Let me just begin by shamelessly pandering to my audience with a little congratulatory pat on the back: if you’ve made it to this blog post, you are already on the right track. You’ve moved beyond simply looking at the aggregate number of site visits your website receives and started to consider how to maximize the actual business value created from that traffic. The exciting world of careful data analysis and meticulous consideration of on-page optimizations awaits!

Crystal Clarity – Put It All Upfront

The first tip is to really drill down on what your business offering is. This might seem obvious or easy, but it’s not. You would be shocked at how many of our clients fail to articulate what their value proposition is clearly and succinctly – let alone elegantly drawing contrasts and points of market differentiation in their website copy (and imagery!) If I can’t tell who you are as a company and what you can do for me that other people can’t within 10 seconds of landing on your homepage, the likelihood of me bouncing and never returning increases dramatically. Consider the cost of all that bounced traffic: not only are these potential customers that didn’t get what they needed or expected from your website, but the very act of them bouncing decreases your organic ranking in the eyes of search providers like Google and Bing. By implementing a laser-focus on putting your core value proposition upfront (on your homepage) we have consistently seen clients cut their bounce rates in half. Let’s look at how a world-class tech company like Apple does it: Notice how Apple is able to implement a beautiful, minimalist design which is all product offering and market differentiation. That’s how it’s done, folks. 

Analyze Conversion Pathways with User Journey Data

I can’t emphasize the importance of getting your hands on high-quality, segmentable user journey data when it comes to reducing friction in your website’s conversion pathways. This is something that PIN Business Network offers our clients. Allow me to give you an example of how this data can be used. We work with a large, private higher education institution in Colorado that has a very high price point. The user journey length from becoming a lead to submitting an application was many months. By visualizing and analyzing their journey data, we identified the Financial Aid page as a key trigger point that launched users into starting an application. We then consulted with the client about making this information more accessible and more prominently placed on their website. By doing this, we saw users getting to the Financial Aid page earlier in their journey, and thus reduced the overall length of their journey by minimizing the friction in the conversion pathway through doing some objection-handling upfront – answering questions that users had before they even knew they had them. Contact us to learn more about optimizing your website’s user experience and ensure customers get value from your website!