Driving conversions is one of the most important things that your website can do to help you build your business. A conversion is an action that you want your site visitors to take, whether an online purchase, a download of a free whitepaper, or a contact to your business through email, phone or online form submission.

Therefore, it is critical to understand and clearly define the ideal conversion events on your website. When you create a website, your intended conversions should steer the direction of the development process. Over time, your website’s conversion performance should also guide the ongoing testing and refinement of your website.

Conversions and conversion rates (percentage of unique site visitors who take the intended action) are useful success metrics for your website, so that you have a direct mechanism for improving your website results.  

Learn from Successful Websites

Understanding the importance of website conversions to your business, it would behoove you to learn from the best. With that in mind, the following is a list of some of the best-converting retail websites according to Nielsen Online, and some of the conversion-generation tactics they are implementing on their sites. (Note, although this list focuses on retailers, similar principles apply across most industries.)

1800Flowers.com

• Option for same-day delivery.
• Gift finder tool.
• Automated gift reminder service.

Office Depot

• Multiple, clear promotions on the home page.
• Print-on-demand service.
• Ink guarantee for their printers.

Lane Bryant Catalog

• Calls-to-action to buy various products, order a catalog, and see head-to-toe looks in one click.
• Web-only exclusive offers and free gifts for online orders.
• Personalized promotions (when you create an account).

QVC

• Calls-to-action to buy clearance items, specials and highlighted products.
• Easy pay option.
• Shopping tools, such as a live TV feed and more detailed information about the items shown on TV.

VistaPrint

• Easy options. Have VistaPrint design your marketing materials, upload your own designs, or use one of VistaPrint’s templates.
• Lots of free products.
• Quick and easy online product-creation process.

Drive Conversions on Your Website

How about your website? Have you defined the ideal conversion events for your site? How does your site compare with the conversion leaders listed above? How can you be improving conversions and conversion rates on your own site?

The following are a few ideas to get you started:

• Define clear calls-to-action.
• Provide an option for the site visitor to acquire as much product/service information as the visitor needs.
• Appeal to multiple senses. Don’t rely solely on text. Use video, images and sound.
• Appeal to different personality types. Some site visitors may want the purchase process as quick an easy as possible, whereas others may need to understand the benefits to themselves prior to making a purchase decision.
• Include “trust elements” on your website, whether customer testimonials, customer profiles or logos from trusted organizations such as the Better Business Bureau, VeriSign and/or industry associations.