You’ve learned about the importance of using data to improve the performance of an e-commerce store. One of the ways you can use data to improve performance is to focus on increasing the conversion rate. In this reading, you’ll learn about conversion rate optimization, which is the process of increasing the percentage of website visitors who complete a desired action.
The desired action for an e-commerce store could be signing up for email offers, watching a product video, or adding a product to cart. These are called micro conversions, which are actions that indicate a potential customer is moving towards a completed purchase transaction. If the customer continues through the buying process, these micro conversions will lead to a macro conversion, which is a completed purchase transaction. That’s the most important conversion for an e-commerce store to track.
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Using data to increase conversion rates
Analyzing data can help you figure out how to increase conversion rates for an e-commerce store. It can also reveal opportunities to improve the customer experience and the checkout process.
Using data, you can discover the following insights:
- Which traffic sources convert at the highest rate
- Which elements on the page have the biggest impact on conversion
- At what point in the buying process customers tend to leave your store or abandon their cart
- Where customers get stuck during the checkout process
You can gather data and discover insights by using analytics tools and other tools designed for conversion rate optimization.
Tools for conversion rate optimization
Analytics tools, such as Google Analytics, can give you insight into how users behave on a website and at what point they leave the buying process. Other conversion rate optimization tools can help you gather more data and test how users will respond to changes on the website.
Here are some examples of the types of tools used for conversion rate optimization:
Heat maps
A heat map is a data visualization tool that demonstrates how visitors interact with a website. It uses color variations to represent users’ behavior. For example, if a large number of visitors clicked on a specific link, the heat map would show darker, more intense color in that area.
Session recordings
A session recording captures a visitor’s actions as they navigate a website, including mouse movement, clicks, taps, and scrolling. It’s also known as a session replay or user recording.
Session recording makes it easy to see how visitors interact with a website. This information provides valuable insight into how to optimize a website and increase conversion rates.
A/B testing
A/B testing is an online test of two variants to determine the better performing option, with 50% of testers directed to one variant and 50% of testers directed to the other variant. An A/B test is also known as a split test or bucket test.
After you decide which changes to make to an e-commerce store to increase conversion rates, you can use A/B testing to find out if those changes will make a positive difference. If the change leads to a higher conversion rate compared to the original version of the website, you can update the website to reflect these changes.
Ways to increase conversion rates
Based on the data collected using the tools above, you can decide which changes to make to a website to increase conversion rates. There are lots of different changes you could make. The specific changes that will make the biggest impact will depend on a business’s products or services, as well as what their customers want.
Here are a few ideas to get started:
General tips
- Remove distractions, such as elements on a webpage that customers don’t notice or interact with.
- Make sure elements that customers interact with most are in a prominent location on the webpage.
- Make your call-to-action buttons clear and easy to find.
- Test out different call-to-action button copy.
- Remove unnecessary form fields for creating an account, subscribing to emails, and completing the checkout process.
- Test out different sales promotions.
- Add live chat.
- Make your website mobile-friendly.
- Improve the speed of your website and/or app, especially on mobile.
Product pages
- Offer a product guarantee.
- Personalize the customer experience by offering a virtual try-on experience.
- Improve your product detail pages by including a detailed product description, using high-quality images that show the product from multiple angles, and adding product videos.
- Add a product recommendation engine to your website.
Emails
- Increase the number of product reviews by asking customers to review a product after they purchase it.
- Send abandoned cart emails.
Checkout flow
- Offer free shipping.
- Allow guest checkout.
- Add flexible payment options.
- Make sure the return policy is clear, easy to understand, and easy for customers to find.
These are just a few of the types of changes that can help increase conversion rates. You can also use A/B testing to test out your changes before making changes to the website.
Keep in mind that conversion rate optimization is a continuous process—not something you only do once. There’s always room for improvement. Even a small increase in conversion rates can make a noticable difference in revenue for an e-commerce store.
Key takeaways
Conversion rate optimization helps you increase sales by making it easier or more enticing for customers to buy. Using data—along with tools such as heat maps, session recordings, and A/B testing—can help you determine what changes you need to make to improve conversion rates.