..Or Make You Lose Your Mind In The Process!
What does converting leads into sales mean?
Lead conversion combines marketing and sales process that involves converting visitors to your website,
social pages and through google search into customers through nurturing tactics like behavior automation, retargeting, and email nurturing.
We’ve outlined 13 techniques you can use to drive customers to your shopping cart and check out!!!!
13 Techniques Guaranteed to Improve Your eCommerce Conversion Rate
- Price Anchoring
- Implement Numerous High Quality Images
- Create Highly Detailed Product Descriptions
- Include Customer Reviews
- Make Checkout as Simple as Possible
- Make it Very Easy to Contact You
- Provide Assurances to Customers
- Draw Attention to Items that are on Sale
- Offer Numerous Payment Alternatives
- Create Abandoned Cart Email Sequences
- Create a Sense of Urgency
- Make it Really Easy to Find Products
- Optimize the Shopping Experience for Mobile Devices
Make more money on your Online Store: Discover how you can maximize your online shop for conversions.
If you want to make more money from your online store, what’s the best way to make that happen?
You’ve got a couple of options. First, you can try to get more traffic to your store. Presumably, more visitors equal more sales, right? If you can go from 100 to 200 visitors per day, you would, in theory, double your overall sales.
This method of increasing sales has been used for many, many years in both brick-and-mortar and online
stores. It’s why brick-and-mortar stores will hire someone to stand outside and spin a sign around.
It’s why they put advertisements on bulletin boards and create radio spots. They simply want to get more
attention and foot traffic.
Unfortunately, there is a distinct problem with this method of increasing sales. Simply put, more sales don’t necessarily mean more profit.
There is a much more effective way to increase your overall sales and revenue: improve your conversion rate.
Conversion Rate Optimization – CRO
YOUR CONVERSION RATE IS THE PERCENTAGE OF YOUR VISITORS WHO PURCHASE FROM YOU. IF YOU HAVE 100 VISITORS AND THREE OF THEM BUY FROM YOU, YOUR CONVERSION RATE IS 3%. SIMPLE, RIGHT?
Let’s say that, using CRO, you’re able to increase your sales from three out of 100 visitors to six out of 100
visitors.
By doubling your conversion rate, you double your revenue without increasing your spending at all. This
dramatically increases your overall profits.
Are you starting to see the potential here?
Now for the good news. You can almost always improve the conversion rate on your website. In other words, you can get a higher percentage of your visitors to purchase from you. This is good news because it means you can get more sales and revenue without needing to spend money to get more traffic. You can squeeze more out of your existing visitors instead of being forced to constantly bring in new ones.
Improving your conversion rate is called Conversion Rate Optimization (CRO).
A/B Testing
CRO relies heavily on A/B testing. In a nutshell, A/B testing involves testing two variations of things against each other to see which produces more conversions.
For example, you may try two different headlines on a page and see which generates more sales per
500 visitors. Or you might implement different ways of describing a product to see which resonates with
customers more.
Some important things to remember when doing A/B testing:
- Always only test one variable at a time. In order to measure the results properly, ensure that you test only one change. If you test multiple changes at the same time, you won’t be able to tell which change caused a difference.
- Ensure your tests reach statistical Some important things to remember when doing A/B testing: significance. Statistical significance simply means that enough events occurred (visitors, clicks, page views, sales) to ensure that the results are accurate and not some sort of fluke.
TECHNIQUE #1: Price Anchoring
It’s no secret that people love to feel like they’re getting a good deal. The more someone feels like they’re getting a steal of a deal, the more likely they are to purchase from you.
THIS IS WHERE PRICE ANCHORING COMES IN. With price anchoring, you include both a higher price and your selling price next to all your products. When people see the higher price and then compare it to your price, it makes it appear that they’re getting a good deal. To be clear, you don’t have to make up a higher price out of thin air. Consider using the suggested retail value of a product or how much you would charge for a consulting session.
For example, let’s say you’re selling a limited-release Small Batch Double Robusto Maduro Box Pressed bundle of cigars for $137.00 The regular price is $197.00. The value is shown side by side. The $137.00 figure as your price anchor. Infomercials do this all the time. Before they reveal the actual price of a product, they list a bunch of potential prices. They say things like, “It doesn’t cost $50. It doesn’t cost $100. You can get this for the low price of just $12.99.” By listing higher prices first, they make people more receptive to the actual price.
One thing to note about price anchoring: the difference between the price anchor and the actual price needs to be reasonable and not outlandish.
TECHNIQUE #2: Implement Numerous High-Quality Images
When it comes to selling online, few things are more important than product pages. A good product page dramatically increases the overall conversion rate, while a poor product page can cause sales to tank.
It’s important to remember that with online shopping, your customers can’t physically handle the products they’re looking at. People shop with their senses as much as their minds. If they can’t touch the products you sell, they want to use their other senses, like sight.
This is why it’s so critical to include numerous high quality images of your products on the product pages. Instead of just using a single hero shot, include a variety of images of your products from various perspectives. For example, let’s say you’re selling a journal. You want to include photos of:
- The cover
- Various inside pages
- The back
- Stock photos of someone writing in the journal to give a sense of size
You may also want to include a video or two so that visitors can get even more of a feel for your product. The video doesn’t need to be complicated. A simple 30 second clip can go a long way in the minds of shoppers.
TECHNIQUE #3: Create Highly Detailed Product Descriptions
This is closely related to the previous point. In addition to using numerous high-quality photos and videos, all of your product pages should contain in-depth product descriptions. These product descriptions help customers understand exactly what they’re getting. If you don’t include detailed descriptions, the odds are much higher that some customers won’t purchase simply because they don’t feel connected to the product.
WHEN CREATING PRODUCT DESCRIPTIONS, IT’S IMPORTANT TO INCLUDE AT LEAST TWO THINGS:
- Highlight the benefits of your product. Help shoppers understand just how much they will enjoy your product. Paint a picture of the good life – cigars are a lifestyle enjoyed by all . Your goal is to help shoppers envision using and strongly benefitting from what you have to offer.
- Be clear on the features of the product. This includes things like the size and gauge, binder, wrapper, filler and packaging. You want to spell out everything that is included with your product and ensure that your customers know exactly what they’re getting.
If your product doesn’t include something that people might expect, be sure to highlight that as well.
TECHNIQUE #4: Include Customer Reviews
Why do people shop online in the first place? It’s primarily for convenience. They want to be able to get the products they need quickly and easily, with minimal hassle. This means that your checkout process should be as streamlined and hassle-free as possible.
On the other hand, if a product has very few or poor reviews, you’ll probably look for something else. Customer reviews are absolutely essential for your ecommerce store.
The truth is that people have much more confidence in what others say about your products than what you say about them. You may have the clearest, most convincing product descriptions in the world and the absolute best photos. But if you don’t have customer reviews, you’re going to be at a disadvantage.
Of course, this implies that you need to get your existing customers to actually review your products. Probably the simplest way to do this is to create an automated email that goes out at a set time after a
purchase is made (like two weeks after).
In the email, ask the customer if they are happy with the product and whether they would be willing to
leave a review. For example, if a customer leaves a review, you could give them 20% off of their next purchase. This kind of incentive can significantly increase the number of reviews you receive, which in
turn helps increase your overall conversion rate.
To generate more reviews, consider offering some sort of incentive.
TECHNIQUE #5: Make Checkout as Simple as Possible
Why do people shop online in the first place? It’s primarily for convenience. They want to be able to get the products they need quickly and easily, with minimal hassle.
This means that your checkout process should be as streamlined and hassle-free as possible. Simply put, if shoppers must go through a complicated checkout process, your conversion rate will fall significantly. So how do you simplify checkout?
CONSIDER IMPLEMENTING THESE TIPS:
- Allow shoppers to check out as guests. Avoid making potential customers sign up for an account with you before they purchase items. You already have their name and email address from the order itself. Guest checkout is much easier for customers.
- Request the minimum amount of information. If you’re don’t need a person’s physical address, don’t ask for it. If you don’t need someone’s phone number, don’t try to get it. The less information you ask for, the less work your customers have to do.
- Ensure that every input field is clear. Some input fields, such as dates or phone numbers, require special formatting. Make it crystal clear exactly how the data should be entered by customers. Better yet, automatically format it for the customers as they enter it in.
- Be upfront with shipping costs. Few things turn customers off like getting to the checkout page and discovering that shipping is much higher than what they expected. To keep customers from jumping ship at checkout, be very clear about what shipping will cost and when the product will arrive.
TECHNIQUE #6: Provide Assurances to Customers
For most people, shopping online is an exercise of trust. They’re trusting you to deliver a high- quality product when you say you will. They’re trusting that your product descriptions are accurate and that your product does what you say it does. They’re trusting you to not rip them off.
Unfortunately, every online shopper has had at least one bad experience. Maybe the product was defective, and they had trouble getting their money back. Maybe the product doesn’t actually match the seller’s description. Or maybe they just didn’t like what they purchased.
What sorts of assurances should you include?
THESE ASSURANCES WILL HELP YOUR POTENTIAL CUSTOMER TRUST YOU:
- Make your return policy abundantly clear. Shoppers want to know that if they have a problem with the product, you’ll solve it for them. Spell out all the details of your policy, including how long people have to return a product and what sort of credit they’ll receive from you if they return your product.
- Assure your shoppers that their information is safe with you. The last thing anyone wants is to have their private information stolen by a hacker. If possible, display security badges from the services that protect your store (McAfee, SSL, and others). These badges serve as trust signals to your customers.
- Answer as many commonly asked questions about products as possible. If customers regularly ask the same questions about a particular product, include answers to those questions on the product page. The more questions you can answer in advance, the fewer challenges you’ll have on the back end.
TECHNIQUE #7: Make it Very Easy to Contact You
Inevitably, your site visitors will have questions, concerns, and challenges. They’ll want to know when a product will be back in stock, a specific taste profile, or whether you offer any sort of quantity discount. If you want to convert these visitors into paying customers who come back again and again, it’s important to make it very easy for them to get in touch with you.
The more ways customers can get in touch with you, the greater the chances of you being able to solve their problems and turn them into paying customers.
Don’t bury your contact information deep inside your website where it’s incredibly difficult to find. Avoid making people work hard to speak to you. Rather, make your contact information obvious, clear, and easy to understand. Put a link to your contact page in your navigation menu as well as at the bottom of every page. Give people numerous ways to get in touch with you, including phone, email, and your physical address, if applicable.
Additionally, you may want to consider implementing live chat on your website so that customers can interact with you in real time. In our age of text messaging, many people like the option of communicating with you without needing to make a phone call, write an email, or wait for their answer. Live chat is easy and immediate.
It doesn’t matter how easy it is for customers to contact you if you don’t resolve their issues in a timely manner. If you take ages to respond to inquiries and problems, you won’t win new customers and you’ll lose your existing customers.
TECHNIQUE #8: Draw Attention to Items that are on Sale
Price is a huge factor when it comes to visitors making purchases. Customers want to feel like they’re paying a reasonable price. As we’ve noted before, they really love feeling like they’re getting a discount on a great product.
If you have certain items on sale, draw a lot of attention to those items. Highlight the sales on your homepage and across your various product pages. Don’t make people go digging through the depths of your website to find your discounted products. Make your sales obvious, clear, and attention-grabbing.
THERE ARE DIFFERENT WORDS YOU CAN USE TO HIGHLIGHT THE DISCOUNTS YOU’RE OFFERING:
- Free
- Marked down
- On sale
- Deep discounts
- % off
- Limited time
- Deal
Cross-selling is promoting related products, while upselling is promoting more expensive versions of the same product. Effective cross- selling and upselling allows you to generate significantly more revenue per
transaction.
For example, say you’re offering a discount on popular product. You could cross-sell it with an accessory or newly released product. Always be thinking of strategic ways you can get customers to purchase additional products from you.
Amazon engages in cross-selling constantly. When you visit a product page, they always show you related products that customers also purchased.
TECHNIQUE #9: Offer Numerous Payment Alternatives
We live in the age of choice and options. When it comes to paying for products online, people want to be able to use their payment method of choice.
If you don’t offer someone’s preferred payment method, there’s a good chance they won’t purchase from you. Yes, it’s true that some credit card companies charge higher transaction rates, but it’s better to pay higher rates than lose customers.
AT A MINIMUM, YOU SHOULD ACCEPT ALL THE MAJOR CREDIT CARDS:
- Discover
- American Express
- Visa
- Mastercard
IT WOULD ALSO BENEFIT YOU TO ACCEPT OTHER METHODS OF PAYMENT LIKE:
- Apple Pay
- PayPal
- Google Pay
- Venmo
Ultimately, this is about providing convenience for your customers. Maybe they want to use a particular credit card to gain rewards. Maybe they have a high balance on their primary card and need to use an alternative.
What you can be sure of is that if they can’t purchase on your site, they’ll buy somewhere else.
TECHNIQUE #10: Create Abandoned Cart Email Sequences
If you’re not trying to get customers to come back to their abandoned carts, you’re leaving a huge amount of money on the table.
THINK OF JUST HOW CLOSE YOU WERE TO GETTING THE SALE. THE CUSTOMER:
- Came to your site
- Browsed your products
- Put products in the cart
All that was required was a few more clicks for them to checkout. But for some reason, they didn’t complete the process. Instead of trying to find a new customer, you can work to convert this customer.
After all, they’re already familiar with you and the products you offer. One final push is needed.
Abandoned cart emails go out automatically whenever a customer leaves their cart and they are designed to bring the customer back to complete the purchase.
WHAT SORTS OF EMAILS WORK WELL IN ABANDONED CART SEQUENCES? CONSIDER USING THE FOLLOWING:
- Simple reminder of what they left in their cart
- Discount if they return and complete the purchase
- Support if they have any questions or challenges
- Time sensitive (cart will expire)
You can send out these emails over a series of days. It’s likely that when the customer sees these emails, they’ll be motivated to finish their purchase.
It’s true that it takes work to create and implement these sequences, but you have a much better chance of converting these customers than trying to convert totally cold traffic.
TECHNIQUE #11: Create a Sense of Urgency
When customers feel a sense of urgency, they’re more likely to purchase from you. People have a distinct fear of missing out (FOMO) and you can capitalize on this fear by creating scarcity and urgency with your
products.
So, how can you create urgency?
SOME PROVEN WAYS INCLUDE:
- Highlight limited stock. If you have a limited number of a particular product, bring that to the customer’s attention. Make them feel like if they don’t purchase now, they won’t be able to purchase for some time.
- Limited time offers. Creating a discount that expires at a predetermined time is another great way to increase the overall conversion rate. People hate paying full price if they can get a discount! This encourages them to purchase within the limited discount window.
- Limited selling window. If you limit when a person can purchase a product, it forces them to decide whether they really want to buy from you. This tends to increase the overall conversion rate.
- Offer a bonus incentive. Give your visitors who purchase right away something additional. This can
motivate those who are sitting on the fence regarding purchasing.
Think long and hard before deciding on the type of urgency you’ll use. Are you really willing to offer a deep discount? If not, you need to come up with some other way of creating urgency.
TECHNIQUE #12: Make it Really Easy to Find Products
You want to make it really easy for customers to find products, especially if you have a large number of them.
People don’t want to spend hours wading through pages and pages of product listings to find the one they’re looking for. They want to get where they’re going quickly and with minimum fuss.
TRY THESE STRATEGIES TO MAKE IT EASY FOR YOUR VISITORS TO FIND PRODUCTS:
- Clearly separate products by category. Put the categories on your website navigation so that your shoppers can get where they want to be within a few clicks of the mouse. Generally speaking, they should be able to get to any page on your website within three clicks.
- Implement search within your site. In the age of Google, people rely heavily on search to find the products they want. Putting a search function in your store can significantly increase conversions. Plus, you can use search data to help you better structure your site. Look at the products people
search for most and then put those on your home page or above the fold on your category pages. - Allow your website visitors to filter products by various characteristics. For example, allow people to
filter by size, gauge, wrapper, country of origin and any other attributes.
When you go through the videos, you’ll see firsthand what it’s like for a visitor to try to pick their way
through your ecommerce store. You can then make appropriate changes based on what you see.
TECHNIQUE #13: Optimize the Shopping Experience for Mobile Devices
By this point, your website should work well on mobile phones and tablets. But there’s a big difference between ensuring your site works on a mobile device and optimizing the shopping experience itself.
EVALUATE THE SHOPPING EXPERIENCE WITH THE FOLLOWING QUESTIONS:
- Is all the text easy to read?
- Can shoppers quickly see all the details around a product or are they forced to scroll endlessly?
- Are the images clear and easily accessible?
- Are the call-to-action buttons (Place In Cart, Buy Now) obvious?
- Are reviews and ratings easy to find?
- Are checkout fields kept to a minimum? (nobody likes endless typing on a phone)
It can be extremely valuable to have other people go through your store and then give you their objective feedback. When you spend hours and hours working on your site, you quickly lose perspective. You forget what it’s like to navigate your store as a stranger.
If you want a great example of what a highly optimized shopping experience looks like, simply visit Amazon on your smartphone. The company has literally spent millions of dollars creating the ideal experience for shoppers.
They know that a huge portion of their customers will shop from their mobile devices and have done everything in their power to give customers the best experience possible. Generally speaking, if it worked for Amazon, it will probably work for you too.
Now that you know the process of optimizing your eCommerce website for increased Conversion Rate and sales, don’t feel overwhelmed at the thought of trying to implement all these different things.
Implement one thing, ensure that it’s working properly, and then move on to the next.
When it comes to CRO, slow and steady wins the race.
Are you looking for a way to boost your customer experience and take your business to the next level?
Our team of digital marketing experts can help you reach new markets, increase lead conversion, and keep your customers coming back for more. And the best part? We have a simple plan to help you assess your digital presence, create a custom strategy, and fire up your brand.
Give us a call at 631-251-5990 or email learnmore@cigarboxmarketing.com and we’ll give you 20 minutes of free knowledge that’ll change the game for your business.
Trust us, it’ll be the best 20 minutes you’ll spend.