Owning a website is a constant fight for attention. Any mistake you make will give your competitors an advantage! Customers only have a limited attention to dish out on websites. If you’re not doing everything in your power to catch interest, then you’re losing out. We’ve put together some tips to boost your conversion ratio and get your site working at its maximum potential.
Make Your Call to Action Ring Out!
Your call to action is what your conversion ratio hinges on. Even if you get everything else wrong, having a clear call to action could help you scrape by.
An effective call to action is one you can’t miss. It should be blatant, and easily accessible.
Your call to action might take a number of forms, such as advertising a product or urging users to sign up, but the rules are the same. Your call to action should occupy a prominent place on your landing page and be visible at all times.
Many websites use pop-ups to ensure the customer has seen their cause to action. Pop-ups are a great way of nudging a customer who might be on the fence, but you should be careful not to overuse them. It’s easy to make it obnoxious, and Google is watching!
Revise Your Headlines
Psychologically, your customers will see your headlines before anything else.
Effective use of your page title and major headlines can decide your conversion ratio. Headlines should be short, to the point, and significantly larger than the text bodies on your page.
Use emotive language in your headlines. Emotive language is a shortcut to your customer’s emotions, and people are more likely to make spur-of-the-moment decisions based on emotions rather than logic.
You should also include a genuine pitch in your headline. Offering a free trial, for instance, is far better than a generic incitement to join your service. Throw your audience something to sweeten the pot!
Show Off Your Popularity
If fidget spinners and Pokémon Go have taught us anything, it’s that people love a trend.
Use your landing page to show off your popularity! If you’re trying to get email subscribers, for instance, it pays to show how many subscribers you already have. Psychologically, this makes your customers feel like they’re in on something big. It also reassures your customers that they’re subscribing to something with real value.
This kind of bandwagon approach is used in everything from marketing to politics, so the evidence for its effectiveness is staggering. It’s also incredibly easy to integrate into a modern site, so this one’s an easy win!
Use Testimonials and Reviews
Following on from that thought, using testimonials, reviews, and other reassuring devices is another great way to boost your conversion ratio.
After all, what’s the first thing you do when you’re unsure about a product? You read the reviews!
Reviews are fantastic because they bridge the inherent distrust a customer has for a new product. Customers see reviews almost as personal recommendations from people they know, which you just can’t achieve yourself no matter how good your sales pitch is.
Testimonials work on the same principle and can be used to back up what you’re saying about your product. If you can get a recognized public or industry name for your testimonial, even better! People give a surprising amount of undue weight to a recommendation from a name they recognize, even if they have no reason to believe they share opinions!
Another thing that makes testimonials so great is how much they stand out. Like headlines, testimonials have a very obvious visual signature. They attract the eye and almost beg to be read.
You can make testimonials even more obvious by including a headshot from the person in question. Including a human face is a subtle way to help your customers believe the testimonial is genuine.
Make Sure Your Site Works
A slow site will turn anyone away. We all have limited time, and even more limited patience.
Your site needs to be fast and responsive to maintain a high conversion ratio. You’re on a timer the moment the customer lands on your page, and you can’t afford to waste the time.
You also need to make sure your site works across multiple formats. More people than ever are browsing on the go, so if your site only works on desktop browsers then you’re cutting out a huge portion of your audience.
Make sure your site is enabled to work on tablets and mobile devices. You should be able to test this yourself with the right online tools, even if you don’t own the devices for it.
If your site is slow and unresponsive, consider moving hosts or upgrading your server capacity. A slow site now will only get slower as web content evolves.
Keep an eye on website design trends, as well. If your site starts to look like it’s falling behind the times, you’re likely to put customers off.
Keep It Clear
It’s tempting to fill the page with visual noise to catch the attention of your audience. You want your site to be a flashing billboard for your product, right?
Wrong. Visual noise will only obscure the intended function of the page. Every element of your page should be designed to draw attention to your call to action, not away from it.
Think of your customer’s attention as a finite resource – if they spend it on flashing banners and quirky page elements, they won’t have any left to use on your actual purpose.
Make Conversion Easy
Here’s one you can easily relate to. How often do you try to do something on a website only to be turned away by how needlessly complicated the whole thing is?
A hard-to-find registration page with five different steps and two levels of verification will do nothing but drive your customers away. We all have a short attention span on the internet, so you need to make the most of the precious few seconds you have with your customers.
Boost Your Conversion Ratio Now!
By putting these tips into practice, you can watch your conversion ratio climb ever higher! There’s always room to tweak, so use these points as a guideline and find out what works for you!
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