What is Conversion Rate Optimization?
Conversion rate optimization (CRO) is the process of optimizing different web elements on your website to influence users to complete a call-to-action (CTA). This is done by using analytical data to identify problems, create solutions, test, and implement the appropriate alternatives from conclusive results.
Finding Your Conversion Rate
A conversion is when a user on a website completes a desired action such as becoming a subscriber or making a purchase. To find out your conversion rate for your website, simply use this formula:
- Total conversions or sales / Unique visitors *100 = conversion %.
A unique visitor is an individual visitor to your site whose value counts as 1 over a certain time period regardless of how many times they visit. Thus, the same user who visits 10 times a day is still counted as 1 unique visitor.
Conversion is the single most important metric used to evaluate the success of any online marketing campaign.
Why is Conversion Rate Optimization Important?
CRO is a cost-effective method to increase your conversions from your already existing traffic. Additionally, CRO is a great compliment to your SEO campaigns. SEO is a great, inexpensive way to drive traffic to your website. CRO helps maximize those efforts by making sure your website is optimized to turn that traffic into conversions. However, generating more traffic without focusing on optimizing your website's conversion funnel can hinder your conversion results.
If you modify your conversion funnel with data-driven analytics, you can assess any customer frustrations that might attribute to holes in your conversion funnel and ultimately improve your conversion numbers from the same amount of unique visitors.
How Can CRO Help My Business?
CRO is an efficient methodology that you can use to:
- lower your customer acquisition costs
- raise your return on investment (ROI)
- allow you to relocate resources that you would otherwise spend on more marketing
- reduce the user frustration on your website
- pinpoint conversion blockers on your website
If you follow the A/B testing process of testing your pages for their highest conversion potential, you can use conclusive results to help maintain the successful flow through your website's conversion funnel.
How do I use Conversion Rate Optimization?
Utilize various CRO tools such as session replay, heatmaps, and form testers to find any holes in your conversion funnel. Go through the five-step A/B testing process of gathering data, creating a hypothesis, testing your hypothesis, reviewing and implementing conclusive results, and repeating the process again using your conversion analytics tools. Every customer is different, but with CRO you can streamline their experience on your website to expand your reach and ultimately satisfy their needs with the solutions that your products or services offer.