{"id":15555,"date":"2021-07-14T13:27:58","date_gmt":"2021-07-14T20:27:58","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/firstpagesage.com\/?p=15555"},"modified":"2021-07-14T13:27:58","modified_gmt":"2021-07-14T20:27:58","slug":"conversion-rate-optimization-best-practices-fc","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/redesign.fpsclients.com\/wp\/conversion-rate-optimization-best-practices-fc\/","title":{"rendered":"Conversion Rate Optimization (CRO) Best Practices"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Conversion Rate Optimization (CRO) is the art of understanding your website users\u2019 interests and behaviors, then arranging your website in a way that responds to them, earns their trust, and converts them into customers.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">This guide to CRO best practices begins by summarizing the theory you need to become proficient at it; then offers 5 specific actions for optimizing your website\u2019s conversion rate.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<h2><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Conversion Rate Optimization (CRO): Theoretical Foundations<\/span><\/h2>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Understanding the basic premise of CRO \u2014 improving the percentage of visitors that take a conversion action on your website \u2014 is easy. What\u2019s more complex is reflecting on the psyche of your website users so you understand how to properly implement CRO. Here are some rules of thumb that reflect today\u2019s digitally sophisticated audience:<\/span><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Almost everyone who visits your website is busy and has a lot on their mind, making them mildly distracted; thus, if you bore, confuse, or overwhelm them, they will immediately leave<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Sophisticated visitors (all B2B and higher-value B2C) are avoidant of ads and intrusive website elements that attempt to wrest their attention from what they\u2019re currently doing<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Users are particularly interested in content that illuminates the truth of an idea in a clearer way than they\u2019ve seen before<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">People don\u2019t mind being \u201csold to\u201d if the approach is earnest, on their own terms, and they can see the value in what you\u2019re selling<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><br \/>\n<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">To sum it all up, if you level with people, essentially saying \u201cI know you\u2019re busy, but I\u2019m willing to share the result of a lot of hard work with you and, if you happen to need what I sell, then great for both of us,\u201d you\u2019ll be successful in conversion.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Truly earning people\u2019s attention puts your company in a far more valuable position towards a potential customer than attracting it cheaply. Rather than generating an impulse, high quality CRO earns a well-thought-out decision.\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Below, you\u2019ll find descriptions of the 5 most effective CRO best practices, in our experience. They are: (1) Tapping into the user\u2019s psychology; (2) Earning attention all the way down the page; (3) Using graphics and white space to maintain the user\u2019s momentum; (4) Tracking micro-conversions; and (5) Testing, discussing, and iterating.<\/span><\/p>\n<h2><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Conversion Rate Optimization Best Practices<\/span><\/h2>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">In the following sections, I describe the most important elements of conversion rate optimization (CRO), from creating the right mindset to optimizing individual pages on your site, to managing your website\u2019s CRO as a whole. We\u2019ll begin with the essential idea of understanding your user.<\/span><\/p>\n<h3><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">CRO Best Practice #1: Tap into the user\u2019s psychology<\/span><\/h3>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Good CRO begins with understanding the types of people arriving on your website. Through this lens, the classic exercise of creating personas is very worthwhile. For each category of visitor arriving at your site, you should understand:\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">What is their job title and overall responsibility?<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Which KPIs does their higher-up use to evaluate them?<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">What makes them feel successful on a daily basis?\u00a0<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">What types of issues make their job harder on a daily basis?<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">It can help to treat each persona like a character in a story, complete with a headshot. Here is an example of a persona write-up that goes into the right level of detail:<\/span><em><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignleft wp-image-15558 size-thumbnail\" src=\"https:\/\/firstpagesage.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/jenna-persona-150x150.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"150\" height=\"150\" \/>Jenna is the CMO at a mid-sized engineering firm. Her overall responsibility is to drive more leads to her company\u2019s website, thereby increasing its customer base. She is judged by the % increase in revenue that results from the marketing channels she invests in, as well as how well she\u2019s stayed within budget. She\u2019s also judged on whether her beginning-of-year forecasts for those KPIs were accurate.<\/em><\/p>\n<p><em>Jenna feels successful when her ideas are well received during management meetings, particularly if they\u2019re unique and she\u2019s worked hard on a presentation; when the team members she manages express to her that they trust her; and when she feels like she is genuinely contributing to her company\u2019s growth.<\/em><\/p>\n<p><em>Jenna\u2019s day is made harder when the marketing team members she manages struggle, either professionally or personally; when she doesn\u2019t have good projections or clear tracking on a marketing program, making it hard for her to manage her higher-ups\u2019 expectations; and when her CEO is dogging her to help him meet his increasingly-lofty company growth goals.<\/em><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Once you \u201cknow\u201d each type of user that you want to visit your website, you are ready for the challenge of catering your content to them.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Your product can\u2019t solve every problem and satisfy every need, of course, but you should think carefully and creatively about unique applications of your product towards those ends. After you\u2019ve considered every way that your product could appeal to your personas, you\u2019ll need to distill that appeal down to a few readable sentences. As you write, remember that your page should feel like it\u2019s written for <\/span><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">them<\/span><\/i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">, with your product only appearing because it\u2019s of genuine value to them.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<h3><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">CRO Best Practice #2: Earn attention all the way down the page<\/span><\/h3>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The science of CRO comes down to continuously earning your users\u2019 attention from the top of the page until one of the Calls-to-action (CTAs) brings them to the next step in the marketing funnel. Their attention is best earned by showing them you can help them without wasting a moment of their time.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Here\u2019s a tried-and-true formula for doing that, starting at the top of the page:<\/span><\/p>\n<ol>\n<li style=\"text-align: left;\">Clean header \/ navigation bar that briefly defines the company and includes contact information<\/li>\n<li style=\"text-align: left;\">Headline that explains how your product helps them in 10 words or less, and<\/li>\n<li style=\"text-align: left;\">Slightly longer sub-headline that elaborates on how your product helps them<\/li>\n<li>Trust element such as customer logos, award icons, or accreditations<\/li>\n<li>3-6 product features described, aesthetically appealing and well-spaced; with CTAs next to each to learn more about that feature<\/li>\n<li>2-3 case studies, either on a rotating carousel or neatly spaced out, each of which can be clicked for the full story<\/li>\n<li>A CTA to demo, try now, or learn more<\/li>\n<li>1-3 links to thought leadership content with thumbnail images and brief descriptions<\/li>\n<li>Mini-form where potential customer or client can reach out immediately<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The image below shows this formula applied to a full page, with each of the 9 elements labeled:<\/span><\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/firstpagesage.com\/seo-blog\/conversion-optimization\/conversion-rate-optimization-best-practices-fc\/attachment\/cro-infographic-firstpagesage-2\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"croimage croinfographic aligncenter wp-image-15610 size-large\" src=\"https:\/\/firstpagesage.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/cro-infographic-firstpagesage-1-586x1024.png\" alt=\"\" width=\"586\" height=\"1024\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<h3><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">CRO Best Practice #3: Use graphics and white space to maintain user momentum<\/span><\/h3>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">If you yourself are a decision maker at your company, you may have noticed that you rarely read business articles that contain only paragraphs. Today\u2019s digitally-overloaded businesspeople read articles in a way that would have been labeled ADHD in the 1990s. Here is the typical reader\u2019s process:<\/span><\/p>\n<ol>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><b>Scan the headline of the article<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> and, if it seems relevant and interesting, continue; otherwise, leave.<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><b>Read the first 2-3 sentences<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> and decide whether the article is worth their time; if not, leave.\u00a0<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><b>Glance at the first third to half of the article<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> to see if anything interesting stands out; failing that, leave.<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><b>Search for any summarizing elements<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">, such as tables, charts, or diagrams &#8212; if they\u2019re present, read them as well as the text surrounding them; if none are present, read the first sentence of a few more paragraphs, then leave.\u00a0<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><br \/>\n<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ol>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">And, if satisfied by the first 4 steps:<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><br \/>\n<\/span><\/p>\n<ol start=\"5\">\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><b>Read the entire article<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> from the top until they get slightly bored; when that happens, leave.<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ol>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Similar to how comedians are told they need to get a laugh every 7 seconds to keep their audiences engaged, content creators in 2023 need to have something eye-catching in every scroll down the page.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Much of what makes sections of a web page eye-catching is negative space, also known as white space. We\u2019re all accustomed to grey font on a white background in 4-7 line paragraphs; when you diverge from that format, you give the reader\u2019s eyes something interesting to play with, and that usually means a different composition of positive and negative space.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">If your page is a sales-oriented landing page as opposed to an article, it\u2019s more natural to utilize white space effectively. Common ways to do this are converting bullet pointed lists into groups of colorful icons alongside short headlines, or visualizing a concept with a well-designed graphic. But even in articles, white space can be used effectively in the form of bullet pointed lists, block quotes, and short paragraphs. Unusual language has the same effect; your readers probably aren\u2019t conscious of what makes them continue reading, but seeing interesting words in an otherwise normal-looking sentence can do that. For example, the following sentence is filled with words that, because they\u2019re less common, are subconsciously engaging:<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: left; padding-left: 40px;\"><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The resplendent wings of monarch butterflies flutter in the cherry-gold evening sky.<\/span><\/i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">You can also play with color on the page too \u2014 there\u2019s no rule against it. The same sentence can be animated further when color is added.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: left; padding-left: 40px;\"><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The<\/span><\/i> <span style=\"color: #00d692;\"><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">resplendent wings<\/span><\/i><\/span><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0of<\/span><\/i> <span style=\"color: #ebc245;\"><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">monarch butterflies<\/span><\/i><\/span> <i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">flutter in the <\/span><\/i><span style=\"color: #eb6969;\"><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">cherry-gold evening sky<\/span><\/i><\/span><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">.<\/span><\/i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">While it\u2019s easy to come up with eye-catching elements, those you employ in your content should be organic to your subject, medium, and writing team.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">As a final note, the job of making your pages eye-catching should fall more under proper division of labor than consummate originality. In our own <\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/firstpagesage.com\/seo\/\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">marketing campaigns<\/span><\/a><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> for clients, we <\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/firstpagesage.com\/seo-blog\/seo-agency-team-structure-a-breakdown\/\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">separate out the tasks<\/span><\/a><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> of conceiving a page\u2019s layout from writing the actual page, since they require different thought processes.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<h3><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">CRO Best Practice #4: Track micro-conversions<\/span><\/h3>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Understanding how to make a page attention-earning and eye-catching would seem to prepare you to carry out Conversion Rate Optimization; however, good measurement is the step that takes you from a few one-off high converting pages to a full high-conversion <\/span><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">system<\/span><\/i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">. <\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><br \/>\n<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><br \/>\n<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">If conversion is your destination, then micro-conversions are the mileposts along the way. In other words, they\u2019re actions that a visitor can take which indicate they\u2019re more interested in your website than any random person. Some common examples are:<\/span><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Visiting more than a single page on your website<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Downloading an ebook or a white paper<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Engaging with your content, whether by commenting or sharing on social media<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Subscribing to your blog or podcast\u2019s RSS feed<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Even though none of these actions result in a new customer or <\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/firstpagesage.com\/seo-blog\/lead-to-mql-conversion-rate-benchmarks-by-industry-channel-fc\/\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">MQL<\/span><\/a><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> by themselves, tracking them gives you greater insight into your website\u2019s <\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/firstpagesage.com\/seo-blog\/the-seo-conversion-funnel-explained-fc\/\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">conversion funnel<\/span><\/a><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">. For example, you may notice that your website receives a great deal of traffic through a single blog post that ranks highly on Google, and visitors who read that blog post will often go on to read your service landing pages. After doing so, however, very few or even none of those visitors fill out a contact form to get in touch with you directly. This would tell you one of two things. Either:<\/span><\/p>\n<ol>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><b>The initial blog post is reaching the wrong audience<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">, i.e. those who are not interested in your services. This means that you should reevaluate the personas you\u2019ve created in Best Practice #1, and ensure that the post really speaks to\u00a0 your audience\u2019s needs.<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><b>The service pages themselves are not encouraging those visitors to reach out<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">. This indicates that those pages are failing to earn attention all the way down the page, or are not maintaining a visitor\u2019s momentum. Sometimes, the remedy can be as simple as including a clear call-to-action on the landing pages.<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ol>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">But tracking micro-conversions is useful for more than just troubleshooting; it can also help you tailor your future actions to better suit the needs of your audience. For example, I like to write about the more data-heavy, nitty-gritty details of B2B SaaS marketing but I know that these pieces are only interesting to a subset of my audience. But if a visitor signs up for my newsletter after reading <\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/firstpagesage.com\/seo-blog\/saas-customer-acquisition-strategy-by-the-numbers-fc\/\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">SaaS Customer Acquisition by the Numbers<\/span><\/a><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> and <\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/firstpagesage.com\/seo-blog\/seo-strategy-for-saas-the-5-core-elements-fc\/\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">SEO Strategy for SaaS<\/span><\/a><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">, I know they\u2019ll also be interested in future SaaS pieces that I write. In other words, tracking these micro-conversions allows me to better serve those visitors\u2019 needs. Down the line, that not only leads to more conversions, but also results in more successful business partnerships.<\/span><\/p>\n<h3><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">CRO Best Practice #5: Test, discuss, and iterate<\/span><\/h3>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">While each of the previous 4 best practices should in theory result in high conversion rate pages, the real world is much messier. Constantly testing different CTA placements, page designs, and copy will allow you to adjust your website to your exact audience. The most effective way to do this is through A\/B testing.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">In the context of CRO, A\/B testing is the practice of creating two separate versions of a webpage to determine which leads to higher conversion rates. The \u201cA\u201d page serves as your control group, and will follow all of the same best practices and guidelines as the rest of your website. The \u201cB\u201d page is the test group, and incorporates the change you\u2019re testing. You\u2019ll then serve a statistically significant percentage of visitors the \u201cB\u201d page instead of the \u201cA\u201d page, giving your team real world data on whether or not that change should be implemented permanently. Each \u201cB\u201d page you test should also incorporate only a single change so you can isolate exactly what resulted from each change. For example, you could test whether a 30 day or a 45 day free trial attracts more potential customers:<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter wp-image-15625 size-full\" src=\"https:\/\/firstpagesage.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/cro-ab-2.png\" alt=\"\" width=\"4660\" height=\"1200\" \/>Depending on how many visitors you have, this can be a slow and time consuming process as you wait for data. That\u2019s why your team should take a scientific approach, making sure each \u201cB\u201d page you test has a single, clear hypothesis behind its change. After collecting enough data, your team should then discuss <\/span><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">why<\/span><\/i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> that change resulted in higher or lower conversions, and update your customer personas with any new insights about your customers. These insights can then be applied to your other pages as well. Through this iterative process, you\u2019ll continuously find new ways of encouraging a greater proportion of your visitors to convert.<\/span><\/p>\n<h2><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Putting CRO Into Practice<\/span><\/h2>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">You should now understand what\u2019s required to encourage your website visitors to convert into leads. The next step is to implement these best practices, starting with persona creation and setting up visitor tracking before moving onto design updates.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Another option is to work with a marketing agency skilled in conversion rate optimization. CRO consulting is a core part of what we do at First Page Sage. If you\u2019d like to schedule a time to discuss your needs, you can <\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/firstpagesage.com\/contact\/\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">do so here<\/span><\/a><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">.<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>In this comprehensive guide to conversion optimization, we break down every aspect of creating a highly converting webpage.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":15557,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"content-type":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[7,13],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-15555","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-conversion-optimization","category-seo-blog"],"meta_box":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/redesign.fpsclients.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15555","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/redesign.fpsclients.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/redesign.fpsclients.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/redesign.fpsclients.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/redesign.fpsclients.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=15555"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/redesign.fpsclients.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15555\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/redesign.fpsclients.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/15557"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/redesign.fpsclients.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=15555"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/redesign.fpsclients.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=15555"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/redesign.fpsclients.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=15555"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}