You’ve put a ton of work into your online store and even started getting a decent amount of traffic to it. But, when it comes to sales, you aren’t meeting your goals. Does this sound like you? If so, don’t worry — Many online stores owners are facing the same problem. You need to optimize your marketing efforts to acquire more customers, and this article show you how.
First, You Need to Determine When Shoppers Leave Your Site
While there are some general optimizations that will benefit allonline stores, the areas where you need to make improvements to your site are determined by user behavior. You need to know precisely when a shopper leaves your website. Upon determining at what point website traffic navigates away, you will have an idea what elements must be improved.
So, you’ll have to monitor your website traffic. From real data, you can acquire invaluable understanding. Here are the indicators you want to look for and what you can do to improve your sales potential.
A High Bounce Rate and How to Solve it
A high bounce rate (above 56%) indicates that your page design or load speed is severely lacking. The problem for your shoppers is immediate, so they leave right away — and most of them won’t come back. So, the first thing you need to do if your bounce rate isn’t at least average, is run a page speed test.
Google PageSpeed Insights can provide you with page load speed and optimization ratings for mobile and desktop browsers. Follow the advice given, step-by-step, right to an optimized user experience upon arrival to your online store.
If you find that your website is fully-optimized and your bounce rate stays in the high range, it may be time to get some feedback on your design and/ or images; the aesthetic appeal of your site might be non-existent or lacking (this is a tough but extremely commonpill to swallow).
Tip: Find a neutral focus group to test your design and give you unbiased feedback on your website design. Most of the time, your staff, friends, and family are going to tell you what you want to hear, whether the aesthetics of your site are terrible or not.
Site Traffic Drops off on Product Pages and What This Means
After arriving at your home page, interested, qualified leads will likely move to your product pages. If this is where they move away, there could be something wrong with your product descriptions. Crafting optimized product descriptions will have a powerful effect on your sales.
SignMission’s now hiring banner product description provides a great example of everything necessary for converting a page visitor. Here’s why it works:
- Right off the bat, it tells the reader what to do with the product: “Advertise your employment needs…”
- Next, it showcases the main benefits: durable, pre-grommeted mounting holes, indoor and outdoor use, fade-resistant, made in the USA, outdoor, heavy duty, 13 oz vinyl.
- Then, it explains where the product can be used: job fairs, grand openings, roadside, and more.
- Plus, it seems to be super SEO-friendly with wise use of subheadings and lists.
- Finally, it makes wise use of grammar and power words.
If you wrote the product descriptions for your online store and this is where visitors are moving away, it’s time to study up on psychological sales triggers, power words, and maybe even grammar. There’s a lot that goes into effective product descriptions.
Tip: If you hire someone to help you rewrite your product descriptions, make sure that you check references. You’ll probably be better off hiring someone with experience in your niche because they will already know the language if your target market.
What if Shoppers Drop off on Category Pages?
You may think that when your traffic moves away upon landing on your category pages, it’s for the same reason as product pages and you need to update descriptions; this could be part of the cause, but it’s definitely not the most likely. Instead, when shoppers leave after landing on category pages, it’s probably because your navigation needs some work. The simpler your navigation menu is to use, the longer shoppers will browse.
MightySkins’ provides a great example of an eCommerce site with good navigation. From one category page you can choose to create your own popsocket skin, buy a pre-designed skin, use the dropdown menu to see a list of the most popular products, or do a search. In the sidebar, they provide product images of other popular products with images. Follow their lead to encourage clear opportunities for conversions on category pages.
Tip: Try to make your main conversion point stand out on your top menu. If website traffic is drawn to the “Shop” button, you’re likely to get traffic to your money pages.
Are Your Shoppers Abandoning Their Carts at Checkout?
. Shopping cart abandonment is one of the main conversion killers eCommerce stores face. You’ll need a streamlined checkout experience if you want shoppers to see their purchases through. So, learn why online shoppers abandon their carts and check to see if your experience makes the grade.
Here’s what an optimized checkout process looks like:
- It never presents shoppers with unexpected costs.
- The price of your products, including shipping, is competitive.
- Site is functioning properly as far as page speed and bandwidth.
- Utilizes minimal security measures while maintaining trustworthiness.
- Presents sufficient and affordable (free when possible) delivery options.
- Shows relevant currency information.
Tip: If you sell the same inventory on and offline, you should use a credit card reader that connects to your online store. This way, you’ll have an easier time with inventory management.
Final Thoughts
An optimized online store leads to higher conversions, hence a greater ROI. If you’re in the business of selling online, use these tips to improve your business’ financial situation. Most of these tips can be implemented right away, so don’t wait to make the right move – start now.
Guest post: About the Author
Ashley Kimler is part of the superhero team atHeroic Search in Tulsa. She’s been working in the digital marketing industry for over a decade. Follow @ashleykimlerand @heroicsearchon Twitter to see what she and her team share next.