HOW TO BOOST YOUR

WEBSITE CONVERSIONS
 Why do we want to optimize
conversion rates?

Conversion rates are measured by the percentage of people who take a desired action.

A phone enquiry, purchase of a product, or a sign-up to your email newsletter are all examples of conversions. The
average business will get some (or all) of these on a regular basis.

What you don’t see is that for every one person who takes one of these actions, there are often 50-100 more who don’t.
This is exactly why we want to optimise conversion rates, bringing in a larger number of people who take the action that is
desired.

Higher conversion rates can lead to more enquiries, more sales and a larger audience of people who are interested in your
business.

If you’ve ever carried out paid advertising using Google Ads, Facebook Ads or a similar platform, you will likely have paid
for each click-through to your website. Having a higher conversion rate would mean that you’re taking better advantage of
the traffic that you’re paying for.

Conversion rate optimisation can bring many benefits to your business. Here’s a few examples:

● Better ROI - Increasing your conversion rates mean that you’ll be getting more out of the resources that you have
available. Increasing your return on investment means greater profits for your business.

● Customer Insights - You can understand your audience more clearly and use messaging that they really engage
with. Bringing in more of your ideal customer is possible when you understand the how and why of their actions
on your website.

● Improved User Experience - When you know what works on your website, you can do more of the same. Giving
people a great experience on your website builds trust and encourages visitors to spend more time on your
website.

It’s quite likely that as you read this, you’ll realise that you’ve never worried about how effective your website is since it
first launched. It probably looks nice and you’ve got some great content. Hopefully, you have some reviews or case studies
from your happy customers. But you’ve never measured anything to actually see which areas of your website really
resonate with your audience.

In our free guide, we’re going to run through what conversions are, why we want to optimise them, how to measure your
conversion rate, focusing on data, what to optimise and how to test your changes.

Let’s get started!

It’s not just about sales. That’s an easy misconception to make when it comes to your website. Only about 2% of the
people who ever visit your website are in a position where they are “ready to buy”. Conversions are about so much more
than sales.

Conversions can be split into two main categories. The first are “macro conversions”, also known as primary conversions.
The second are “micro conversions”, otherwise referred to as secondary conversions.

We can split macro conversions up into three general areas:

● Enquiry based conversions - This could be a contact form submitted or a telephone call made from the website
itself.

● Revenue based conversions - An example of this would be a completed order for a product from your website or a
paid sign-up for a subscription service.

● Lead acquisition based conversions - This could be someone signing up for a free account, a completed loan
application form or someone requesting a demo of your service.

Micro conversions can be divided up into these areas:

● Engagement based conversions - This could be time-based e.g. spending more than 1 minute on your website or
it could be for a total number of pages viewed in one session.

● Navigation based conversions - You could track users who visited a specific page, such as a product or landing
page. You may also track the number of users who reach the checkout on your website.

● Action based conversions - Examples of these could be signing up to your newsletter, downloading a brochure or
adding a product to their cart.

It’s important that you’re tracking both macro and micro conversions on your website. Of course, the macro or primary
conversion will get the most focus. Yet, there are often micro conversions that are completed on the way to the macro
conversion goal.

Most websites will have one main macro conversion goal, although it’s not unusual to have multiple goals. For example, if
you have an E-Commerce website you may want to track your sales conversions as well as enquiries.

For a completed E-Commerce sale, micro conversions will take place on the way such as: viewing a product page, adding
the product to the user’s cart and finally visiting the checkout page.

TIP: Think about your website and what the most important macro conversion goal is for your
business. Next, take the time to think about all of the micro conversions that could be made. Not every
micro conversion will lead to a macro conversion, but many will. The easiest way to do this is to walk
through your website and think about the different steps and actions that users can make. Which of
these do you want to track?
2 What is your conversion rate?

Now you have an idea of what a conversion is, you’ll want to understand how you can work out your conversion rate.

There is something to consider before jumping straight in. You need to decide if the goal you’re tracking is something that a
user can complete every time they visit your website, or if it’s something that each unique user would only complete once.

For example, if you sell products on an E-Commerce store, a user could make a purchase every time they visit. If this is the
case, then you’ll want to track the number of sessions when calculating your conversion rate.

If a user can only complete an action once, then you’ll track unique users. An example of this would be a user signing up
and paying for Amazon Prime. This is a one-time subscription sign-up, and not something a user would do every time they
visit Amazon’s website.

To work out your conversion rate, you take the number of completed actions (conversions) and divide this by the number of
visitors (sessions / unique visitors), then multiply by 100. Your conversion rate will be a percentage.

Let’s look at two examples, one using sessions and one using unique visitors.

● ABC Toys have an E-Commerce store. Their customers can purchase products on each visit. They want to work out
their website’s purchase conversion rate. Last month they had 500 orders and 40,000 total sessions.

Their conversion rate is: 500 / 40,000 x 100 = 1.25%

● XYZ Video offers a subscription service for their video content. Users can only have one paid account. They want to
work out the conversion rate for subscriptions to their service. Last month they had 1000 new subscriptions and
75,000 unique visitors.

Their conversion rate is: 1000 / 75,000 x 100 = 1.33%

Each of these fictional companies will have more data points to focus on through the micro conversions that they’ll track.
Looking at the conversion rate data for these two macro (primary) conversions tell them that for every 100 people visiting
their website, just over 1 are completing the desired action.

Once you work out the conversion rates for your business, you’ll have actionable data that you can use to improve
conversions and measure your success. Over time, you’ll be able to compare month on month data to look at how your
business is faring historically.

TIP: Review your revenue, enquiry or lead acquisition data and find the total number of new completed actions for the
previous month. Next, look up the total number of unique visitors or sessions in your analytics data. Work out your
conversion rate as a percentage using the formula above. If you have data spanning back far enough, it would be great to
work this out for the last 12 months of business.
3 Data is the key
Conversion Rate Optimisation (CRO) is carried out based on data. Without data, you’re left making decisions based on
hunches and feelings. This is a great way to waste your time and resources - two finite things that are almost certainly
better used elsewhere in your business.

There are two key data methods that you can utilise. These are analytical data and people based data. You’ll always need
the analytical data first, before you can carry out any people based analysis.

Analytics (Quantitative Analysis)

With analytics data, you can find out information such as:

● How someone found your website - Which website or search engine did they find your website on and click
through from. The referrer information is useful for tracking paid ads or social media activities.
● Which page the user landed on - By “landed on” we mean the first page that the user visited on your website.
● Devices and browser - You can see the percentage of visitors who use computers or mobile devices, as well as
the browser software they’re using. It’s helpful information that you can use to ensure you’re delivering a
consistent experience to every visitor.
● How many users abandoned your website - For E-Commerce businesses, it’s very helpful to know how many
people abandoned their cart and didn’t purchase. For other websites, you’ll want to know which page people left
your website from.

Your analytics data will help you to have clear ideas of where to focus your efforts. It’s best to start with pages that have
the most engagement from your visitors, so you can use your time effectively.

People Based (Qualitative Analysis)

Using people based analysis, you can find out information such as:

● Why they visited your website - What made them choose to click through to your website over your
competitors, or why did they visit a specific page on your site?
● Would they tell their friends - Would they tell friends about your business and how would they describe your
business to others?
● Does your business stand out - Do they think your business stands out amongst your competitors? Is there
something your business offers that competitors don’t?

Taking the time to combine people based analysis with your analytics data is very powerful. It will let you see both the
“how” of the actions taken and “why” your visitors decided to take those actions.

You can leverage this information to learn more about your customers and ensure that your website is resonating with
exactly the right type of customers you want to attract.

TIP: Block out some time in your calendar on a monthly basis to look at the analytical data on your
website. Make a note of elements that are important for the specific goals that you are tracking. If you
have a decent sized audience, set up on-site or satisfaction surveys to get some feedback from your
customers and learn more about them.
4 What can you optimise?

You can optimise almost anything on your website, although it’s best to focus on opportunities that will bring both quick
and big wins to your business.

In the research that you’ve carried out into your analytics data, you will have been able to identify key landing pages for
your website. These will typically be product pages, service pages and specific landing pages that are set up to capture
leads via an opt-in form.

These pages should be where you focus your attention initially. They’re the most visited pages on your website and
therefore positive changes here will create the biggest impacts on your business.

Let’s take a look at 5 elements you can optimise and change on your website:

● Headlines - Your headlines are one of the first things visitors will see on your page. Test variations that speak
specifically to the problems that your ideal customer faces, e.g. their reason for searching for the products or
services that you offer.

● Website Copy - The text on your page needs to engage your visitors. You should be re-emphasising the points
you’re making in your headlines. Make sure you focus on the visitor and not your audience, so limit the use of “I”
and “we”.

● Images - Are you using good quality imagery on your pages that resonate with your content? Choose imagery that
suits your target audience and doesn’t look like you were lazy on a stock photo website. Images work
hand-in-hand with your website copy to tell your story.

● Video - Video is a great option for your pages. You can show your audience how your products or services work,
share valuable content and ideas or even use video testimonials from your customers. Video increases the time a
user spends on a page, which is great for conversions and also provides SEO benefits (dwell time).

● CTA - Your Call To Actions are the most important elements on your pages. They’re the desired action that you
want visitors to take. This could be to purchase a product, send an enquiry, or download a free guide. Never use
text like “Submit” or “Click Here” for your CTA text. Use more descriptive wording, such as “Download My Free
Guide”. Try testing the colours of your CTAs to help them to stand out from the other content on your pages.

If you’re not a web designer or confident at making changes to your pages, it may be a good idea to speak with the
company who built your website and ask them to assist you.

Most importantly, when you make changes to your website’s pages, only make 1-2 changes at a time. You need to be able
to test the changes that you’re making to see if they’re effective. We’ll talk about testing a little more in the next section of
the guide.

TIP: Look at the pages you’ve identified from your analytics data as the most popular or most visited
pages on your website. Start looking through each page at elements you can change that will improve
the message you are sharing and provide more engagement with your audience. Make a list of the
changes you can make to each page and rank them in order of importance to your business.
5 Optimising and testing

Whenever you make a change to your website, you need to test the results - positive or negative. Without any testing, you
won’t be able to clearly define which changes are working for your business and improving your conversions.

For websites, the best type of testing you can carry out is called A/B testing or split testing.

Split testing isn’t something you can do manually, but there are software tools available to help with this. Two of these
tools are Google Optimize and Split Hero. They are quite easy to use, although the technology side of things could be a
stumbling block for some business owners. If you find using either tool a struggle, it would be a great idea to involve your
web designer or marketing team to assist you.

A/B testing works by taking two versions of your website page and showing them to your audience. To keep things simple,
you would serve 50% of your visitors with the existing page and the other 50% would see the new version of the page.
The “winning” page is the one that achieves the most conversions from the goal that you’ve set.

Let’s run through an example…

You have a landing page and you want to test a different colour for your CTA (Call To Action) button. When clicked on, the
button will open your enquiry page. The button is currently green, but you’d like to test it with an orange colour as it stands
out more on the page.

You’ll make two versions of your page. Version A is going to be the existing page with the green CTA button. Version B will
be the same page with an orange version of your CTA button. Using a tool such as Google Optimize or Split Hero, you set
up your test with the desired goal. In this case, you want to track how many people have clicked the CTA button and
submitted an enquiry. The test is set-up and ready to go.

At the end of the week, the test ends and you can look at the data that has been collected. You find that the original page
(Version A) has generated 25 conversions and the new page (Version B) has generated 42 conversions. You can see that
the new page clearly brings more conversions, so you update your website to use the new button colour. Now you’re ready
for the next test…

If you haven’t got a clear statistical difference after 7 days, don’t be afraid to run the test again for another 7 days until
there is a clear winner.

Finally, remember to limit the number of elements you test at once, so you can get high quality actionable results. Testing
too many items at once will not give you effective data that you can use to improve your website.

TIP: From the list of changes that you made previously, set up your first A/B test. It’s a good idea to use an important page
that has a lot of traffic. Set up your test by creating two versions of your page and using Google Optimize or Split Hero.
You may need your web designer or marketer’s help here. Run the test for at least 7 days, action the results, then repeat
with your next test.
 It’s an ongoing process

Conversion Rate Optimisation (CRO) on-going and repeatable process. You can test as many things as you like, and it’s a
very good idea to always be testing and optimising your website.

Not every optimisation and test that you run will give a positive increase in conversions. Sometimes you’ll have a negative
result and the existing copy of your page will perform better. This is okay and should be welcomed.

It’s only through testing that you’ll know for sure which changes are most effective for your website and your audience.
This is why every part of conversion optimisation is based on data. If you copied your competitors or tried to implement
something you read online that worked for another business, the chances are that your business would not see the same
results.

As you continue to optimise, run tests and make further changes, you’re bringing value to both your business and your
audience. You’ll be increasing your website conversions, meaning that you’re getting a greater return on your investment.
Your audience will have a better experience on your site, as your message is crafted over time to resonate more effectively
with them.

Understanding conversion rate optimisation will help when you’re working with a marketing agency or marketing
professional too. You’ll be able to speak in a language that they understand, and you can take a closer look at the figures
they share with you - giving you peace of mind.

Schedule in some time to read through this guide a few times and to have a good long look through your website. You
might not see the opportunities at first, but they are there. You need to get into the mind of your customers and see your
website as if you were in their shoes.

Keep an eye out over the next few days as I’ll have a few more emails to follow with some additional tips and ideas for
you. In the meantime, if you have any questions, please don’t hesitate to reach out!

Prof.Christian Farioli
CEO, Digital Marketing Lecturer, Strategist & Book Author
+971 55 889 2295 / ESD.me
LinkedIn.com/in/christianfarioli
Get My Book: The Pizza Guide to Digital Marketing

"I believe every organization needs a great Digital Marketing Strategy to succeed nowadays" – Prof.Christian Farioli