Traffic Alchemy: 3 Ways To Scientifically Convert More Incoming Customers

Have you ever walking into your local grocery story thinking "I'm just going to grab a couple items" only to leave an hour later with a dozen things you didn't need?

You've been had.

And that's the point. You are being silently sold based on consumer behavior that is heavily mapped out before a single customer steps food in one of the stores.

Your website should be diligently mapped out so that each decision has a reason and purpose. you only have a very small window to capture the attention of a potential customer and keep their attention. I'm a big fan of CrazyEgg and their scientific approach to conversion. They simplified this concept to the "15 second" rule. You've got about 15 seconds tops to delight the customer with value and curiosity or lose them to confusion and lack of attention. It's easy for marketers to not take this seriously sometimes as people assume consumers care about what they offering. They DO NOT. The fact that this is the reality makes it all the more crucial you are thinking of your copy as if your business depends on it - because it does.

Try implementing these three steps to taking back control of your digital conversion.

1. Study Your Sales Cycle
Sales cycles matter because they dictate the amount of convincing you need to do and what kind of messaging you need to put out in order to give the potential customer the information they need to make a decision. Here are the some core questions to be asking yourself to better understand your sales cycle:
- How long does it take for a consumer to decide if your category is right for them? Are you any faster than your respective category?
- Are you selling a product or service that falls more into the "need" camp or "desire"?
- Are you selling a product or a service? How sophisticated is your product or service?

These questions matter as they touch on how receptive your consumer is and how primed they are for a purchase. For instance, length of the decision cycle is usually correlated to a more sophisticated service or product. In this situation, more education is needed. If you were to simply ask for the sales above the fold without doing anything to prove to the consumer that you have information that can make their life easier, then you are destined to fail on conversion. Your above the fold Call To Action, CTA, should be that hammers home a clear value proposition centered around delivering value in the form of helpful information which you'll trade for an email. They should clearly understand that you'll use this email to provide them more information like the kind you are about to give them.

IMPORTANT POINT: Your goal as marketers should be to entice a potential customer by reducing perceived risk while simultaneously delivering on value.

All of this hinges on your ability to breakdown the path to purchase. You can check out more about your customer's journey in a recent Mailbag Monday feature episode.

2. Set Your "Booby" Traps
depending on your sales cycle and where your consumers are by regarding their readiness to buy, then you create different tactics that encourage deeper engagements. what's
Focus On Value - Don't make a "moral" bribe to your potential consumer if it truly doesn't give them value. It's no longer moral if it's something that won't add to their life. They need to get a quick win here.

Filter Deeper Towards Purchase - In exchange for personal information such as email and name, you need to be sure what you're offering is not only good, but has a purpose. If they reveal their identity, they obviously think it's worth it in some way. Be sure what you give them takes them closer to purchasing. For instance, if you offer them just a guide of your services in PDF format, that's not encouraging them to do anything more than read. But, if you offer them something that would require even more assistance from you, then you are making sure there's still more to be done with you. This "lock & key" model is especially valuable as it creates a situation in which the consumer NEEDS your services to even decrypt and use the value you just delivered to them.

3. Test, Learn, & Optimize
You can't optimize what you don't measure. And you can't learn from results you don't collect. All this said about maximizing opt-in of your incoming traffic, testing placements and ad copy is the rosetta stone of digital conversion.

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