About 50% of purchases are not completed due to lack of information. There’s a reason why wildly successful online merchants like Zappos dedicate a huge amount of time to photographing every product from every imaginable angle, and even shooting video of their products. Ever gone to a brick and mortar store to check out a product before making the purchase online? We like to be able to see the item, hold it, flip it around, read the box, maybe talk to a salesperson about it or even try it out before we’re sold. We like to see and know exactly what we’re getting. And the product’s monetary value usually plays a role in how much information we require. How big is the potential loss if the product doesn’t work out? The bigger the risk, the more research you can bet will be done before a decision is made.
General Online Marketing
Show some evidence to back up claims
Anyone can make a claim about themselves, their product or their business. But why should users believe your claim? Provide users with some kind of evidence, preferably from authoritative third parties. Your product is “the best”, but according to who? You? According to your customers? And what’s so great about it? Testimonials, ratings and other types of social confirmation are great ways to support your claims and have often been shown to be even more influential to customers than saving money.
Make your site look more professional
Your visitors begin forming opinions about your business before they’ve even read a word of your copy. The second they land on your site, they’re presented with visuals that instantly begin forming impressions based solely on outward appearance. And because trust plays such a crucial role in whether or not your visitors will convert, it’s important that your site look trustworthy. If it doesn’t, many visitors may just bounce. Avoid looking “spammy” by investing the extra money to hire a professional designer. It shouldn’t look like you threw it together with some cheap drag and drop software in the mid-late 90’s. A website that looks expensive and professional usually is. It’s no different than being approached on the street by a disheveled homeless man versus a clean-cut business man in a suit and tie—would you turn and walk the other way or would you stop to listen what he has to say?
Make contact and other identifying information easy to find
Don’t be too anonymous. Not publishing things like names, photos, phone numbers or physical addresses makes it seems like you’re trying to hide something. You wouldn’t trust just any old stranger off the street, so don’t expect your visitors to trust one either. Make contact and other identifying information easy to find. Include it in areas of the page where it’s most commonly found, such as header and/or footer areas to reduce user anxiety.
Use testimonials or reviews to boost credibility
User anxiety is one of the biggest conversion killers. Displaying customer testimonials or reviews is a great way to help eliminate some of the uncertainty and boost your credibility. People trust customer reviews 11 times more than they trust descriptions written by manufacturers! The more detailed they are, the better. Don’t just use generic responses. Specific statements are much more believable. So, if your conversion rate increased by 43.78%, don’t just say that it increased by “over 40%”…say that it increased 43.78%! And don’t neglect to reveal some specific details about the person doing the review as well. Including things like the person’s name, city, and even a photo can help to create a more personal connection with your potential customer.
Reiterate your ad copy or call to action
If you’re running ads on any kind of external site like Google, Bing, Facebook, etc., be sure to reiterate your ad copy on your landing page. If your ad reads, “Enter now to win a free iPad”, then “Enter now to win a free iPad” should be the first thing users see when they arrive at your landing page. People in the conversion rate optimization world sometimes refer to this as maintaining a good “scent” from the ad or incentive to the goal. You want your visitors to know immediately that they’re in the right place, so the less disconnect between the two touch-points, the better.
Simplify the process
Don’t make processes any more complicated than they need to be. Remove all unnecessary options. Make it intuitive. Shorten the distance from point A to point B. Don’t make your users do any more work or thinking than they have to. The less options, the better. Whether it’s implementing a sticky menu to prevent unnecessary scrolling or adjusting the steps in a lengthy application process, the simpler things are, the less chance your users will become frustrated and leave.
Pay attention to the page fold
In most cases, the higher on the page you can keep your most important information or calls to action, the better. Ideally, visitors will see the most important elements the second they arrive on the page, without having to scroll. However, if what you’re selling has a large price tag or is something that requires a significant amount of research or consideration before the sale, consider testing your call to action placement below the fold so that it follows the copy.