Seeing a rise in web visits can be such a thrilling feeling for any new startup. But the feeling of excitement quickly starts turning to despair when those visits are not converting to customers/users.
Before we get into the article, let me show you why increasing your conversion rate is a gold mine for your startup.
Let’s analyse why this is an underused goldmine.
Let’s say you have a traction goal of 100k signups
You spend $4000 through paid ads and get 100,000 landing page visits with 15% conversion (15000 signups)(all things being equal).
What 90% of founders do is increase the amount spent on ads to reach more people so that they can get more signups instead of optimizing their conversion rate.
If you optimize your conversion and increase it to 25% that means for the same $4000 you will get 25000 signups
So instead of spending almost $27,000 on paid ads to get 100k signup, with an optimized conversion rate of 25%, you will spend $16,000 to get to your traction goal, saving you $11,000 for other marketing/business activities.
I like to call it the hidden gold in your marketing funnel.
As a startup founder/marketer, you need to be cautious of every $1 spent on marketing, because unlike big companies with huge marketing budgets, startups are very limited and should be careful about how they spend. In other to thrive and get early growth we must always try as much as possible to avoid loopholes.
The hidden gold mine represented in real-time
The experimentation stage is a good place to make sure your funnel is tightly girded. Although we will always have the inevitable churn and drop-off, the goal is to reduce the drop-off to the barest minimum.
In the experimentation stage, you need to check to see if there is no unusual high drop-off rate. From the Awareness stage to the Revenue/Referral stage.
What should happen in the experimentation stage
Start experimenting with different traction channels to find your core traction channel. this can be done with little budget.
Monitor and optimize:
- Monitor your awareness campaign to see if your CTR is good (People are not just seeing your campaign and not clicking to your landing page),
- Monitor your acquisition rate (people landing on your website or app store and signing up or downloading the app)
- Monitor your activation/retention rate (People signup up are performing core actions on your website and coming again to perform our north star action)
- Monitor your revenue/referral (People are opting for the pro plan for a Saas product and sending invite links to their friends/connections).
SO HOW DO YOU TURN VISITS TO CUSTOMERS?
Landing page Optimization:
Optimizing your landing page is a good way to get more people to convert.
- Remove Noise and Focus your CTA
- Have a clear CTA
- Establish credibility and trust for the business with social proof and Testimonials
- Decrease page load time
- Keep the important part above the fold
- Run Experiments
- Carry out surveys
- Match the expectation and needs of the visitor based on their previous interaction (context)
Message-Market Fit:
Just like product-market fit, message market fit is also crucial to the success of any startup. Message market fit is making sure that how you message your product resonates with customers. The right features must be accompanied by the right message. If your landing page/product copy does not have the right message to speak to the needs of your target market then you will likely high drop-off rate that will ultimately affect your marketing goals.
“How can they believe if they don’t know”
Avoid using Jargon or industry-over-used words, but simple words resonate with your target market. Don’t over-promise — “Get money Instantly”, focus on benefit messaging and not feature messaging. Carry out surveys to identify your market core problem that your product can solve and tailor your message around solving those problems.
Personalization and Engagement
Live chats and personalized landing page experience have been proven to be effective ways to increase conversion. According to research from Salesforce, 75% of business buyers expect the companies they buy from to provide personalised experiences, anticipate their individual needs and provide relevant suggestions.
Separate research has found that 57% of online buyers are happy to exchange personal data in return for personalised offers or discounts. While a similar majority of 58% say personalised experiences are important when buying from a company. Industry personalization for b2b. Give visitors a personalized and engaging experience using chatbots, automation platforms like HubSpot etc.
CTA temperature:
CTA temperature shows the different types of calls to action. It is represented by hot, warm or cold. Most landing pages have hot CTAs for cold audiences. So the issue is not with the landing page but the call to action does not match the need of the traffic sent to the landing page.
CTA Temperature examples
With CTA temperature, you need to make sure the traffic temperature matches the CTA temperature. you are likely to get low or zero conversions when you send cold traffic via paid ads to a landing page with a “buy $500 product” CTA. Especially for a startup with little or zero brand awareness.
For Example
Travel brand Secret Escapes adapts its on-site experience, depending on the keywords typed into Google Search.
As you can see, the copy and images on the site are delivered to match the purchase intent of the user.
Secret Escapes is by no means the only brand using this technique and it’s a relatively easy strategy to implement, using truncated URLs.
This is a good example of tapping into Google data to deliver a personalised experience that matches the unique desires of individual users.
Product-Led Growth
Product-Led Growth is defined as a go-to-market strategy that relies on using your product as the main vehicle to acquire, activate, and retain customers. — Product Led.
The product-led concept, on the surface level, has a CTA of “try before you buy” as a way of converting cold/warm leads to users of your product. Get your visitors to experience the value of your product instantly by removing the barriers and limiting the time to value.
This concept is focused on reducing the gap between perceived value and expected value.
Most Saas/eCommerce platforms will get you to build the website, create a dashboard, search for a therapist, select things to buy, in general, make a particular action before asking the user to commit with their personal information. It’s easier to get visitors to become users and repeat customers when they have already experienced your product.
QUICK RECAP
- Always make sure your conversion rate is optimized— The hidden gold in your marketing efforts.
- 4 Ways to turn visits to customers — Landing page optimization; CTA Temperatures, Message Market Fit, Personalization and Engagement; Product Led Growth
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MORE READING: 3 Stages of Growth for a Startup
