Are you wondering what conversion rate optimization strategies work?
Sometimes you can only learn from the best.
The world of conversion rate optimization can be hard to keep up with because of constant changes in best practises and new innovations taking place all the time.
The best way to keep up with innovations and strategies is to follow those who are experts in this field.
I have listed below six conversion rate optimization strategies that are currently being used by 6 of the best optimizers.
1. Removing Distractions – Neil Patel
Neil Patel is the founder of Crazy Egg and KISSMetrics, which are two very successful SaaS companies.
He recently published a blog post about removing distractions from your homepage and landing pages to increase conversions.
He certainly practices what he preaches as you can see in the below image just how simplistic the KISSMetrics homepage is with one clear, actionable focus.
Busy Backgrounds
Remove anything from the background that may distract the user from taking the action that will see them convert.
The elements that must stand out from the homepage or landing page is the compelling headline, the benefits, lead capture form and CTA.
If there is any clutter surrounding these elements, remove them.
You can clearly see on the KISSMetrics homepage what action they wish you to take.
Company News
One grave mistake that many online businesses do is showcase company news on their homepage or landing pages.
Your main business objective is to grow revenue not to build interest and so again, remove this distraction.
You can always share your company news on your blog or social media but try to keep it away from your conversion-focused landing pages and homepage.
Too Many CTA’s
While it is important to have a stand out CTA (call-to-action), having too many CTA’s can actually distract a user from completing the action you wish them to take.
You can see from the KISSMetrics homepage that they have one clear CTA, which is “Try KISSMetrics” which is in contrasting colours so to stand out.
A landing page should only be about one thing, and so you should only have one CTA.
2. The Gum Trampoline Technique – Brian Massey
Image Source: ConversionScientist
It’s time to move onto our next conversion optimization expert, Brian Massey, who is the conversion scientist as Conversion Sciences.
He recently published an article that spoke about what he calls the gum trampoline technique that is all about reducing high bounce rates by making people stick to your website by adding gum to it.
Stop Low-Value Traffic
To reduce bounce rates, you can edit the targeting of your paid ads, use long-tail keyword for content and stop using channels that are directing low value and irrelevant traffic to your website.
You will be able to know specifically who to target and what long-tail keywords to use by better understanding who your target audience is in great detail.
Create Relevant Pages
A big mistake that I see many online businesses make is not keep their ads relevant to their landing pages.
For example, if I were to search for “blue running shoes” and seen a paid search ad that said “blue running shoes”, I would expect to see blue running shoes when I clicked through to the website.
If however I clicked through and seen all colours of running shoes, the chances of me converting would be reduced and bounce rate would be higher.
Create Content For Short Span Time
You only have a matter of seconds to capture the user’s interest and so when designing and writing content for your landing page or homepage, make sure it can all be digested in a matter of seconds.
This means the user understands what the product is, how it can help and where they can sign up or buy.
3. Using Scare Tactics To Convert – Tim Ash
Our next expert is Tim Ash, who founded SiteTuners that is an online marketing agency that was founded in the 1990’s so was an early adopter of online marketing.
Tim recently published a blog post about how Amazon uses scare tactics to increase conversions, and I thought it pretty interesting, so I wanted to delve a little more into it.
Pair It With Trust
Using scare tactics works best when it is paired with trust signals.
As you can see from the two images from Amazon below, they display how many of that product is in stock and add the word “only” to add a sense of urgency and scarcity.
However, they also have customer reviews displayed close by to indicate that this product and their service can be trusted.
Avoid Fabricating Fear
What you must never do, is fabricate fear as this can have the opposite effect and decrease your conversion rate.
For example, you wouldn’t say “limited time only” if it is a product or service you continually sell.
Customers will see through this and find it abrasive and even offensive so it is best to avoid fabricating fear to keep your credibility.
4. Killer Content – Oli Gardner
Oli Gardner is the landing page expert at Unbounce which is a SaaS company that lets marketers and businesses build, publish and split test landing pages.
He recently published an article about how to create a killer content strategy that will lead to increased conversions.
Think of your content marketing as a part of your sales team, it should speak directly to your customers pain points and educate them on how to achieve their business goals.
Understand Your Audience
To create content that will convert, you are going to need to understand exactly who your target is.
You can read our blog post about how to create customer avatars to be able to find out what are the pain points of your customers, what their business goals are and what type of content they get their information from.
Talk About Their Business Goals
Once you understand you audience, you can build your content marketing around their pain points and business goals so as to attract their attention.
You want to be the resource that they continue to use to learn from and gather information.
If you find that your target audience would prefer listening to podcasts than reading, then create podcasts to tell them how they can achieve their goals.
5. Continually Split Test – Chris Goward
Image Source: WiderFunnel
Chris Goward is the founder of WiderFunnel, which is a marketing agency specializing in conversion rate optimization and designing landing pages that convert.
He is an avid supporter of split testing and regularly posts new ideas to split test on the WiderFunnel blog.
He recently published an article recommending the A View From My Seat app that lets you seamlessly split test from your mobile device… if Chris Goward is recommending it, it must be good.
When To Split Test
Split testing shouldn’t just be used for when conversion rates are low; it should be used throughout your entire online business lifetime.
If there is anything Chris Goward has learnt, is that there is always room for improvements… even when you believe you are doing well.
Another great tool to use for your split testing is Optimizely, who has been around for a while and also now has a mobile app for testing.
What To Split Test
In order to know what to split test, you need to create hypotheses rather than guesses.
For example, I notice that one of my landing pages has a higher conversion rate.
That landing page has a short video on it and so I have a hypothesis that if the other landing pages have a video, then their conversion rates should increase.
I then test this theory by adding a short video to one other landing page and run it for the same period of time on the same channel to compare the results.
If my hypothesis is right, I have concrete evidence that videos on my landing pages lead to higher conversion rates.
6. Conversion Copywriting – Michael Aagaard
Last on my list of conversion optimization experts is Michael Aagaard who is another split testing fan and is now the Senior Conversion Optimizer at Unbounce but also owns Content Verve.
He published a great article about how to become better at conversion copywriting that we can all learn from.
Talk About The Benefits
When writing the copy for your homepage or landing pages, you only have a few seconds to pique the interest of the user.
One of the best ways to do this is by listing key points in bullet points that are easily digestible to read.
What Michael Aagaard preaches, however, is that your bullet point the benefits of your product and not its features.
Again, it comes down to targeting the emotions of your audience.
Actionable Headlines
As well as key bullet points, the other element of copy that is easily digestible to read is the headline.
If it is bold and includes actionable words, then it will keep the user on the page.
Someone who does this well is Crazy Egg.
The headline on the homepage is a simple question that targets their audience’s pain point, and their sub heading is actionable.
A Few Reminders…
Well I hope you have learnt something from these inspirational conversion optimization experts and will try these strategies out for yourself.
Here are a few reminders to take with you:
- Remove all distractions from your homepage and landing pages – Neil Patel
- Make people stick to your website to reduce bounce rate – Brian Massey
- Targeting the scare emotion to create a sense of urgency to convert – Tim Ash
- Target business goals with killer content – Oli Gardner
- Always continue to split test to always improve conversion rates – Chris Goward
- Improve your sales copy with actionable headlines – Michael Aagaard
What processes do you follow to optimize a landing page which may not be performing?
Share your experiences and ideas by leaving your comments below.
Awesome article thanks for sharing