Transcript
Page 1: 21 CRO Best Practices for Ecommerce

21 CRO Best Practices

for

eCommerce

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About VWO

VWO is a leading A/B testing platformused by more than 3,700 brands in 75countries to optimize their online salesand revenues.

Companies such as ShoeDazzle,Groupalia, JustFab and Unibet useVWO to understand and analyseonline user activity and behaviour.

VWO offers marketers an easy-to-implement and use, but highlyeffective A/B testing, multivariate,behavioural targeting, usability andheat map testing solution that requiresno coding knowledge.

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Table of Contents

INTRODUCTION

CHAPTER 1

Reduce Form Fields

CHAPTER 2

Use A Contrasting CTA Button

CHAPTER 3

Get Rid of Automatic Image Slider

CHAPTER 4

Don’t Use Cheesy Stock Photos

CHAPTER 5

Test CTA Button Text

CHAPTER 6

Place CTA Above The Fold

CHAPTER 7

Add a Video

CHAPTER 8

Craft a Clear Headline

CHAPTER 9

Create Urgency

CHAPTER 10

Display Phone Number

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Table of Contents

CHAPTER 11

Change CTA Link to Button

CHAPTER 12

Use the Magical Word ‘Free’

CHAPTER 13

Add Value to Your Offer

CHAPTER 14

Flaunt Testimonials

CHAPTER 15

Identify and Communicate Your USP

CHAPTER 16

Show Off Award Badges

CHAPTER 17

Add Trust Badges

CHAPTER 18

Use Recognizable Security Seals

CHAPTER 19

Add Live Chat Widget

CHAPTER 20

Give a Price Match Guarantee

CHAPTER 21

Use Better Images on Product Pages

CONCLUSION

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Introduction

If you own an eCommerce website, you know how challenging it is for you to squeeze outrevenue from your website visitors. Conversion Rate Optimization (CRO) helps you doprecisely that!

CRO is essentially the science and art of getting a higher percentage of your visitors to takethe desired action on your website. For an eCommerce business, this desired action can begetting more visitors to click on the ‘Buy-now’ button. In this case, every single click countssince it directly affects the bottom line of the company.

Getting more visitors to your website becomes futile once you realize that those visitors arenot taking the desired action. Moreover, focusing on your existing visitor base and gettingthem to convert more is a far more effective strategy than simply getting more people to visityour website. In the most simplistic terms, CRO helps in bridging the gap between a visitorshowing interest in your product and an interested visitor finally becoming a customer. Ithelps your identify what visitors are looking for when they arrive at your website such thatyou can optimize key parameters on your website to suit the needs of your visitors.

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21 CRO Best Practices

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1. Reduce Form Fields

Flying Scott, an airport car parking company, conducted a test on their website where theyremoved all unnecessary form fields from their details page of their booking process. As aresult, they saw a 35% increase in form submissions.

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2. Use A Contrasting CTA Button

There is no one-color-fits-all rule here. The basic idea is to have your CTA attract attention.Using colors and images that are in contrast with the page background usually helps thepurpose.

Flipkart.com, online retail store, uses contrasting CTAs on its product pages to direct visitorsto take the desired action.

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3. Get Rid of Automatic Image Slider

A usability study by Neilson Norman group confirmed that auto-forwarding carousels annoyusers and reduce visibility. The study highlights reasons why these design elements areactually not good for your site’s usability or conversions:

1. Automatic rotation makes the user losecontrol of their interaction with the site.

2. They create banner blindness and areoften easily ignored by users. The eyetracking example below from anothersource also validates this.

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3. Get Rid of Automatic Image Slider

Here are a few alternatives to try in place of carousels:

1. Focus your homepage on yourprimary offerPrioritize your offers and let your mostrelevant offer get the maximum share ofvisitor attention. Ben Sherman, an onlineclothing store and implemented this very wellon their homepage.

2. Convert Each Slide into a TargetedHomepageLet’s say, you have a global clothing storeonline. You can segment your visitors on thebasis of their geographical location with thehelp of pre-set segments in VWO. Once youhave segmented your visitors, show them thehomepage that promotes an offer about themost popular clothing trend in their country.

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4. Don’t Use Cheesy Stock Photos

Conversion Scientist Brian Massey calls stock photos ‘business porn’.

Using images for ornamental reasons (like the below example of T Mobile) does more harmthan good to your landing page.

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4. Don’t Use Cheesy Stock Photos

The next big question is if not stock photos then what? Try replacing stock photos on yourhomepage with real human images and test it out for better conversions!

Medalia Art, an online art store, decided to test what happens if the paintings on theirhomepage are replaced by the artists’ photos. Replacing the paintings with human photos ledto a 95% increase in conversion rate from 8.8% with paintings to 17.2% with artist photos.

Control Variation

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5. Test CTA Button Text

This is one of the easiest tests to set up and can drastically lift your conversions. Therelevance of your CTA copy influences decision making at the Zero Moment of Truth (ZMOT).It essentially answers the most critical question “Why should I click this button?”

Pcmbtoday.com, an online learning book store, experimented with a more culturally relevant CTA on their product page.

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5. Test CTA Button Text

Here are a few things you should keep in mind while creating the copy for your CTA button:

1. Don’t use the word ‘Submit’! It’s been overused and doesn’t convey any value.

2. Use a valuable and actionable copy. Letyour CTA tell the visitors what they shouldexpect.

3. Add urgency to your CTA. The idea is tomake your visitors click on the CTA thereand then.

4. Begin your CTA with an action verb.

5. Make sure your CTA copy is relevant tothe primary goal of your landing page.

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6. Place CTA Above The Fold

Don’t ask your visitors to put in extra effort i.e. scroll down below the fold to reach your callto action. Place it above the fold, at a prominent position on your page.

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7. Add a Video

According to a study by eyeviewdigital.com, using video on landing pages can increaseconversion by 80%. Using a video on the landing page not only offers a more detaileddescription of your product, it also helps engages visitors for a greater period of time,allowing your brand message to sink in well.

Here’s a list of different ways in which you can use videos for your ecommerce website:

1. Create a personalized product advice video for your visitors.

Morrisons, the online groceries store, added a video survey to its wine section to help shoppers identify what kind of wine they like.

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7. Add a Video

2. Use instructional videos for complex products. For products that require set up andinstallation, add a how to video to your product page.

3. Educate your visitors about a new product category without making them go through hugechunks on online content.

4. Use a simple product video to give your audience a live experience of the product.

Simply Beach, an online store for swim and beachwear, embeds a video on each of its product pages allowing visitors to see a brief clip of a model trying out the clothing item.

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8. Craft a Clear Headline

Make sure your headline is crisp yet detailed to instantly let the prospects know what theycan expect on your website. There’s no scope for ambiguity since you have only 10-20seconds to make an impact with your headline.

Movexa, a joint-supplement manufacturer that sells supplements online, experimented withmaking its headline clearer by adding the word ‘supplement’. This change led to an 89.97%increase in conversions.

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9. Create Urgency

People usually tend to place higher value on an object that is scarce and a lower value on onethat is available in abundance. When combined with Urgency, the two make for a potentweapon for increasing eCommerce sales. Here’s how you can create urgency among buyers tomake them act now!

1. Stock ScarcityDisplaying your stock meter on the eCommerce product page is always a good conversionpractice. Not only does it ensure there are no last-minute heartbreaks for the customer, italso speeds up the buying process.

Boticca.com, an online store for fashion accessories, almost urges visitors to complete the purchase right away. The use of an active verb like ‘Act’ is used to drive immediate action.

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9. Create Urgency

2. Size ScarcityIntimating the buyers when a particular size goes out of stock is killing two birds with onearrow. Not only is it a huge favour for the prospects, the information also works as a positivereinforcement of the product.

Zappos.com, an online retail store, shows how many items are left for a particular size andcolor combination to induce visitor action.

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9. Create Urgency

3. Time-Bound Purchase for Next Day ShippingWhen you ask the visitors to make the purchase in a specific amount of time, you not onlymake them more proactive towards the purchase, it also eliminates any kind of confusion attheir end as to when they will receive the order.

Amazon shows the exact number of hours/minutes within which the purchase needs to becompleted to qualify for next-day shipping.

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9. Create Urgency

4. Limited-Period DiscountsThe fear of missing out is a legitimate one. It is the anticipated regret of not being able to seizean opportunity. A limited-time discount works exactly at that level. It makes the offer look sotempting and fleeting that one is compelled to seize the opportunity.

MakeMyTrip.com, an online ticket booking platform, shows an alert when the last fewdiscounted airline tickets are left in stock. See how they use color psychology here to instilurgency. The use of the color ‘Red’ is associated with energy, increased heart rate and is oftenused in clearance sales.

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9. Create Urgency

5. Limited-Time Free DeliveryThis works the same way as limited-time discounts. The desire to avail free delivery couldpossibly offset the visitors’ tendency to procrastinate the purchase.

6. Special Discount HoursA special discount hour can be used to galvanize excitement around that specific hour. Zivame,an online lingerie store, sent out this mailer to subscribers to build up craze for its hour-longsale.

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10. Display Phone Number

It is usually a good practice to add your contact number in your homepage header so that itisn’t missed by your site visitors. This adds credibility and also assures people that you areeasily approachable if they have any problems or concerns during their purchase process.

See how OzScopes, an online telescope retailer, has its phone number noticeably displayedon the homepage:

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11. Change CTA Link to Button

In case your call-to-action is embedded as a link to text, you should change it to a clickablebutton right away! Text links are often lost with the rest of the text, making it difficult to spotthem on the page. CTA is the most important element on your website to achieve higherconversions.

Underwater Audio, an eCommerce website, changed their text links to CTA buttons and sawimprovement in conversions.

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12. Use the Magical Word ‘Free’

The word free is a powerful emotional trigger and a source of irrational excitement. Themoment you see the word free, there’s an urgency to take action created in your mind. Sameis the case with your visitors. People end up buying stuff they don’t even need when it isoffered for free.

In this world of uncertainty, ‘free’ is a sure-shot conversion booster. Way back in 1999,Amazon began offering free shipping on orders of $99 or more. Since then they have beenexperimenting with their marketing strategy to best take advantage of our desire for 'free.‘

Gregory Ciotti of Copyblogger puts in another perspective to the ‘power of free’. She pointsto loss aversion and our natural instinct to go after “low hanging fruit” as the reasons why weare so susceptible to snatching up free stuff.

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13. Add Value to Your Offer

As long as the perceived value of your offer is not greater than what you are asking from yourcustomers, you cannot make them convert. One great way to increase the perceived value ofyour offer is to add benefits in your copy. Answer the “What’s in it for me?” question of yourvisitors, and they will happily convert into leads or sales.

Urbanladder.com, an online furniture retail store, add value to its offer by introducing a luckywinner content for newsletter signup.

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14. Flaunt Testimonials

Adding testimonials to your website is like spreading word-of-mouth in the real world. Themore your happy customers talk about you, the better will be your conversions.

Having big names or companies talking about you is a huge conversion booster. It addscredibility and assuages buyers’ fears.

However, in order to add testimonials to your website, don’t forget that they have to comefrom real customers based on their experience with your website.

Fabfurnish.com, an online furniture store, beautifully uses customer testimonials on thewebsite. In addition to adding a quote from the customer on the homepage, they have a‘Share your story’ section where customers share their stories about their experiences withbuying products from the website.

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14. Flaunt Testimonials

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15. Identify and Communicate Your USP

Your Unique Selling Proposition is the real reason why you exist. To identify your USP,answer these questions for yourself:

1. What is it that distinguishes you from your competitors?

2. What gives you an edge over them?

Once you have identified your USP, make sure you communicate it clearly to your targetaudience.

For example, Zappos.com, an eCommerce store, identified superior customer service as itsUSP and they have been communicating it well to their target audience through their taglinewhich says “Powered by Service”.

Also, they prominently display the ‘Free Shipping and Returns’ badge on their homepage toreinforce their USP of superior customer service.

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16. Show Off Award Badges

Displaying award badges on your website helps eliminates online buyers’ distrust.

Bagservent.com, an online bags retail store, saw an increase in conversions when they addedthe esteemed ‘WOW’ trust badge to their website.

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17. Add Trust Badges

There are various ways to add trust elements to your website. If you have got great reviewsfrom Glassdoor, Yelp or Better Business Bureau don’t hesitate to flaunt them.

Express Watches, an online watch retailer, saw a 58. 39% increase in sales when they addedthe Trust Pilot widget to their website.

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18. Use Recognizable Security Seals

The greatest barrier to online sales is trust. Since your online store doesn’t have a human facethat your visitors can interact with, it is important to assure them about the trustworthinessof your website. The best way to do it is to add trust badges.

In case you are wondering which trust badges you should try adding to your website, here’s areport from a survey conducted by Baymard Institute that showed which badge gives thebest sense of trust during online payments.

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19. Add Live Chat Widget

According to study conducted by Forrester Research, 44% of online consumers say thathaving questions answered by a live person while in the middle of an online purchase is oneof the most important features a Web site can offer.

To give you a real life example, supplygeeks.com, an online business supplies retailer, addedlive chat to their website and saw conversions increase by 17%.

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20. Give a Price Match Guarantee

People want to be sure that they are not getting ripped off. Assure them that you can givethem the best price in the market. If possible, show them a comparison of your prices withyour competitor’s prices.

BestBuy.com, an online retail store, offers a selective Price Match guarantee on their items.

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21. Use Better Images on Product Pages

The battle of an eCommerce sale can be won or lost on a product page. Visitors to yourwebsite take their most crucial decision on the product page. Hence, the importance ofstructuring the page well and presenting products clearly on the products page cannot beover-stated. When it comes to product page images, use product images that are clear andattractive.

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Conclusion

In the end, all methods to increase website sales and leads come down to better relevance,improving clarity, fewer distractions, reducing anxiety, and increasing urgency. When youtake care of these, you should have good hypotheses to start off your tests and look forwardto better conversions on your website.

Some of the changes as described in this eBook can be quickly implemented on your websiteand immediately reap in more sales while others may require more expertise.

However, I would recommend going with one change at a time so that you are able to analyzewhat’s working and what’s not in your specific business scenario.

You can start implementing those tips which you think are most relevant to your businessneeds. But before you do that, I absolutely insist that you A/B test them.

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About the Author

Smriti Chopra is a Marketer at VWO and also

helps with VWO’s demand generation initiatives.

She's responsible for handling social media and

creating content offers, including eBooks and

guest posts.

She’s passionate about experimenting with new

techniques in the marketing arena.

LinkedIn | Twitter | Google+

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