If you create or license your own products and sell them on-line, I don’t have to tell you that converting visitors into leads and sales is your lifeblood.
It is also very well known (and we see it through our on-line information business coaching program each day) that the vast majority of websites, blogs, and e-commerce sites out there struggle to get even ‘satisfactory’ sales conversion let alone sales that would make them stand and up and scream for joy!
Fortunately improving conversion is completely within your control and can be done starting with a relatively small list of techniques that we have found make the biggest overall difference in improving your website conversions.
5 Techniques To Improve Your On-Line Business Conversions
While these are not in any particular order, each one of these techniques for improving sales conversions can have a dramatic impact on your visitor to lead and visitor to sales conversions.
Use Of Video On Your Sales Page
I have to admit, all of the evidence in my Mastermind groups pointed to video messages on sales pages having a positive impact on conversions and STILL I ignored it for years!
There’s nothing like being FORCED to do something that pushes you away from a bad habit, and that is exactly what happened in my case. Last year I launched my first Udemy course and for those of you who have published on Udemy, you know they require a sales video and member intro video which forced me into action into creating a sales video – and IT WORKED!
I quickly did the same on some of my other sales pages outside of Udemy and noticed an immediate improvement in all 3 factors: length of time on page, leads and sales.
Social Proof And Testimonials, BUT…
A testimonial from a big name used to be all you needed when I started my information business many years ago, things have changed today. What works better now are testimonials (video or written) from “average” people who use your product and talk about getting results.
This may seem obvious, but people rarely use these and still either neglect testimonials altogether or use generic ‘review-type’ testimonials.
For new products I have gone out of my way to collect these “user-based” testimonials by giving away versions of my product based on contest of who is more likely to use it rather than just asking for reviewers. I have also run webinars and then offered 3-5 copies to those who commit to using and providing feedback within 14-days, etc…This doesn’t always work, but when it does it leads to testimonials that are far more results focused than I used to get in the past.
Time-Based Offers
Scarcity has been a long-used technique to influence prospects to become buyers, done correctly, limiting offers by time or by quantity can be extremely effective.
Since many of our products are digital in nature, we do not typically put qty. limits on the products themselves, but rather favour offers that include limited-time bonuses.
These are real takeaways for me because they usually involve some degree of personal coaching/consulting which definitely has limited scale. Building scarcity into your offers is important, but keep in mind this scarcity must be justified in the mind of your prospect, so make sure you can provide an explanation behind limiting your offer.
Be Careful With Options
Offering different options (for example, a gold, sliver and platinum edition of your information product) can definitely improve conversions while improving profit margin as your customers end up buying a more expensive package. However, keep in mind that each choice must be scrutinized and tested as in many cases we have tested, the options actually reduce conversion either by invoking confusion or indecision in the mind of your prospect.
We like to typically start our offers with one simple option, work on conversions on that product until we are happy and then test introduction of additional options weighing both the impact on conversion as well as the impact on overall profit margin.
Endorsements, Affiliates And Partnerships
While many of you reading this may not think of how the source of your traffic plays into conversion I can tell you it is CRITICAL.
Secure a partner that has a strong bond to his or her subscriber base or audience, get them to do a solid promotion for you while ensuring their subscriber base is well aligned to your offer, and you will find conversions go through the ROOF as compared to other traffic generation tips.
For an overview on how to secure top-notch affiliates for your products and launches, here’s a great introduction…needless to say that affiliate partnerships, JV’s and other forms of mutual endorsement is not only a fast and highly effective way to get early traffic, but tends to lead to extremely high conversions as well.
Whereas paid and organic traffic to your site may result in 1-5% conversions, strong affiliates can show 10% or more conversions with the right alignment and marketing.
Smart on-line business entrepreneurs understand that conversions are even more important than traffic – even though everyone else tends to pursue traffic at any cost.
If you are launching or growing your on-line business or need help taking the next step in your venture, one of the best resources you will find to help you succeed is the Information Business Marketer’s Zone…check it out and you could be in a very different place 1-2 months from now.
