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SMX Melbourne : How to Make Conversion Optimization Work for Your Business

By Kalena Jordan in Featured

This is a summary of the presentation given by Alan Long, from Experian Hitwise at SMX Melbourne last month, about how to make conversion optimization work for your business.

Survey of Australian Marketers

Conversion optimization is basically like product placement in a store, says Alan. In retail stores, you switch your products around, change signage etc. to see where/how they are best placed to produce the most sales. This is what Conversion Optimization is all about, but using your web site content.

Experian researched 300 Australian marketing professionals from multiple industries about conversion optimization via an independently commissioned study. The idea was to explore how Australian organizations are using online marketing channels and assess their understanding of conversion optimization.

The study showed that 2.043 billion was spent in Australia on online marketing to the end of June 2010. That’s a 13 percent increase over last year. Aussie marketers are pumping more budget into online marketing to drive higher volumes of traffic.

Are marketers missing a trick when it comes to boosting web ROI? Yes, Alan says. Lots of money being spent, but very little of that is put into converting visitors into customers or measuring success.

At the moment, site visitors are the main measure of web site success for many marketers. However, conversion is a more a valid measure of success, with conversion rates typically running at 1-5 percent. The trend in Australia is towards boosting traffic rather than reviewing site performance to drive conversion.

But, Alan says, why attract large volumes of traffic to your website if no-one is buying or doing what you wanted them to? This failure likely stems from a lack of awareness around conversion optimization and how to measure success.

Six Signs Your Business Should be Doing Conversion Optimization:

1) You have a high spend on attraction activities or advertising that drives consumers to your website.
2) You have a high spend on website content look and feel.
3) You have a large amount of online traffic.
4) There is pressure to increase profitability but you’re unsure how to measure it.
5) You’re frequently making website changes based on guesswork.
6) You’re operating in a highly competitive industry.

Warning, Scary Statistics Ahead!

Almost half of Australian online marketers surveyed spend over 40 percent of budget driving traffic to their sites. Their biggest increase in spend will be on website updates (55 percent).

Of annual budgets allocated to online marketing:

• 17% = creative and design
• 13.5% = content development and updates
• 13.2% = hosting, software and licenses
• 11.3% = usability
• 10.4% = programming and development
• 8.2% = SEO
• 7.1% = analysis and measurement
• 7.1% = conversion optimization

Despite ongoing investment in web site design and traffic generation, 90% of marketers surveyed spent less than 10 percent of their budget on persuading existing visitors to take action! (conversion optimization). You need to compliment traffic generation with a website that provides the right experience, leading visitors to the desired action, says Alan, otherwise your web site is as effective as a billboard in the desert.

Big Brands Make the Same Mistakes

It wasn’t just the small companies making the mistakes either. The study showed that large brands throw big bucks at getting traffic with conversion rates of less than 5 percent. They have large volumes of traffic, however, they continue to compete for more online traffic by investing in expensive advertising and marketing, despite low conversion rates of sales or customers – many less than 5 per cent.

By focusing on attracting more customers to your website you are competing against your peers who often use similar tactics (e.g. display, pay-per click and search engine optimization). Instead of competing with others for traffic and squandering the traffic you get, you should be competing against yourself by optimizing your site for more conversions. This is a competition you’re guaranteed to win. How much better could you be doing? Why does one change work but another doesn’t? How much impact could it have on traffic and conversions if you tweak your landing pages or checkout process?

Lack of Understanding About Conversion Optimization

There is a significant lack of understanding of conversion optimization in Australia – 89 percent do not do ANY. Most of these companies don’t have the tools or knowledge to accurately measure it, let alone act on it. Meanwhile, 62 percent of those surveyed have never even heard of conversion optimization or don’t understand what it is.

Research found that 30 percent of Australian marketers either do not evaluate the success of their website or only evaluate it on an annual basis, while 26 percent don’t know what factor/s contribute most to the success of their websites. Almost 45 percent of marketers surveyed that DO evaluate the success of their websites believe total visits/unique visitors or page views per visit are the key indicators of success. Wow.

Of those marketers that know about and conduct conversion optimization, over half have a website conversion rate of over 11 percent – double the figure claimed by respondents who have never heard of it. Marketers who are using conversion optimization are gaining competitive advantage by maximizing the engagement and sales opportunities of their sites. They understand what impacts the performance of their web site and what needs to change in order to increase sales and/or participation.

Getting started with Conversion Optimization

Conversion optimization doesn’t require significant budget or a fresh online marketing strategy to be effective. The critical factors are using web expertise to research and identify what online clients want and taking the necessary steps to build engagement, says Alan. Here are 8 ways to get started:

1. Know what your customers want.
2. Present an appropriate call to action.
3. Design your layouts & forms with users in mind.
4. Test your processes.
5. Use reviews, ratings and endorsements.
6. Use promotions and find synergies.
7. Improve navigation search and filtering functionality.
8. Increase credibility.

SEO Tips to Double Rankings, Traffic and Conversion

By Jeffrey Smith in Featured

The only thing better than one search result in the top 3 positions in Google is two search results from a double ranking. This SEO tip works by pushing a competitor off the first page, broadening your websites keyword funnel and thereby doubling traffic and conversions.

Two Results are Better than One

I read somewhere that 87% of search engine traffic for a given keyword is allocated from occupying the Number 1 position in the search engine results page. If you understand SEO, then this post will share a quick method to double your SERP positions and to improve the likelihood of keyword conversions – once you have reached the Mecca for a specific search term.

Secret Copywriting Trick Makes People Buy with Eyes Closed

By Dan Lok in Featured

“I’ve tried it all Dan. But after sending traffic to it (his sales copy), my response rates are still poor!” one of my mentoring clients told me on the phone.

“You’ve tried it ALL?” I asked.

“Yes.”

“And what do you mean by that?”

“From using proven swipe files for my headlines, using powerful benefit bullets to telling a compelling story – everything Dan!”

When he finished saying this, I understood where exactly he had gone wrong.

“You see, here’s exactly where you’ve gone wrong,” I told him. “What you’re focusing here is how you can SELL better with your copy.”

“You mean… we’re not supposed to sell with our sales copy?” he retorted in a confused tone.

“It’s the mindset! If you only focus on SELLING, that’s where a lot of things can go wrong.

The fact is, people don’t like to be sold to. But they always love to BUY.

When you focus too much on how to sell, you may come off boring, uninteresting, confusing. Maybe your end copy might sound compelling to you as the salesman, but it might sound irrelevant to your consumers.

So no matter how hard you sell, your response rates and profits will always have a low ceiling.”

“Wow, I never thought of it in this way… I thought all we need to write profitable sales copy is just be a skilled wordsmith,” he said.

“Far from it. The mindset where you’re writing from is much more important. Put in your prospects’ perspective – what you need to do is give them OFFERS they can’t refuse.

Earn their trust, their respect, their sale. Don’t try to make it, earn it.

If you do this well, you’ll never have problems getting rich.”

How to Write Friendly Rich Copy

“All things being equal, people want to do business with their friends.”

“All things being not so equal, people STILL want to do business with their friends.”

But how do we implement this into writing sales copy? Here’s our following conversation:

“But Dan, do you have any specific tips on how I can implement this with my sales copy?” he asked.

“Sure. Here’s an easy way to do it:

First, ask yourself how you’d perceive an ideal friend to be. Is he friendly? Does he has credibility in your eyes? When he says something, can you trust him? Now when he recommends something to you, what is his tone? How does he talk?

Those are a few of the questions you can ask yourself.

Whatever trait you think can compel you to BUY from him – without him having to ask for it, write it down. Because write your sales copy with them in mind and you’ll have what I call, a friendly copy.”

“That’s powerful Dan! But will writing sales copy in this manner make much profits at all?” he continued.

“Good gracious YES. It still comes back to the art of salesmanship-in-print. Sure you’d want to create rapport and sound friendly on your sales copy. But in the end, you still have to write from your prospects’ perspective.

Remember the THREE major response rate killers.

Boredom. Confusion. Disbelief.

Find out how you can craft friendly copy with these response rate killers in mind. You’ll have a FORTUNE maker before you know it.”

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A former college dropout, Dan Lok transformed himself from a grocery bagger in a local supermarket to a multi-millionaire. Dan came to North America with little knowledge of the English language and few contacts. Today, Dan is one of the most sought-after business mentors on the Web, as well as a best-selling author. If you enjoy this article, you’ll love Dan’s info-packed website: http://www.websiteconversionexpert.com

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