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It takes a lot of time, effort, and money to bring a decent amount of traffic to an e-commerce site for it to make money. Between organic search, social media marketing, pay per click and search engine optimization, the costs can be quite high. Usually, when a site isn’t making as much money as hoped, the effort to increase goes toward bringing in more traffic.
Although extra traffic is always a good thing and usually leads to making more money, there is a better way to go about it. It makes more sense to make an effort to make more money from the traffic that is already coming to the site. Increasing conversions is the most effective way to go about this. Of course, there are steps for e-commerce success with high customer conversions.
In this article, we will go over several techniques that will increase profits by helping people to make a purchase.
Use Videos
Video marketing is an integral part of the overall traffic strategy for an e-commerce site. In the case of conversions, however, a video serves a different purpose. And rather than being used as a magnet to bring in more views, it is on the site itself to increase conversions.
A polished and professionally done video by a company like Miami-based video production agency Zipinmedia can be much more persuasive than any text copy or image can be.
When your site is product-based, often visitors who are interested need to be sure that the product can solve their problem. A video can do this in a way that is much more effective than text. It shows the product being used in real life so it makes sense to a viewer. In an instant, their questions are usually answered so they are now ready to buy.
The position and format of the video also play a part. Putting the video on a landing page above the fold will have an immediate impact on the conversion rate. And if the video is interactive, in the sense that there can be embedded clickable links, then this also increases conversions.
Having a video on the landing page also puts a human face on your shop. This will help gain trust by the visitor and can also lead to conversions.
User-Generated Content
Word of mouth is still a very important way to sell goods and services and new technology hasn’t changed that. What has changed is that the technology itself can actually be the word of mouth.
Consumers are more likely to believe another person recommending a product than they do a celebrity or the brand itself. Of course, you can hire a product content writer. Adding content that can be uploaded from other users allows visitors to hear it from other people who have actually used the product. Since they likely have similar concerns about how it works or if it will solve their particular problem.
Set up a way for users to upload videos or images along with their reviews so others can see them. This is what Amazon does with their product pages and it helps considerably. However, there is an erosion of trust among consumers about reviews on Amazon. They aren’t sure which reviews have been paid for or not.
This gives you an advantage as seeing videos from users and not being on the Amazon platform will allow consumers to see for themselves without the lingering doubt that it isn’t authentic.
Optimize The Landing Page
The addition of a video on the landing page is important, but it doesn’t end there with regard to optimization for conversions. The most important thing to have, both in the video and on the page itself, is the value proposition. This is the reward that they will get either for signing up to be on the email list or b making a purchase.
The key to making the value proposition irresistible is to understand the pain point the visitor is experiencing. Then, it should use the right language to reinforce that the pain point is understood and the product in question is the ideal solution to the problem.
In addition to that, the form that they are asked to fill out getting them onto the list and into the funnel should be easy to fill out and not ask for too many personal details in the beginning. Multipage forms are better for this as the information is gleaned gradually so trust is built up.
Testing different landing pages is also highly recommended. Some may seem to be totally optimized but the only way to tell is to go through A/B testing to find out. This involves having two different versions of the landing page to see which one performs better.
One version will appear to half of the people and the other will appear to the other half. Then, you can dive into the data to see how they did. You’ll be able to see some of the metrics that may have contributed to the difference. For instance, one version may lead to better conversions among men while the other does better with women. This type of analysis allows you to create the most ideal version that will make more money.
Test The Checkout Process
As soon as a customer meets any resistance when trying to make a purchase then they are likely going to click away and the sale is lost. An easy and intuitive online checkout process is the key to increasing conversions if yours is not passing muster.
Most plugins that come with the content management system for your e-commerce site are usually good at this. However, it could be the cause of low conversions if you are using a custom system that is not optimized. Or, some systems are not going to work for the particular customer your product attracts.
Increasing conversions is the best way to work with what you already have. It can pay off immediately which is another bonus since getting more traffic takes time. Of course, adding traffic should also be part of the strategy but making the most of that traffic is good business.
