Conversion Rate Web Marketing Blog 

Kogan Technologies launched a cheeky PR campaign this week aiming to win their share of the Australian Government’s $40 billion economic stimulus package.

The Kevin37 campaign is named after the Australian Prime Minister, Kevin Rudd and Kogan’s 37” LCD TV.

Let’s just say that the PR campaign was clever and effective! It has given this relatively unknown company a lot of publicity. The campaign has had coverage on TV, radio and in print.

Here is just a tiny snapshot of the types of articles that have appeared online:

• IT Wire
• Daily Telegraph
• Good Gear Guide
• PC Authority

However, you can’t walk into a Harvey Norman or JB Hi-Fi to buy a Kogan TV. Kogan is an entirely online seller, so how is Kogan planning to capitalise on this brilliant PR campaign?

While there is always room for improvement in ecommerce, we really like what Kogan have done. To make sure that PR turns into sales, Kogan have ensured that this campaign is easily referenced from their website. Here are just some of the conversion rate initiatives that they have taken:

1. The Kevin37 campaign gets a spot on the home page amongst the 4 screen rotating banner at the top.
   
2. Kevin37 is also featured in the news section of the home page. Unfortunately it is below the fold on 1024×768 screens, so a number of people miss it. But hey, it is there, and that is a good start.
   
3. Kevin37 is at the top of their products list (click the shop link on the top menu).
   
4. The Kevin37 campaign also gets a blog entry.

Importantly, Kogan has launched a Google Adwords campaign targeting searches related to Kevin37. It’s amazing how many people run marketing campaigns without ensuring that their website shows up in Google results for the key phrases that they use in their ads.

Kogan have a simple clean website with lots of good content. At the very least, they have generated lots of exposure for their brand and products. We’re sure that Kogan’s website has enough of the right elements to ensure that they will sell lots of Kevin37’s from this campaign.

Author: Brett Gilbertson

From the Author: If you run an ecommerce website then you might wonder, “How do I know if I’m getting as many orders as I could be?” The answer to that question is in your website’s conversion rates.

We know that to achieve high conversion rates and sales from your ecommerce website you need an ecommerce platform that is designed to maximise your conversion rates. That’s why we created eComMetrix®.

Contact us on 03 9012 6600 to find out how you could boost the conversion rates of your eCommerce website.

Since we reported on eBay’s recent move to force PayPal on all of its online auctions in Australia, you may have heard that eBay has compromised on the second part of its plan to eliminate all competition in the payment systems market.

Faced with the case that was building against the move at the Australian competition watchdog (ACCC), eBay pre-empted a negative response by withdrawing its proposal to eliminate all competition in payment systems.

It was unlikely to go well for eBay at the ACCC as objections flooded in from consumers and bodies like the Australian Federal Reserve Bank, Electronic Frontiers Foundation and others.

Of course, eBay is still forcing everyone to offer PayPal, and I wonder if eBay’s strategy was to distract you from that fact by creating a fuss around the threat to eliminate the competition. eBay can’t seriously have ever believed that they could pull a stunt like that.

Rather than doing their a PayPal business any favours eBay has galvanised dissatisfied users to educate the public on the perils of dealing with the monopoly. It has undoubtedly tarnished the eBay and PayPal brands as well as given competition the best opportunity it has ever had to gain a foothold.

eBay claimed that they should be able to offer PayPal exclusively since they say it is more secure than other payment methods. However, contrary to what eBay’s publicity machine have been pumping out, according to the ACCC (from this artcile by Alex Zaharov-Reutt on ITWire):

5.173 The evidence available does not support the view that PayPal is the most secure method of payment, or offers the best service for all transactions.

Simon Tsang of the Sydney Morning Herald compared eBay’s method of consumer “protection” to organised crime.

We can take this out of the whole eBay + PayPal debacle so far: If you’re operating on the Internet and you’re prepared to walk all over your customers, it will come back to bite you.

Was this whole episode simply smoke and mirrors from eBay to distract you from the fact that they are now forcing you to offer PayPal?

From the author: If you run an eCommerce website then you might wonder, “How do I know if I’m getting as many orders as I could be through my website?” The answer to that question is in your website’s conversion rates.

We know that to achieve high conversion rates and sales from your eCommerce website you need a team that includes seasoned marketers, web designers, web programmers, copywriters, editors, bloggers and search engine gurus. That’s why we created Bitemark.

And yes, we can get your website to number one in Google too !

Contact us on 03 9012 6600 to find out how you could boost the conversion rates of your eCommerce website.

You may have heard that eBay recently announced its intention to force buyers and sellers to use PayPal on its monopoly online auction site. eBay currently allows users to use other payment methods such as direct bank deposit.

According to iTWire eBay has asked the ACCC to excuse it from the trade practices act over the move.

eBay excuses its actions by arguing that users of PayPal are 4 times less likely to open a dispute about an item. It is understandable that eBay would want advise its customers of those statistics and make recommendations about the best ways to trade.

However, forcing you to risk your money with PayPal is another question altogether.

Remember that PayPal is not a bank.

Unlike the money that you deposit at a real bank, the money in your PayPal account is at far more risk. Moreover PayPal doesn’t behave anything like a bank, and according to many reports intelligible communication with PayPal is practically impossible.

We hope that the ACCC acts to force eBay to abandon this move that is sure to disrupt the bulk of Australia’s retail eCommerce activity.

From the author: If you run an eCommerce website then you might wonder, “How do I know if I’m getting as many orders as I could be through my website?” The answer to that question is in your website’s conversion rates.

We know that to achieve high conversion rates and sales from your eCommerce website you need a team that includes seasoned marketers, web designers, web programmers, copywriters, editors, bloggers and search engine gurus. That’s why we created Bitemark.

And yes, we can get your website to number one in Google too !

Contact us on 03 9012 6600 to find out how you could boost the conversion rates of your eCommerce website.

One of the simplest metrics that you can use to benchmark your eCommerce website is the dollar value of a visit. Often this metric is called “Revenue Per Visit,” but I just find that it feels better if you put the $ sign in front of it. It’s an emotional thing. If your currency is not called a dollar, then insert your symbol here…

$ Per Visit = Number of Website Visits / $ Total Website Sales

If the number is high, then just concentrate on getting more traffic. If it’s low, then start asking questions about things like:

• Order process conversion rates
• The average number of items sold on orders
• Your pricing 
• The pages where most people abandon the order process.

There are many places to look for ways to improve you $ per visit.  

You should also look at this metric across the different sources of traffic. For example, look at the $ per visitor from Google organic searches as opposed to Google Adwords.

Dollars Per Visit is also extremely useful for setting bid limits in Google Adwords and Pay Per Click (PPC) advertising campaigns. For instance, if you know that you margin is 50% and your $ per visit is $1.50, then bidding over 70c a click will lose you money. Be sure to monitor this specifically for your Adwords and PPC traffic as it is sure to vary with different traffic sources.

From the author: If you run an eCommerce website then you might wonder, “How do I know if I’m getting as many orders as I could be through my website?” The answer to that question is in your website’s conversion rates.

We know that to achieve high conversion rates and sales from your eCommerce website you need a team that includes seasoned marketers, web designers, web programmers, copywriters, editors, bloggers and search engine gurus. That’s why we created Bitemark.

And yes, we can get your website to number one in Google too !

Contact us on 1300 248 362 to find out how you could boost the conversion rates of your eCommerce website.

With all of the information that is available from measuring websites with tools like Google Analytics, it’s easy to get distracted. A typical eCommerce website has it’s own unique set of KPI’s (Key Performance Indicators) and conversion rates. These conversion rates will tell you where you can gain quick and profitable improvements from your eCommerce website.

So start with the basics. The touchstone metrics of your eCommerce website are the number of:

1. Visits to your eCommerce website
2. Shopping carts created
3. Orders placed, paid, sealed and delivered.

From these figures you work out your conversion rates.

Visit to Cart Conversion Rate
Visits / Carts created = %

Cart to Order Conversion Rate
Carts / Orders = % 
(or subtract this figure from 100 to determine your cart abandonment rate).

IMPORTANT: The conversion rates tell you where to look for the answers. 

For instance, if you have 1000 visits to your site and yet only 5 people created a shopping cart (0.5% visit to cart conversion rate), then you will want to look carefully at the process that people have to go through to create shopping cart on your website.

If you were finding on the other hand that out of the 1000 visits to your website 500 shopping carts were created (50% visit to cart conversion rate), but only 5 placed an order (10% cart to order conversion, a.k.a. 90% cart abandonment rate), then you would need to carefully analyse your ordering process.

From these stats you might launch into your Google Analytics stats to find out what’s going on. From the clues that you find you could formulate a Google Website Optimiser test to prove your assumptions.

The rewards in this sort of work are high. While traffic may be getting harder to generate with increased competition, your conversion rates are likely to be an easy to reach and untapped gold mine.

From the author: If you run an eCommerce website then you might wonder, “How do I know if I’m getting as many orders as I could be through my website?” The answer to that question is in your website’s conversion rates.

We know that to achieve high conversion rates and sales from your eCommerce website you need a team that includes seasoned marketers, web designers, web programmers, copywriters, editors, bloggers and search engine gurus. That’s why we created Bitemark.

And yes, we can get your website to number one in Google too !

Contact us on 1300 248 362 to find out how you could boost the conversion rates of your eCommerce website.

“Our customers are price sensitive.” “Our product is a grudge purchase.” I’ve been hearing this quite a bit in one of the industries that we’ve been working with recently. Now, I’m not going to dispute the fact that price always comes into the sales process. However, it consistently seems that the businesses that say this allow their staff to get by without fundamental selling skills. It’s the same with their websites.

The question is, what differentiates you in a price sensitive market? Is the way you treat your customers on the phone, in store or online? Is it your enthusiasm for the product? Is it your follow up? Is it the useful information that you share with them? If it’s not, then your customers have only 2 options:

1. They shop around for the cheapest price
2. They shop around and stumble upon a company that treats them better, and they pay a reasonable, but not necessarily the best price.

People shop on price when they have no other option. Unless you give your customers more than a price you will never know whether your they really are price sensitive.

From the author: If you run an eCommerce website then you might wonder, “How do I know if I’m getting as many orders as I could be through my website?” The answer to that question is in your website’s conversion rates.

We know that to achieve high conversion rates and sales from your eCommerce website you need a team that includes seasoned marketers, web designers, web programmers, copywriters, editors, bloggers and search engine gurus. That’s why we created Bitemark.

And yes, we can get your website to number one in Google too !

Contact us on 1300 248 362 to find out how you could boost the conversion rates of your eCommerce website.

Ever wondered what it takes to get the most out of your eCommerce website conversion rates? Well, let’s start with the basics.

You must give your website visitors all of the information that they require to make a purchase.

Seem simple? A good eCommerce system and good information are the first steps to maximising your eCommerce website conversion rates.

Here’s some of the information that is typically required on your product pages for a user to feel comfortable making a purchase.

Product details

At a minimum, your product copywriting should detail the benefits of the product and the problems that it solves. Information that’s required includes things like:

• Features
  • Size, colour, height, width, depth, weight etc
  • Options, add ons, upgrades, requirements
• Benefits 
• Stock levels.

Think of the things that your customers always ask about your product and make sure they are addressed in some way.

Product pictures 

For a physical product, you should have:

• A hero shot – showing the product doing it’s job (like making someone look good)
• High resolution closeups – Consider using a flash zoom in utility
• Showing details of Front, Back, Sides, etc

Interestingly a good flash close up zoom utility gives the user an experience similar to that of touching and feeling the product. It’s a great conversion tool for eCommerce items like shoes and clothing.

Even a virtual product like an eBook should have a product shot. 

Trust elements

In order to have any chance of making an eCommerce sale. you need to satisfy the question of trust. You can go a long way to doing that by keeping important details up to date on your website. Details such as:

• Your physical address, phone number and email addresses
• Pictures of your physical location, staff, factory or warehouse 
• Information on how to get help
• Product Warranty, Guarantees 
• Shipping Policy
• Payment options
• Returns Policy
• Privacy Policy

Once you cover the basics and start to get more advanced, you can add things like product reviews, recommendations, comments and live help to your eCommerce website.

The trick to making it all work is making sure that your web design uses space effectively in order to present information in a logical way so that a website visitor can process it.

From the author: If you run an eCommerce website then you might wonder, “How do I know if I’m getting as many orders as I could be through my website?” The answer to that question is in your website’s conversion rates.

We know that to achieve high conversion rates and sales from your eCommerce website you need a team that includes seasoned marketers, web designers, web programmers, copywriters, editors, bloggers and search engine gurus. That’s why we created Bitemark.

And yes, we can get your website to number one in Google too !

Contact us on 1300 248 362to find out how you could boost the conversion rates of your eCommerce website.

Number one on my list of eCommerce conversion killers is the shopping cart registration page. It really bothers me that so many online shops ask you to “sign up” or “register” before you enter the purchase process. The topic was discussed in a recent blog entry by Bryan Eisenberg of Future Now in the US, “Why must I register before checkout?”

Now as a programmer, I understand the want and need for a nice, neat and tidy database. It’s so fulfilling to have all those records matching up together and connected to each other.

As an online shopper, nothing irks me more than filling in forms! If I can’t see the shopping cart contents, shipping options and have a peek at the payment process, then the chances are that I won’t ever finish the order. Distraction, buyer’s remorse or lack of time will win out. The order may be lost forever. . .

Of course, if you have a product that is so perfect, so rare and so amazing then the effect of this will probably be minimal. People will put up with an awful lot if the end result is worth it, but there is a better way.

Why do we even need registration?

After all, if I make a purchase from you, you’ve most likely collected all of the data that you need to do business with me. Out of that, you’ll find some fairly unique data to match me up with the next time I come shopping. Add together my email address, name and address, phone numbers, etc, and what you have is something like my identity fingerprint.

The next time I come back you’ll know it’s me, and you should be able to match it up.

How could Automatic Registration work? 

See the simple example to the left. On this site, when you click on the “shopping cart” link,  the cart page includes shipping options, personal details and shipping address. All of the information needed to make a decision to purchase appears on the shopping cart page. There are no confusing choices. The next page is for payment details, and then a payment confirmation page.

If it’s the first time the user has been to the shop, they will be sent an email with a password and a link to access the account. If the details entered match an existing user in the database, then an email is sent reminding them of their account password and previous purchases.

The more steps in the process and the longer it takes to check out the more likely your shoppers are going to have second thoughts about purchasing.

From the author: If you run an eCommerce website then you might wonder, “How do I know if I’m getting as many orders as I could be through my website?” The answer to that question is in your website’s conversion rates.

We know that to achieve high conversion rates and sales from your eCommerce website you need a team that includes seasoned marketers, web designers, web programmers, copywriters, editors, bloggers and search engine gurus. That’s why we created Bitemark.

And yes, we can get your website to number one in Google too!

Contact us on 1300 248 362 to find out how you could boost the conversion rates of your eCommerce website.

A simple way to boost your eCommerce website’s conversion rate is to make sure your visitors can actually find what they’re looking for. It’s highly likely that a visitor to your site will use your website’s search tool to do that.

Seems simple right? Well, in researching this topic we found that the simple things sometimes slip through the cracks. A review of our own eCommerce System’s search tool revealed a number of improvements that we needed to make.

Since up to 80% of visitors to your eCommerce website will search within your site, these 10 simple rules to improving your search results are well worth focusing on. Continue reading eCommerce website search >>.

From the author: If you run an eCommerce website then you might wonder, “How do I know if I’m getting as many orders as I could be through my website?” The answer to that question is in your website’s conversion rates.

We know that to achieve high conversion rates and sales from your eCommerce website you need a team that includes seasoned marketers, web designers, web programmers, copywriters, editors, bloggers and search engine gurus. That’s why we created Bitemark.

And yes, we can get your website to number one in Google too !

Contact us on 1300 248 362 to find out how you could boost the conversion rates of your eCommerce website.

US company Tealeaf recently released some interesting research related to errors on eCommerce websites.

“42% of online consumers abandon or switch after experiencing online transaction issues.”

http://www.tealeaf.com/news/press_releases/2007/0917.asp

It can be difficult to emulate the problems that your customers experience, so there’s a number of simple actions that you can take to give you a chance to keep your customers.

1. Where possible make sure that your eCommerce system logs and reports on errors
2. Make sure that your eCommerce system handles errors gracefully. There’s nothing worse than seeing an error something like this during a transaction…  “Warning: fsockopen() [function.fsockopen]: unable to connect to yourwebsite.net:80 (Connection timed out) in /a/dev-01.yourwebsite.com/system/libs/core/http-connection.class.php on line 73″
3. Follow up on customer complaints quickly and systematically. Your customer’s help in resolving an error could save you many silently lost orders.
4. Communicate with your customers and ask them for the information that you need to replicate their problem.
5. Have your software team address technical issues as a priority.

Treating your customer with respect and addressing their issues will give you a chance to recover the situation and keep the customer. By ignoring complaints you will miss the opportunity to fix the problem and, according to Tealeaf’s data, probably lose the customer.

From the author: If you run an eCommerce website then you might wonder, “How do I know if I’m getting as many orders as I could through my website?” The answer to that question is in your website’s conversion rates.

We know that to achieve high conversion rates and sales from your eCommerce website you need a team that includes seasoned marketers, web designers, web programmers, copywriters, editors, bloggers and search engine gurus. That’s why we created Bitemark.

And yes, we can get your website to number one in Google too!

Contact us on 1300 248 362 to find out how you could boost the conversion rates of your eCommerce website.