How to Boost Conversions on Your Website
You've put your heart and soul into creating a stunning online presence for your business and you have a beautiful website to show for it. But there's one tiny little problem—conversions are about as rare as a unicorn riding a rainbow. Fear not, I’m here to help you sprinkle some of that unicorn magic on your website to help you boost your conversion rate. So let’s dive in and unlock the power of effective website design.
Unlock the Power of Effective Web Design
#1. Keep it Simple, Smarty-Pants (KISS 💋)
These days, attention spans are shorter than a TikTok video, so you need to make sure your website gets straight to the point. I always prefer to opt for simplicity over aesthetics. Yes, it’s important that your website looks the part, but beauty without substance is not gonna get you those coveted conversions. So head on over to your website (in another tab - I’ve got more tips coming your way and you don’t want to lose this blog post), and review each page, asking yourself these questions:
Is this page uncluttered and clean? If the answer is no, what can you remove or simplify?
Are your colours, fonts, and images clashing? If yes, how can you make your site more harmonious?
Are you repeating information throughout your content? If yes, what can you remove?
Can you make your copy more to the point? If you find that your content is waffling a bit, try to re-work some of your copy to make it more precise and direct.
Simplicity is key to an effective website, because waffle, clutter and overwhelm will just put people off before they even get to the good stuff (aka, you and your offers).
#2. Make Them an Offer They Can't Refuse
If you don’t ask, you won’t get… a clear and compelling call-to-action (CTA) is essential for an effective, conversion-generating website. You want to make sure your CTA buttons are easy to find - sending your customer on a hunt for that “BUY NOW” button will just make them frustrated. You also want to make sure you don’t have too many CTA buttons (especially with different actions) - asking your customers to click here to do ‘X’ or to click here to do ‘Y’ just gives them too many choices. Again, keep it simple - make your call to actions clear, prominent and easy to find, direct, and focused on the main action you want your website visitors to take.
#3. The Need for [Website] Speed
We live in an era of instant gratification. We fast forward through ads, we have the latest TV shows and movies at the click of a button, and we expect websites to load at lightning speed. So, if your website takes eons to load? Your website visitors will say “sayonara” faster than you can blink.
PageSpeed Insights is a nifty [free] tool that will help you see how quickly your website loads. Run your website url through the tool and it will give you an analysis of how your website performs on mobile and desktop devices. If it shows that your website speed is sloth-like, here are a few changes that you can make to speed things up:
Compress your images before you load them - I love Optimizilla and use it for all my websites
Remove any unnecessary code on your website
If you have a WordPress site, you can move your website to a better host
Reduce the number of redirects you might have on your website
Reduce the use of embedded content, such as videos - if you have a lot of embedded content, try to spread it across various pages rather than having it all on one page
Reduce your image gallery size - try to keep your photo galleries to a max of 50 images
Ensuring that your website is speedy and efficient will prevent potential customers from slipping through your [digital] fingers and give you a better chance of convincing them to click on that enticing CTA button.
#4. Mobile-Friendly Matters
Picture this: your website visitors are browsing your website on their phones, and they see something they like. They try to tap the brilliant CTA button that you’ve included, but the buttons are too tiny to tap. Frustration sets in, and poof! They’re gone. They’ve moved on to the next website in their search results and your competitor gets their money. All because the buttons on your website were too small to use on a phone…
To prevent this type of disappearing act, it is essential to test your website on mobile devices and to ensure that your website design is responsive. It should adapt flawlessly to different screen sizes, and deliver a seamless experience no matter whether your customer is visiting from their iPhone, their laptop, or their tablet.
One of the things I love about Squarespace is that your design automatically adapts to different screen sizes, but you can also tweak your mobile design to make it even more efficient. Tiny buttons be gone!
#5. Navigate Your Way to Conversion City
Your website has a fabulous [simple] design and compelling, engaging content. But, without easy navigation, they simply won’t be able to find any of it. Streamlined navigation is essential to boosting your conversions because if your website visitors can’t easily find their way around your website, they will simply leave. Again, review your website through the eyes of your customers - are your links, buttons, and navigation menus well-structured and easily navigable? Are they easily identifiable, or are your naming conventions more clever than they are simple? Are they user-friendly and intuitive? Do they guide your user through your website, to your desired call-to-action?
Take some time to review other websites - competitors or not - and see what annoys you about their navigation setup. Or, what you find easy and intuitive. Apply your insights to your website, and voila, your website becomes conversion city!
#6. Eliminate Hesitation and Friction
One of the main reasons why website visitors don’t convert is because there is friction in the process. And sometimes, the easiest way to remove this friction is by making your forms shorter. If your enquiry form is too long, your visitors may be hesitant to fill it out. By shortening your form, it will take less time to fill out, so your visitors are more likely to complete it. And boom - you’ve got a new conversion!
If you sell products on your website, make sure your checkout experience is also friction-free. Make it easy for people to purchase from you by offering multiple payment options, giving the option to create an account for future purchase-ease, and making it easy to fill out the checkout forms. By removing any friction in the purchase process, you’ll make it easier for your visitors to become your customers.
#7. Back Yourself
We all know how important online reviews are to the conversion process, I don’t need to convince you of that. Your reputation and online presence impact your conversion rate. Fact. And that’s why you need to include social proof on your site. Make sure you have relevant testimonials and reviews on your main pages to add that layer of trust to your products or services. Yes, it feels a little bit boasty, but in this instance, it’s totally okay to shout your awesomeness from the top of the [digital] mountains.
#8. Get Chatting
The reason a website visitor might not convert is simply that they have a question or concern that they haven’t found the answer to [yet]. Cue live chat. You can easily embed Facebook Messenger on your Squarespace website so that you can meet your customers where they are, rather than making them hunt you down on a different platform to ask their questions. By using live chat, you can alleviate any concerns and answer all questions, moving your website visitors from “on the fence” to converted customers.
#9. Immediate-Action Benefits
Give your visitors a reason to take immediate action. Maybe it’s a limited-time special offer or a free gift with purchase for the first 50 customers. Maybe you’re launching a new service and you’ve got a beta price offer for the first 5 customers to book with you. Whatever it is, outline the benefits of taking action now, rather than dwelling on the decision. But - pro tip - don’t fake the benefits. Consumers these days are super savvy and they can sniff out fake scarcity like a bloodhound. Be authentic and genuine, and this tactic has the potential to boost your conversions significantly.
#10. Test, Tweak, Triumph
Even the most stunning websites need a little fine-tuning every now and then. That's where testing comes in. Use your analytics tools to gain valuable insights into your visitor behaviour and to identify what’s working and what might need a little TLC. To discover a winning formula, you can experiment with different layouts, colors, headlines, and call-to-actions. Just be sure to only change one thing at a time - if you make changes to A, B, and C and your conversions tank, you won’t know if it’s been caused by A, B, or C. With each tweak, you’ll uncover new ways to entice and convert your visitors.
We are obviously all in the business of selling - we may love our small businesses and what we do, but ultimately we’re all here to make money. So ensuring your website converts effectively is worth investing your time in. All of the tips above won’t help boost your conversion rate unless you know what you want to boost, to begin with. So before you dive in and take action on these tips, make sure you know what action you want people to be taking in the first place. Is it signing up to your email database, is it an online purchase, is it booking a call with you? Once you know what your ultimate goal is, it will make it easier for you to optimise your site accordingly.
See, it isn’t really unicorn magic after all… just your common sense, insights into your customers, and the patience to find your winning formula. If you’ve got all that, you’ll get the conversions coming in no time!
