15 Proven Strategies To Improve Conversion Rates By 65%
What we’re about to tell you may shock you, so it might be best if you’re sitting down to hear this.
Are you ready?
Website traffic doesn’t matter. It’s useless… unless, and this is the whole point today, you’re converting that traffic. But before we get into ways to improve conversion rates, let’s first define it.
What is a Conversion Rate?
If you already know this, bear with us; the good stuff is coming. A conversion rate is the percentage of website visitors (or Facebook ads traffic) that you convert. So, the next question is this:
What is a Conversion?
A conversion can mean many things but the essence of it can best be summed up with another question: What are you asking this traffic to do?
Obviously, if you’re asking for a sale and you get it, that’s a conversion. However, a conversion can be something as simple as getting a click-through in an email, getting someone to fill out a form, or persuading visitors to reach out via email or phone.
Whatever you’re asking, no matter what it is, a conversion is simply an affirmative response to your CTA. It’s about persuading your audience to do what you ask of them; it’s a little more Jedi and a little less business owner.
(By the way, getting email addresses – list building – is pure gold and something you should be strenuously focused on.)
What is a CTA?
CTA is short for Call to Action. This is the ask. In this guide, we’ll be showing you proven strategies that will guarantee that your CTAs are as persuasive as possible. But first, to illustrate how important conversion rate optimization (CRO) is for the growth of your business, we’re going to do a little math… apologies in advance.
Let’s say that Business #1 gets 1000 visitors a month, while Business #2 gets 10,000. Business #1 has a conversion rate of 2 percent, while Business #2 sees a conversion rate of .10 percent. The math that follows is why traffic alone is meaningless:
Biz #1: 1000 visitors X 2% = 20 conversions per month
Biz #2: 10,000 visitors X .1% = 10 conversions per month
By the way, according to studies, the average conversion rate for landing pages is around 2.35 percent, and this is across industries. If you’re in the top 25 percent, your conversion rate will be around 5.31 percent. And if you’re in the top 10 percent, your conversion rate jumps to revenue-bursting 11.45 percent.
Are you ready for some strategies that will vault your conversion rates into the top 10 percent? We thought you might be.
15 Strategies to Improve Conversion Rates?
The strategies that follow require a little CTA psychology – using psychological triggers and persuasive techniques to elicit the responses you want.
What’s required from you is this: You’ll have to use empathy and put yourself in your target audience’s shoes.
You’ll also have to start thinking like a business psychologist rather than a business owner or entrepreneur.
1. Less is More
Ever heard of KISS – keep it simple, stupid? Not only does it apply in sales, but it also applies when unleashing your marketing strategies on visitors or subscribers.
Are you using an optin form to build your list? (In case you’re not sure, the answer is a BIG yes.) Stick to the basics, unless you have great reasons to deviate. The basics are first name and email address. With each box you add to your form, you can expect diminishing returns, as in fewer signups.
Less is more also applies to your landing pages… all of your static pages, really. And we’ll be digging into some specifics throughout this guide to optimize conversion rates on all of your pages.
2. Speak to Your Audience, Not at Them
There is a distinct way your target audience speaks and thinks, unless you’re Walmart, in which case, your target audience is everyone. So, first, define your target audience, and then tailor all marketing copy specifically for them.
Do you think lawyers speak differently than teachers or business owners? You better believe they do. Not sure how your target audience thinks or speaks – the words they use – to go LinkedIn and input your target audience’s job title into the search bar. Then read through some of their profiles, and make a list of the most commonly used words.
3. Use Offers to Improve Conversion Rates
Here’s an example you might appreciate: You land on a website and see an optin box asking for an email address. They offer nothing. You go to another site and see an optin box, but this time, they’re offering you a detailed guide about how you can improve conversion rates in return for your email address.
Which site gets your email address? Incidentally, once you have someone’s email address, you have permission to market to them. And if you don’t abuse that permission, you can nurture that prospect until you persuade her or him to become a customer.
This also applies to email marketing, since we’re on the subject. Companies like WinZip use offers all the time to improve conversion rates. If your list members gave you permission, they likely are interested in what you’re selling. Now, just give them a good reason to do what you’re asking of them.
4. Understand How Visitors Read Online
First of all, hardly anyone reads anymore. We skim now. Our attention spans have dwindled to the point where a 30 second TikTok video is considered too long. Yes, it’s out of control. But what does this mean for you?
Write copy specifically for skimmers. This means using headlines to tell the whole story. After all, you cannot count on them to read what’s in between the headlines. But this also applies to areas of a web page and how visitors’ eyes tend to track.
Do you know what part of a web page is seen the most or seen the least? These details are essential when you’re talking about moving the needle a percentage point or two. Web site visitors’ eyes track in an F-shaped pattern, which means you should be putting the important stuff on the left side of the page, as this image from Crazy Egg shows.
Here a few more tips to improve conversion rates with this information:
- Use visuals more often, but only if they achieve your page or ad objectives; graphics grab attention.
- Use contrasting fonts and colors to do the same.
- Use directional cues, like arrows, to point visitors where you want them to go.
- Use white space liberally to make important things (CTAs, benefits, etc.) stand out.
5. Ask, Ask, and Ask Again
Ask and ye shall receive. Don’t ask and… guess what happens?
Include at least one CTA on every web page, email, PPC ad, home page section, etc. Never miss an opportunity to ask your visitors, email subscribers, or social followers to do something that will benefit you. But you’ll still need to ask the right way – which we’re getting to – which means putting on your marketing psychology hat for the rest of this guide.
One other important thing few people mention with CTAs: Clarity wins the day. If you want someone to click-through, tell them to click-through. If you want someone to reply to an email, tell them to hit the reply button. You can’t ever be too clear with what you want.
Here are a few more thoughts on using CTAs effectively:
- Buttons perform best because they are more easily seen.
- Action verbs also work best – grab your free ___ today, reserve your spot now, sign up below, etc.
- Use popup optin boxes, but also use them in a way that doesn’t annoy visitors or violate any of these 15 strategies to improve conversion rates.
6. Consistency is King
Well, consistency and content, that is. Imagine a Facebook ad that’s about losing weight, clicking on that, and then landing on a page about muscle growth. OK, maybe a bit of an extreme example, but every part of your funnel must be aligned in its messaging.
This means your ads, your website copy, your landing page copy that’s expected to convert, your emails… every part of your funnel must include a consistent message.
Here’s the thing with people and websites in particular: Once they leave, they’re not likely to return. So, don’t give them a reason to leave.
7. Benefits not Features
We mentioned benefits a while back and this is the number one way to improve conversion rates. Let’s use another example.
You desperately want to lose weight. You’ve tried everything and nothing has worked. You click through from an ad or email and get to a landing page with a headline that reads – Our special botanical blend of herbs blah blah blah.
Now imagine landing and seeing this headline: Lose the weight and keep it off.
The first example is feature centric, as in us, our product, our company. The second example is benefit-centric, as in you, your pain point, what you want.
See the difference? If you take away one thing from this guide it should be this: Always lead with benefits. Benefits create emotion and emotion is that magical land where buying decisions are made. (Take our home page for example, we lead with benefits.)
Now, there is a place for features. Features provide the reasoning and logic to back up that buying instinct. So, don’t toss those out; but don’t lead with them either.
Benefits should particularly show up in email subject lines, headers for marketing copy everywhere – PPC ads, landing pages, other static pages – and especially in CTAs. Try pairing your CTAs with the strongest benefit (or pain point) and watch conversions soar. Execute it like this:
If you’ve had trouble losing weight in the past, we can help you. Click the Buy button below and you’ll be slimmer and fitter than you ever thought possible.
When you speak about benefits, you naturally use the word you more often, and this is important because it allows you to speak directly to your target audience. You is what’s known as a power word when it comes to creating persuasive marketing copy. And you should use it often.
8. Landing Pages Without Distractions
If your landing pages have more than one direction for visitors to go, tsk tsk tsk; that will not do.
Your landing pages aren’t like other pages. There shouldn’t be a footer, or a sidebar, or a menu. Landing pages should have one place to go, and your CTA will determine where that one place is. So, use some software if you have to, but create real landing pages, not normal static pages posing as landing pages.
Since we’re on the subject of landing pages, you should also follow Improve Conversion Rates rule #1: Less is more. If you’re only asking for an email address, try keeping the entire page above the fold. And remember to keep those optin forms down to as few asks as possible.
9. Test Everything
Do you know why digital marketing is so much more beneficial when compared to other types of marketing? You can measure everything in real-time and make adjustments as you go.
Fine-tuning is expected. If you’re not paying attention to your metrics and making changes, you’re not maximizing your digital marketing return; yes, we’re talking about ROI. Let’s use email marketing as an example.
The three key metrics and what they’re related to:
- Open rates – subject lines
- Click-through rates (if you’re asking) – CTAs, offers, benefits, persuasive elements – we’re getting to these
- Conversion rates – same as CTR above
If your audience isn’t opening emails, you know what you need to fix. If they’re not responding to your emails – CTR or conversion rates – you know what you need to fix.
10. Ask for a Date, not Marriage
This is why building an email list is so vital. We consumers prefer to be courted for a while. We generally don’t make buying decisions on the first go. So, nurture those relationships, and don’t propose on the first date.
11. Use Social Proof
There are six elements of persuasion:
- Likability
- Consistency
- Authority
- Scarcity
- Reciprocity
- Social proof
There are books written solely about these elements of persuasion, so we’ll be briefer here. Social proof is what your customers have to say about you, your product or service, and your company.
These can be reviews, customer testimonials, word of mouth, social posts, blog comments; any forum in which people are commenting. But for our purposes here today, let’s focus on testimonials.
If you have them and they’re good, use them… a lot! (Again, we certainly do this like the one below.)
Put them in emails. Put them on landing pages. Just get them out into the world in as many ways as you can. Who better to sell your products or services than your satisfied customers? Do you want to know what your audience will think?
Well, if it worked for this person, it should work for me.
12. Likable
You probably won’t be able to use every element of persuasion and certainly not all at once, but some are more important than others, and being likable is one of those.
We tend to do business with people we genuinely like and get a good feeling from, so use this. Emails especially are more personal than other marketing mediums. Don’t be too stiff when creating email copy and don’t come off as a jerk. I’m sure you’ve gotten emails where the tone is less than friendly.
One way we can portray ourselves as more likable is by coming across as helpful. As a business owner, your CTAs and marketing copy should be worded as such: We exist to help you.
13. Authority
Let’s continue with our weight loss theme. Whose weight loss marketing copy will come across as more reliable: Joe Schmo or Dr. Lose Weight?
If you are an expert, don’t shy away from it. Lean into it. Just remember to do it in a way that’s also likable. And remember, this is a feature, so don’t lead with your authority; use it to back up your benefits. Let’s use About pages to illustrate.
An About page is typically about the what (us). But if you can concentrate on the why (them), it’s more persuasive. How about we use Dr. Lose Weight’s About page as an example.
I created ___ because I saw how much my patients were suffering from ___. Continue on for a paragraph or two about helping the reader and providing benefits to your target audience. And afterward, dive into the features; in this case, experience, credentials, education, etc.
You create emotion then back it up with logic, and boom – you’ve got a conversion. And yes, there should be a CTA on your About page, too.
14. Scarcity
WinZip uses scarcity well in their email copy. They tell you about a product, make you an offer, and then put a time limit on it. You’ve probably seen Shopify e-commerce pages that tell you how many of a certain product is left in the inventory. Do you want to know something? That product is probably always on the verge of being sold out.
Losing something is more powerful than gaining something. This is true in relationships, too. Your significant other is getting attention elsewhere and suddenly you want her or him more than before. Consumer psychology is everything when creating persuasive marketing copy.
15. Stronger CTA Copy
Take everything you’ve learned here today and use it to maximize your CTAs. This is the best way to improve conversion rates immediately.
Improve Conversion Rate Conclusion
As you now see, improving conversion rates is more about understanding human psychology than anything else, and it all begins with empathy. If you can put yourself into your target audience’s shoes, your marketing copy will be strong.
Yeah, this is some Jedi mind-trick stuff we’re talking about. But the question is:
Are you ready to be a Jedi?