9 Proven Ways to Increase Conversion Rates on Your eCommerce Store

If you want to run a successful eCommerce business, getting traffic to your website is essential. But your work does not end there. You’ll have to sell your products to make money. The question is – how to make sure your customers are converting? 

There are many things you can do to boost your conversion rate, and we’ll talk about nine of our favorites in this post.  But first, let’s look at a few reasons why your store might be failing to convert in the first place. 

Why Is Your Online Store Failing to Convert?

Pinpointing the exact reason why your customers aren’t converting as much as you’d like could be a bit tricky. There are many reasons a prospect may choose not to make a purchase at any given time. 

Here are a few examples:

• You don’t have a well-defined customer persona.
• Your store makes a poor first impression.
• Your website suffers from slow loading times.
• Your pages are not optimized for mobile.
• Your product images are not clear enough.
• You don’t have a persuasive copy.
• Your prospects don’t trust you.
• The checkout process is a drag.

Understanding all the potential problems helps you anticipate and avoid them. The first step towards change is awareness. 

Be aware of any mistakes you might have made with your eCommerce store in the past and accept them. Only then you can work on fixing these problems and improving your conversion rates.

What Is Considered a Good eCommerce Conversion Rate?

Before you can improve your conversion rates, you should first get an idea of their current state. After all, this is one of the best indicators of your store’s overall performance. Conversion rates outline the percentage of site visitors who end up making a purchase, signing up for your newsletter, or completing another action, depending on your goals.

So, what’s a good eCommerce conversion rate that you should be striving for? 

As you might expect, answers may vary. For example, sporting goods stores had an average conversion rate of 1.34% in January 2021, while apparel retailers averaged 1.75%. Generally speaking, anywhere from 1.5% to 2.5% is a good target to aim for.

9 Ways to Increase Your eCommerce Store’s Conversion Rate

It’s time for us to deliver some actionable advice and tips on generating more conversions, even if you keep your traffic roughly the same. 

Let’s get started!

Make a Great First Impression

First impressions are everything in the online world. If you want your first-time visitors to stay on your website, you have just 50 milliseconds to prove your worth. 

But how is it even possible to make an impression in a blink of an eye? 

A big part comes from custom website design, so make sure your website is:

• Easy to navigate — Don’t let your customers be overwhelmed when they look at your site. It should be arranged logically, with the shopping cart and all the categories easy to find.
• Responsive — Your store should detect the type of device your prospect is browsing on and load the appropriate store version.
• Quick to load — Make sure you get a high-performance hosting plan. The extra money will be well worth it if you can drop your loading times down to a minimum.

Your website should also be easy to update and customize. Make sure the platform you choose is easy to operate so you don’t have to contact an outside contractor each time you need a new product added to your store.

Stand Out with Stunning Product Photos

Online shoppers rely heavily on photos since they can’t touch, feel, or try the product on your website. A picture is worth a thousand words and that rings especially true in eCommerce.

Try to bridge the gap between the digital and the physical world as much as possible. You can do this by adding features like zoom or 360 view, helping your visitors take a closer look from all angles.

Another good idea is to try and show your products in their real-world context. Lifestyle photos will help shoppers see themselves using the product, which is guaranteed to boost conversions.

Focus On Your Product Descriptions

Having great images is hugely important, but that doesn’t mean that product descriptions don’t matter. Take an honest and unbiased look at your website copy. Are you giving your customers all the information they need? Again, because your shoppers can’t feel the product, try to convey as many details as you can textually and provide adequate descriptions.

Have your buyer in mind, and try to appeal to what they need. Present the benefits of your product as concisely as you can, as if you were trying to answer the question, “Why should I buy this?”

Add Value with Free Shipping and Returns

In a Walker Sands survey, 77% of people chose free shipping as the most important option when it comes to online shopping. Free shipping is not just welcomed – it has become an industry norm, which means you should strongly consider it as part of your offer.

According to the same research, free returns and exchanges are the second online purchase driver. Sure, offering this perk might come at an extra financial cost, but it will do wonders for building trust and customer loyalty.

Consider Curbside Pickup and Local Delivery

Let your customers choose their preferred delivery method. With curbside pickup and local delivery, users can choose to skip the lengthy shipping times and get their items quicker.  

According to a study done by Oracle, 13% of customers would never shop with a retailer again after a late delivery. This may not sound like a lot, but if you factor in how much work goes into converting just one customer, you will realize that losing 13% of them due to slow shipping is A LOT.

Set a radius where you can locally deliver client packages. This will cut down on shipping rates and packaging costs and add a personal touch to the process.

Curbside pickups also reduce shipping costs by allowing customers to get their online purchases whenever they choose to. Be sure to inform shoppers of the possible pickup hours and exact procedure.

Boost Conversions with Discount Codes

Let’s be honest – everyone loves a good deal!

Offering discounts can boost your conversion rates quickly, as searching for coupons has become a significant part of the online shopping process. In fact, 69% of millennial shoppers search for discount codes before any purchase they make.

One of the best ways to share discount codes is by offering them in exchange for the visitors’ email addresses. This can help you start a newsletter as well, essentially killing two birds with one stone. A newsletter is an excellent way to keep your customers informed about sales and new product launches. It drives targeted traffic to your online store.

Build Trust with Product Reviews

Reviews matter. According to a study by the Spiegel Research Center, as many as 95% of online shoppers read reviews before purchasing a product. There’s no better social proof of your products’ quality than a bunch of good and honest reviews. 

We know what you’re thinking — enabling product reviews on your store opens the door for one-star comments as well. That is true, but these also allow you to learn about your product imperfections and talk to dissatisfied customers directly. This kind of personal touch can easily turn a skeptic into a loyal fan.

 Speed up the Checkout Process

You don’t want your customers to go through many steps to make a purchase in your eCommerce store. This significantly increases the risk of cart abandonment and subsequently – lower conversion rates.

In the past quarter, 18% of US online shoppers have abandoned their carts solely because of a complicated checkout process. Online users are impatient, and they want their purchases to be quick and effortless.

One thing you can do to speed things along is to enable guest checkout. You could also implement ways to skip the process entirely, with services like Google Pay and Apple Pay.

Make it Easy for Customers to Reach You

One of the advantages of brick-and-mortar shopping is that customers have the opportunity to get immediate answers to their questions. With online shopping, timely customer service is a perk rather than a guarantee.  Make your store stand out by offering a live chat option.

One of the most significant benefits of live chat, compared to email, is that a user can continue shopping while chatting with a representative instead of waiting hours for a response. This provides a more seamless experience with minimal disruption. Also, unlike phone service, one customer support representative can help multiple users simultaneously, improving efficiency.

Make sure to set up an automatic reply for your off-hours. That way, your customers will know that they should expect a response, even if they send a message in the middle of the night.

Conclusion

There you have it, folks. Even if you cover just these 9 ways for boosting your conversion rates – you can be sure the results will be visible. Considering there are many other ways to get a faster store, promote it to a wider audience, and stand out from the crowd – your ecommerce success might be closer than you think.