Conversion can mean different things depending on the business goals of your web site. Whether you spent advertising dollars to get that user to your site or have invested time and resources to optimize your site for inbound traffic, you need to know what you want them to do when they get to your site. What does conversion mean, specifically as it relates to your business? Sometimes conversion is turning a visitor to your web site into a paying customer, while others, conversion is capturing an email address that will allow you to stay in touch with that person.
Once you determine what conversion means for your business, ask yourself the following questions to make sure you’re website is converting as well as possible.
What are you offering?
In an environment where most companies have their own agendas front and center, you can choose to put your users first and offer them something of value. Can you think of something that you can provide your user with that will enable them to be more successful at something they care about? If you can, you’re well on your way to earning their conversion.
Can you ask for less?
When we’re handed a long-winded form at the doctors office, we sigh, and fill it out because the doctor won’t see us until we do. You don’t have such a captive audience. If you present a long web form for users to fill out, they will bail on you. Do you really need the address of their college apartment? Reduce what you’re asking of your visitor to the most essential bits of information. If you’re selling something and the user needs to create an account, ask yourself what is the least amount of information you can ask for and still complete that transaction. Everything else is for you, and doesn’t help your user.
Are you able to follow through?
When you ask for something from your visitors, you are promising something in return. Some of those promises are explicit, like delivering the goods that they purchased. Other times, those promises are implicit, teaching people how to write calligraphy. Are you able to follow through on whatever implicit or explicit promises you make on your website? We’ve all signed up for email newsletters that never come. For some reason, we were led to believe that the author of that newsletter was going to deliver some value to us. When that newsletter never arrives, they’ve broken a promise and broken your trust. It would be better for you to stop collecting email addresses than for your to promise a newsletter and not deliver.
If you need help figuring out what conversion means for your business and if your website conversions are in line with your business goals, check out our Maxwell package.
