This year’s Business Show featured presentations and panel discussions with experts from across the industry. We’ve collated our highlights for those who missed the event.
How to convert website clicks into sales
When we think of driving sales through our website, it’s likely that thoughts turn to Google Ads, search engine optimisation (SEO) and social media campaigns, but all that will be a waste of time and money if your website infrastructure isn’t built and optimised for maximum effectiveness.
“UX (user experience) plus CRO (conversion rate optimisation) equals profit,” says Daryl. Simply, UX is the term given to the interaction between the website and the user. The goal of effective UX design is to make it intuitive to the user needs so that their journey is enjoyable, seamless and simple.
Daryl says the priority is to make sure your website is optimised for mobile browsing and it has a defined user journey and call to action. There is no point investing in a marketing campaign only for visitors to have a negative experience when they arrive at your site.
How can you tell what is working on your website and what isn’t?
CRO is the process of improving your conversion rate on your website. But to increase web sales, you need to know exactly how your website visitors are using your site, what’s working, what isn’t and why.
Heatmaps and analytics tools can help with this. They plug into your website and track the real-time behavior of users. In this way, they provide meaningful data that you can use to fix usability issues, deliver a more compelling web experience and ultimately boost conversion and increase sales.
Getting this data used to be expensive and the preserve of big business. But now there are a number of affordable plug-in tools available for budget-conscious small businesses that will help you to eliminate the guess-work about what is and isn't working on your website. Some even offer anonymous visitor recordings so that you can actually see how your users scroll and click through your site, and at which point they leave.
Daryl says: "Prioritise the biggest opportunities for improvement by identifying on which page and at which step most visitors leave. Test different conversion funnels to see which users like best."
Google Ads, search or social – what to choose?
Once your website’s conversion funnel is in place, you can then look to drive visitors to it. Phil says paid social media posts only really work alongside viral social media content and have on average a 2% to 3% conversion rate. This is compared to a 20% to 30% conversion rate for search ads for a similar price.
He urges business owners to focus on thoughtful, audience-centric email newsletters, because as an owned channel, you have complete control of the content.
Key Takeaways
- Invest in your website for maximum effectiveness before spending money on a digital marketing campaign
- There are many budget-friendly heat map and analytics tools on the market, which offer real-time recordings of user behaviour – key insight to create a more compelling website experience
Thank you to Dentons Digital for their insightful session!