For eCommerce businesses, a small increase in your conversion rate can equal hundreds of thousands in revenue or more. However, with the average eCommerce conversion rate hovering around 2.5-3% (speedcommerce), falling below this benchmark means you’re not just underperforming – you’re losing substantial revenue and wasting valuable marketing dollars. Every visitor who doesn’t convert is a missed opportunity, a drain on your resources, and a step backwards for your business.
To avoid these pitfalls and turn your site into a conversion powerhouse, continuous testing and refinement based on well-formed hypotheses are essential. By making data-driven changes to your website, you can enhance user experience, boost conversion rates, and drive substantial growth for your business. Here are 10 powerful tactics to test on your site to supercharge your bottom-line revenue and keep a consistent flow of customers coming back to your business.
-
Customer Reviews
91% of eCommerce site visitors will read customer reviews before making a purchase and customers were willing to spend 31% more on a retailer that has excellent reviews (BigCommerce). This means that if you have 100 website visitors and a $100 product, that 91 people will read reviews and those 91 people will spend an additional $31 if your store features glowing reviews. Add these to every single page on your site. Homepage, Collections, Product, Cart, Checkout – hammer reviews as #1 priority always.
-
Page Speed
40% of users will abandon a page that takes longer than 3 seconds to load. If your site loads in less than 2 seconds, it boasts a 15% higher conversion rate on average (WebFX). Ensure your site is a lighting rod by compressing images/videos/files to nextgen formats, improving your server response time, and removing any unnecessary or render-blocking Javascript.
-
Popups & Banners
There’s lots of heated debate over whether or not pop-up banners and forms are annoying and if they should be used. At (un)Common Logic, we use data-driven analyses to inform our strategy. According to OptiMonk, the average conversion rate for popups is 11.09% – far above the average eCommerce site conversion rate of 2-3%. With that being said, all pop-ups aren’t equal and there are some considerations to make when evaluating when/if to use popups on your site. Exit intent popups at critical periods of user interaction (like an abandoned cart), have the highest conversion rate at 17% on average. Newsletter popups have the lowest conversion rate at 10%. Additionally, popups with a countdown timer or a set deadline have a 46% higher conversion rate than those without timers/deadlines. Use this to your advantage on your next sale offer.
Aside from direct sales-focused initiatives, you can also use pop-ups to gather qualitative data from your customers on how they are experiencing the site or viewing your products in real-time. The more you understand how your customers perceive your brand, the more you can leverage to cater experiences to them.
-
Personalization
Personalized product recommendations are a powerful tool for increasing eCommerce conversions. According to a study by Coniq, 91% of consumers are more likely to shop with brands that provide relevant offers and recommendations. The most popular and effective way to do this in eCommerce is by showing relevant products based on what a user has already expressed interest in. These can be done with pop-ups, under product details, or in the final point of conversion in the cart. These suggestions are relevant to the user, making them feel understood and aligned with the brand, but they also increase average order value by incentivizing bundling or adding accessories. Think of selling socks with a pair of shoes!
-
Live Chat & Enhanced Customer Support
Even if your website is perfect at explaining everything and you’ve outlined every possible question a prospective customer might have about your product, they may still prefer to talk with a human or in a conversational format – queue live chat. Live chat support has become an essential feature for eCommerce websites looking to provide immediate assistance and improve customer experience. According to CrazyEgg, 38% of customers are more likely to buy from a company if they offer live chat support. People want to get answers right away and value that from their eCommerce experience as outlined below. Incorporate Live Chat into your site and watch your customer base grow while they promote your brand through word-of-mouth even more!
-
Product Images/Videos & Callout Additions
Many times on both desktop and mobile devices, users will not scroll down enough to see product features/details. The most interacted item on product pages is often the image carousel as shown in the heatmap below.
To ensure users are seeing your important social proofs and trust signals, spell it out for them by adding images/videos with all the important feature callouts you want them to see when evaluating your product. Feature these additions in the first 2-3 images of your product carousel to ensure details aren’t being missed by users.
-
Checkout Functionality
According to the Baymard Institute, the average cart abandonment rate is around 69.57%. Optimizing the checkout process can help recapture lost sales and improve overall conversion rates. Here are several strategies to test and optimize your checkout process:
-
Remove Navigation Elements
- Navigation menus and other links can distract customers during the checkout process, leading them away from completing their purchase. By removing these elements, you can create a focused environment where the primary goal is to complete the transaction.
-
Reinforce Social Proof
-
- Social proof, such as customer reviews, testimonials, and trust badges, can reassure customers and reduce purchase anxiety. Highlighting positive experiences and security assurances during the checkout process can boost confidence and encourage completion.
- Social proof, such as customer reviews, testimonials, and trust badges, can reassure customers and reduce purchase anxiety. Highlighting positive experiences and security assurances during the checkout process can boost confidence and encourage completion.
-
Implement Multi-Step Checkout
-
- A multi-step checkout process breaks down the information into smaller, more digestible sections. This approach can reduce cognitive load and make the process feel less overwhelming for customers. Use progress indicators, guest checkout, auto-fill and address verification to speed up the process.
-
Scarcity
People act when they feel like they’re missing out. Utilize advanced inventory setups to show the quantity remaining and encourage users to take action. This also works with displaying signals such as “10+ others have this item in their cart” or “Buy within 10hrs 20min 30s to receive by XYZ date.” These are powerful persuasion methods every eCommerce store needs to be implementing.
-
Offer Testing
Aside from website A/B testing, a mature conversion rate optimization service will test business-level decisions. Typically, these tests are higher risk, higher reward since they apply to all interactions. Test different variations of your pricing model through sales like Buy 1, Get 1 50% Off. Use bundling psychology to incentivize discounts like free shipping or quantity discounts for ordering larger bundles. These will grow your store’s average order value quickly and you can measure these at the business level to find which are the most profitable for your unique business with specific margins.
-
Email & Customer Flow
Congratulations you’ve gotten a customer and you’ve spent the upfront money in acquisition of them. It is now much cheaper and easier to keep them as a customer. Utilize email marketing to keep them up-to-date on the latest product launches, sales, and additions. Incentivize reviews or social media postings with discount offers and referral bonuses. Make your happiest customers into your biggest advocates on social media. Repurpose their content and encourage product images and videos of how they’re authentically enjoying the product and your brand. Create loyalty programs to keep them coming back and their lifetime value to your business going up!
Conclusion
By testing and implementing these tactics you can create a seamless and efficient website experience that reduces cart abandonment, enhances customer satisfaction, and supercharges revenue growth for your company. Optimizing your eCommerce site through hypothesis-driven CRO testing can lead to significant improvements in user experience and conversion rates. Take this B2C eCommerce company that saw a 70% increase in orders following our CRO expertise.
For expert support and tailored strategies to enhance your eCommerce business, book a call and get a tailored CRO audit of your website. Our team at (un)Common Logic is ready to help you achieve your growth goals through data-driven optimization.
For eCommerce businesses, a small increase in your conversion rate can equal hundreds of thousands in revenue or more. However, with the average eCommerce conversion rate hovering around 2.5-3% (speedcommerce), falling below this benchmark means you're not just underperforming – you're losing substantial revenue and wasting valuable marketing dollars. Every visitor who doesn't convert is a missed opportunity, a drain on your resources, and a step backwards for your business.
To avoid these pitfalls and turn your site into a conversion powerhouse, continuous testing and refinement based on well-formed hypotheses are essential. By making data-driven changes to your website, you can enhance user experience, boost conversion rates, and drive substantial growth for your business. Here are 10 powerful tactics to test on your site to supercharge your bottom-line revenue and keep a consistent flow of customers coming back to your business.
-
Customer Reviews
91% of eCommerce site visitors will read customer reviews before making a purchase and customers were willing to spend 31% more on a retailer that has excellent reviews (BigCommerce). This means that if you have 100 website visitors and a $100 product, that 91 people will read reviews and those 91 people will spend an additional $31 if your store features glowing reviews. Add these to every single page on your site. Homepage, Collections, Product, Cart, Checkout - hammer reviews as #1 priority always.
-
Page Speed
40% of users will abandon a page that takes longer than 3 seconds to load. If your site loads in less than 2 seconds, it boasts a 15% higher conversion rate on average (WebFX). Ensure your site is a lighting rod by compressing images/videos/files to nextgen formats, improving your server response time, and removing any unnecessary or render-blocking Javascript.
-
Popups & Banners
There’s lots of heated debate over whether or not pop-up banners and forms are annoying and if they should be used. At (un)Common Logic, we use data-driven analyses to inform our strategy. According to OptiMonk, the average conversion rate for popups is 11.09% - far above the average eCommerce site conversion rate of 2-3%. With that being said, all pop-ups aren’t equal and there are some considerations to make when evaluating when/if to use popups on your site. Exit intent popups at critical periods of user interaction (like an abandoned cart), have the highest conversion rate at 17% on average. Newsletter popups have the lowest conversion rate at 10%. Additionally, popups with a countdown timer or a set deadline have a 46% higher conversion rate than those without timers/deadlines. Use this to your advantage on your next sale offer.
Aside from direct sales-focused initiatives, you can also use pop-ups to gather qualitative data from your customers on how they are experiencing the site or viewing your products in real-time. The more you understand how your customers perceive your brand, the more you can leverage to cater experiences to them.
-
Personalization
Personalized product recommendations are a powerful tool for increasing eCommerce conversions. According to a study by Coniq, 91% of consumers are more likely to shop with brands that provide relevant offers and recommendations. The most popular and effective way to do this in eCommerce is by showing relevant products based on what a user has already expressed interest in. These can be done with pop-ups, under product details, or in the final point of conversion in the cart. These suggestions are relevant to the user, making them feel understood and aligned with the brand, but they also increase average order value by incentivizing bundling or adding accessories. Think of selling socks with a pair of shoes!
-
Live Chat & Enhanced Customer Support
Even if your website is perfect at explaining everything and you’ve outlined every possible question a prospective customer might have about your product, they may still prefer to talk with a human or in a conversational format - queue live chat. Live chat support has become an essential feature for eCommerce websites looking to provide immediate assistance and improve customer experience. According to CrazyEgg, 38% of customers are more likely to buy from a company if they offer live chat support. People want to get answers right away and value that from their eCommerce experience as outlined below. Incorporate Live Chat into your site and watch your customer base grow while they promote your brand through word-of-mouth even more!
-
Product Images/Videos & Callout Additions
Many times on both desktop and mobile devices, users will not scroll down enough to see product features/details. The most interacted item on product pages is often the image carousel as shown in the heatmap below.
To ensure users are seeing your important social proofs and trust signals, spell it out for them by adding images/videos with all the important feature callouts you want them to see when evaluating your product. Feature these additions in the first 2-3 images of your product carousel to ensure details aren’t being missed by users.
-
Checkout Functionality
According to the Baymard Institute, the average cart abandonment rate is around 69.57%. Optimizing the checkout process can help recapture lost sales and improve overall conversion rates. Here are several strategies to test and optimize your checkout process:
-
Remove Navigation Elements
- Navigation menus and other links can distract customers during the checkout process, leading them away from completing their purchase. By removing these elements, you can create a focused environment where the primary goal is to complete the transaction.
-
Reinforce Social Proof
-
- Social proof, such as customer reviews, testimonials, and trust badges, can reassure customers and reduce purchase anxiety. Highlighting positive experiences and security assurances during the checkout process can boost confidence and encourage completion.
- Social proof, such as customer reviews, testimonials, and trust badges, can reassure customers and reduce purchase anxiety. Highlighting positive experiences and security assurances during the checkout process can boost confidence and encourage completion.
-
Implement Multi-Step Checkout
-
- A multi-step checkout process breaks down the information into smaller, more digestible sections. This approach can reduce cognitive load and make the process feel less overwhelming for customers. Use progress indicators, guest checkout, auto-fill and address verification to speed up the process.
-
Scarcity
People act when they feel like they’re missing out. Utilize advanced inventory setups to show the quantity remaining and encourage users to take action. This also works with displaying signals such as “10+ others have this item in their cart” or “Buy within 10hrs 20min 30s to receive by XYZ date.” These are powerful persuasion methods every eCommerce store needs to be implementing.
-
Offer Testing
Aside from website A/B testing, a mature conversion rate optimization service will test business-level decisions. Typically, these tests are higher risk, higher reward since they apply to all interactions. Test different variations of your pricing model through sales like Buy 1, Get 1 50% Off. Use bundling psychology to incentivize discounts like free shipping or quantity discounts for ordering larger bundles. These will grow your store's average order value quickly and you can measure these at the business level to find which are the most profitable for your unique business with specific margins.
-
Email & Customer Flow
Congratulations you’ve gotten a customer and you’ve spent the upfront money in acquisition of them. It is now much cheaper and easier to keep them as a customer. Utilize email marketing to keep them up-to-date on the latest product launches, sales, and additions. Incentivize reviews or social media postings with discount offers and referral bonuses. Make your happiest customers into your biggest advocates on social media. Repurpose their content and encourage product images and videos of how they’re authentically enjoying the product and your brand. Create loyalty programs to keep them coming back and their lifetime value to your business going up!
Conclusion
By testing and implementing these tactics you can create a seamless and efficient website experience that reduces cart abandonment, enhances customer satisfaction, and supercharges revenue growth for your company. Optimizing your eCommerce site through hypothesis-driven CRO testing can lead to significant improvements in user experience and conversion rates. Take this B2C eCommerce company that saw a 70% increase in orders following our CRO expertise.
For expert support and tailored strategies to enhance your eCommerce business, book a call and get a tailored CRO audit of your website. Our team at (un)Common Logic is ready to help you achieve your growth goals through data-driven optimization.