5 CRO Tips You Can Use Now
If you have decided that 2016 is the year that you need to put extra attention into your conversion rate, you’ve come to the right place. I think that sometimes people shy away from CRO activities because it seems a bit daunting but it really doesn’t have to be. Here are five things you can do to help turn prospects into customers:
- Simplify Your Landing Pages
There is one school of thought that goes something like this: “Hey, I’ve got someone to click on my ad (or whatever) to come to my landing page, now I’ve got to show them everything I’ve got—this is my one chance!” To this end, they put a whole bunch of stuff on their landing page trying to communicate everything possible about their business to a person in one visit. What happens? The person leaves—without taking any other action.
I’ve found that the KISS method works much better for landing pages than this approach. You were successful in getting someone to your page probably based on only one small message. Keep them focused on that and move them to the next stage—that is the point of a landing page.
- Streamline Your Forms
Along the same lines, get rid of fields in your forms that do not need to be there. If someone wants to subscribe to your blog, you really only need to know their email address. Let them get into your system, nurture them along and then ask them for more information later on when they are ready to take another step with you. Align what information you ask of people to what phase of the buying cycle they are in.
- Create Multiple Landing Pages
Here is how you can handle your need to communicate more than one message. By developing more than one landing page, you can use each one to focus on a slightly different area. Even if the overall topic is the same in each one, be careful to ensure that your content is truly unique on each page.
- Test, Test, Test, Test, Test
I just can’t say it enough—if you don’t test, you may as well do nothing. Confront your fears head-on and learn how to A/B test. You’ll probably be surprised that it’s nowhere near as hard as you may have thought. And, even better—it can give you information that is more than worth its weight in gold.
- Develop a Consistent Identity
Whether you are publishing on social media, a blog, a PPC ad, a landing page or something else, make sure people get a consistent view of who and what you are. This is where some brand or messaging guidelines can be useful for larger businesses in which multiple people are touching and creating content.
This latter point relates as much to what is now referred to as experience optimization as it does conversion optimization. You want to create a positive—and unified—experience for people when they come into contact with you regardless of the platform.
If I were to add one more tip on here, I’d tell you to think about your own experiences as a prospect, user, or whatever term you like. Quite often, what you don’t like your prospects won’t like either (and the same goes for what you do like).
