Online Marketing Blog

Conversion rate optimization is the marketing art of maximizing your investment in existing site traffic, through improvements and problem-solving rather than additional ad spend. At some point in any business site’s lifetime, CRO is a must; for smart marketers, it’s an ongoing process that pays dividends over and over again.

Once you’ve invested in attracting traffic to your site, whether to complete a purchase or take some other action, CRO helps ensure your visitors are engaged and converting at the greatest rate possible.

Some believe CRO happens only on-site, though attracting targeted prospects likely to convert through paid search ads, email marketing and landing pages, for example, is a critical step. Another misconception is that CRO is all about increasing the number of conversions. You like to make money, right? Optimizing for higher revenue conversions and increasing the value of each site visitor is another element of CRO that can’t be overlooked.

The mantra for digital marketers interested in conversion optimization is ABT “always be testing.”  That mantra fits well with the perspectives TopRank has been advocating for years: optimization is a continuous process.

Although consumer needs remain fairly simple when it comes to achieving an outcome after they arrive at your website, the opportunities to test different elements to improve conversion performance has grown in both sophistication and complexity. From eye tracking studies to monthly A/B tests, converting more visitors into buyers is both an art and a science.

The Internet is not a static environment; change is constant and consumers’ expectations have evolved along with web technology. The challenge for marketers is to make sense of the customer journey and provide the right information at the right time to inspire a desired outcome.

In the 1989, Greg LeMond overcame a 50 second deficit in the final stage to win the Tour de France by 8 seconds.  He clocked the second fastest time trial ever recorded in the Tour de France.  So how did LeMond secure a stunning victor after 3 weeks and 2025 miles?

Optimization.  The optimization of his equipment, including aerodynamic handle bars and helmet, allowed LeMond to shave crucial seconds from his time and ride to victory in front of his less well optimized competitors.

Optimization results had a big impact on this race and they can have a big impact on business as well. I recently attended a session by Mikel Chertudi, Senior Director of Marketing of Adobe on Conversion Optimization: From Strategy to Execution. He offered strategies for businesses to optimize their digital marketing, in order to move ahead of the pack and secure a victory.

Websites and landing pages face very real trust issues – for consumers they can be a scary and uncertain place. Before people will take a desired action, their concerns and anxieties must be addressed. But how can you do this on landing pages when you only have seconds to establish trust?

Tim Ash, SiteTuners CEO and bestselling author of Landing Page Optimization , shared how to effectively use the Four Pillars Of Trust and optimize your online conversion goals.

Tim started by reiterating what we know – it’s not about technology, it’s about people. If you’re going to transact with anyone it’s all about building trust.

We can’t function without trust, we are social beings. If we are going to cross the street, we have to trust that people driving cars will see the red light. Trust is critical, it’s the glue that holds everything together.

The average conversion rate for a website is around 3 percent, but many websites convert at 10 percent or higher.  What are they doing right that you’re missing?

Bryan Eisenberg, NY Times Bestselling Author gave a solo presentation on the secrets of top converting websites and how you too can achieve high conversion results.   Following is a summary of his presentation.

What exactly is conversion rate?  In essence, conversion rate is a measure of your ability to persuade visitors to take the action you want them to take.  It’s a reflection of your marketing effectiveness and customer satisfaction.  For you to achieve your marketing goals, visitors must achieve their goals first.

No one should settle for a conversion rate of less than 10%.  Looking at top retailers, many have conversion rates greater than 15% monthly.  What are they doing that you’re not?

Tim Ash is a marketing machine. He writes a blog, contributes to Search Engine Watch, hosts a weekly show on WebmasterRadio.fm, is author of the book “Landing Page Optimization”, speaks at numerous conferences and is the chair of the upcoming Conversion Conference in May.

Oh, and he also runs SiteTuners, a successful landing page optimization consulting business and has launched a new tool called AttentionWizard that offers eye tracking “without the eyes”.

Tim has worked with American Express, Sony Music, American Honda, Coach, COMP USA and many other major brands.

“Landing page testing is the best accelerator of your business that you have available.”

Tim is a very smart and very nice guy who took a few rare moments of time to answer a few questions about measuring social media ROI, budgets for testing, common mistakes, tips, tools and how he stays current in such a fast paced and changing field.

Conversion Optimization: Picking Up Where SEO Leaves Off, via ISEDB
Seth Godin on Passive vs Active SEO. AKA Content and Link building.

John Jantsch adds 14 new blogs to the Duct Tape Marketing network. Press Release.
Aaron Pratt does an excellent Interview with Bill Slawski

Marketing Sherpa marketing blog voting goes awry and switches to survey monkey. Please vote for “Top Rank” here.