Conversion rate optimization (CRO) is the process of optimizing your sponsored search ads, landing pages, and overall website design to raise your conversion rate. In other words, the goal is for the highest possible percentage of visitors to your site to convert, or complete your desired action. CRO is quickly gaining in popularity because it’s seen as a way to increase profits from sales without raising your advertising spend.
Of course, just as SEO isn’t really free, neither is a website redesign. It requires time and resources and, if you’re doing it right, testing. Nonetheless, it’s more than worth your while to familiarize yourself with the basic principles of website conversion optimization, so you can maximize the chances that a potential customer who arrives at your site from a search engine becomes a qualified lead or a paying customer.
There are a number of things you can do to increase your conversion rate, among them:
Write compelling, clickable PPC ads that are highly relevant to the keyword/search query and your intended audience. All the better if you’re targeting high-intent mid-tail and long-tail keywords that indicate a searcher who is late in the buying cycle, as those consumers are more likely to convert.
Maintain a high degree of relevance between your ads and corresponding landing pages. Your landing page should deliver on the promise of your ad (the call to action) and make it easy for the searcher to complete that action, be it signing up for a newsletter, downloading a white paper or making a purchase.
Test your landing page design. Conduct A/B testing to find the right layout, copy, and colors that push the highest percentage of site visitors to fill out your form, call in, or otherwise convert to a valuable lead or customer.
Optimizing PPC Conversions: Start with the Right Keywords
When you start thinking about conversion rate optimization, it’s tempting to fiddle around with buttons and forms and other low-in-the-funnel design elements that might make or break the sale. But remember that part of optimizing conversions is getting the right visitors to your site in the first place:
High web traffic is useless if none of those people convert.
With search marketing, increasing your qualified traffic is a matter of bidding on and optimizing for the right keywords.
Better keyword traffic data means you can make better decisions about your website and ad copy and better target the right customers.