you want a website visitor to complete. For example, a macro-conversion could be visitors actually purchasing a product from your site.
The most important distinction is that the macro-conversion is the end goal, while the micro-conversions are the minor goals that potentially lead a visitor to the end goal.
Why Is Conversion Rate Optimization (CRO) Important?
Imagine a brick-and-mortar storefront window that has a steady stream of passersby. However, most of the passersby don’t ever enter the store and make a purchase. Now imagine that the storeowner creates an enticing storefront window display that suddenly causes one out of every 10 passersby to enter the store and make a purchase. You’d probably wonder why this storeowner didn’t improve his window display earlier! The “enticing window display” in this analogy is conversion rate optimization.
Conversion rate optimization is important because it allows you to get more out of your existing traffic without having to spend money on acquiring new visitors. That means you can generate more leads and sales from your current marketing efforts without having to boost your budget. CRO can also help you improve your website’s overall user experience, which can lead to even more conversions down the road.
How To Calculate Conversion Rate
Calculating your conversion rate is simple: just take the number of conversions (leads or sales) divided by the number of total visitors for a given time period. Then multiply that result by 100 to get a percentage. So if you had 100 website visitors and 10 of them converted into leads, your conversion rate would be 10%.
What Are Some Conversion Rate Optimization Best Practices?
Now that we’ve answered the question “What is conversion rate optimization?” let’s take a look at some best practices for CRO.
Make sure your website is mobile-friendly: In today’s world, more people are accessing the internet on their smartphones than ever before. As a result, it’s crucial that your website is optimized for mobile devices. If it isn’t, you run the risk of turning away potential customers—after all, no one wants to try to navigate a complicated website on their tiny phone screen.Â
Streamline your checkout process: A long and complicated checkout process is one of the surest ways to lose potential customers. The goal should be to make it as easy as possible for people to buy from you; if they have to jump through too many hoops, they’ll likely just give up and buy from someone else.Â
Use compelling visuals: People are visual creatures, so make sure your website includes plenty of high-quality images and videos. In addition to using visuals to break up blocks of text, you can also use them to highlight important information and call attention to special offers.Â
Test and follow the data: Remember that effective CRO is an ongoing process; it’s not something that you can set and forget. Be prepared to continuously test different elements on your website and make changes based on the results. In order to be effective, conversion rate optimization must be based on data and analytics. Only by constantly tweaking and optimizing your site will you be able to increase your conversion rate and reach your business goals.Â
What Are The 2 Types Of Conversion Rate Optimization Tools?
There are many conversion optimization tools you can employ, but all of them fall into two broad categories: quantitative and qualitative.
Quantitative tools
Quantitative tools are any type of CRO tools that collect numerical data about what users are doing on your site. Google Analytics is an example of a tool that you can use to track numerical data about your website visitors.
Qualitative tools
Qualitative tools are any type of CRO tools that collect non-numerical data. For example, a customer feedback form that allows users to share their opinions about their experience on your website.
3 Conversion Rate Optimization Pitfalls To Avoid
1. Applying a CRO strategy without verifying it works: Businesses should avoid making changes to their website without first testing them. A/B testing can help businesses determine whether a change will actually improve conversion rates before they implement it on their live website.
2. Treating conversion rate optimization as a one-time project: CRO should be an ongoing process, as website visitor behavior can change over time. Businesses should regularly monitor their conversion rates and make changes to their website accordingly.
3. Not segmenting traffic: Traffic from different sources will often have different conversion rates, so it’s important to segment traffic in order to accurately track conversion rates. Businesses should track their conversion rates by traffic source, device, and other relevant factors to get a complete picture of how their website is performing.
Need Help Optimizing Your Conversion Rates?
Contractor Growth Network has a team of digital marketing experts who can help you with conversion rate optimization. Contact us today to learn more about conversion rate optimization and other digital marketing strategies that can grow your business.
