Aligning brands with behaviour: the case for Conversion Rate Optimisation (CRO)
In this post, we explore the concept of conversion rate optimisation (CRO) and its pivotal role in driving business growth online.
From understanding the intricacies of user behaviour to leveraging data and implementing evidence-based adjustments, CRO serves as a foundation for brands that want to nurture lasting relationships with customers online and maintain a distinctive technological edge in the highly competitive digital space.
Window shopping
The next time you enter a high street store, take a few moments to consider how its layout and product displays influence what you look at, where you go, what (if anything) you buy, and how you feel. Was the overall experience enjoyable, or could you not wait to leave?
Many retail brands dedicate considerable time and resource to visual merchandising strategies that optimise in-store experiences. They study how customers interact with physical spaces and make continual improvements to nudge customers toward making one decision or another. The brands that do this best tend to see considerable improvements in sales, customer satisfaction, and repeat business.
Not every business has a bricks-and-mortar storefront, but most - if not all - have a website. Unfortunately, some companies take a ‘set it and forget it’ approach to their website, to the overall detriment of their brand.
Consider some of these questions when you think of your website:
What specific website actions do you want visitors to take?
Which pages and features do your visitors interact with most often, and which do they ignore?
Are there any elements of your website that could be distractions or roadblocks?
Is the user experience better on a computer or mobile phone?
How do you fix one issue without causing more problems elsewhere?
These and other questions are at the core of conversion rate optimisation (CRO). Like successful retailers, brands that pay careful attention to website visitors' behaviour tend to enjoy a range of downstream benefits for their business.
Conversion Rate Optimisation
CRO is a critical process for any brand with an online presence. It ensures that a website operates at its fullest potential and facilitates a seamless user journey. Optimising website conversions has many positive downstream effects, including:
Maximising ROI on paid advertising.
Greater understanding of your customers and what they want.
Increased sales on your website (without inflating acquisition costs).
Enhanced search engine optimisation (SEO) rankings.
Improved advantage against unoptimised competitor websites.
Before we go any further, what do we mean by conversion? Simply put, a conversion marks the moment when a website visitor completes a desired action. The action could be an online purchase, a newsletter registration, or clicking a link to an interesting blog post.
Now for a little maths - don’t worry, we’ll keep this brief. A website’s conversion rate is simply the percentage of conversions divided by the total number of website visitors.
This percentage will look different for each website, brand, and industry, so don’t be overly concerned if you have a low conversion rate initially. What truly matters is how you use CRO to inform strategic and tactical adjustments to your website on a continual basis. In other words, CRO is an ongoing cyclical process rather than a one-time linear procedure.
Why CRO strategy matters
Just like the marketplace, the digital landscape is dynamic, with user behaviours and expectations in constant flux. Thus, there is always a need for improvement, adaptation, and evolution. Adopting an 'always-on' approach to website optimisation helps keep businesses ahead of the curve.
Driven by data, not intuition
Effective CRO depends on an abundance of high-quality data. Leveraging data-driven insights empowers businesses to make informed choices that yield tangible results.
Accord’s CRO services involve various advanced tools that track and analyse website visitors' behaviour. These include:
Hotjar, which offers qualitative insights into web visitor behaviour.
Google Analytics 4 (GA4), which provides deeper quantitative context about those visitors.
Visual Website Optimiser (VWO) that facilitates the A/B testing of proposed website changes.
Userlytics, to conduct remote usability tests.
LOOP, a powerful resource with custom dashboards that provide a wealth of data and insights to inform strategic next steps.
More engagement for less ad spend
A well-executed CRO strategy amplifies the effectiveness of paid advertising efforts. By enhancing a website’s pathways to conversion, you can maximise the return on investment from paid digital campaigns. This leads not only to more conversions but also to an increase in overall traffic available for conversion.
Furthermore, CRO efforts can leverage existing website traffic. When someone visits your website, much of the hard work of ‘marketing’ has been done. It’s vital to keep prospective customers engaged by delivering a seamless user experience that bridges the gap between the actions you want visitors to take and historical user behaviour.
A well-oiled machine
CRO doesn't solely benefit paid advertising and conversions; it also boosts SEO rankings. Aligning CRO recommendations with SEO considerations ensures that optimisation efforts positively impact search engine visibility. In practice, the symbiotic relationship between CRO and SEO creates a positive feedback loop: a user-centric website attracts more qualified traffic, which improves conversion rates, which in turn helps the website rank higher in search engine results.
Implementing CRO strategy with Accord Connect
For over a decade, Accord has been at the forefront of CRO. Our bespoke strategies, complemented by advanced tracking tools like LOOP, offer clients a range of insights and options to improve their website's performance.
But CRO is just one piece of a larger puzzle. To maximise the impact of your website -and, by extension, the other customer-facing elements of your brand - it’s essential to holistically integrate related elements like paid search, SEO, strategy, and creative services. This approach makes Connect, a new service from Accord, a singular opportunity for brands to build, grow, and accelerate business performance.
With a team of diligent analysts, strategic thinkers, and creative minds, Accord delivers tangible results that align with your key objectives.
Evolution as the end goal
Implementing a data-driven CRO strategy is not just beneficial; it's essential for staying competitive in the digital landscape. It’s about adapting to the marketplace, understanding user needs, and continuously refining strategies to enhance user experience and generate more conversions. In essence, CRO is an ongoing process of learning, growth, and improvement that can propel your brand towards sustainable, long-term success in the digital realm and beyond.
Are you ready to optimise your website’s power and potential? Contact Accord Marketing today to start CRO analysis and plan your digital strategy.
Kara Bennett
Kara is Accord’s Head of Analytics.
