Conversion Optimization Consulting: Get More with Less
Increase ROI on PPC ads, websites, and other digital marketing tactics with conversion optimization consulting services from The Brand Auditors.
August 11, 2023
Introduction
You’ve got a fantastic product or service and a compelling brand story.
There’s only one problem: given the ROI on your digital marketing, you’d be better off handing out flyers.
If this sounds familiar, don’t despair. Most businesses struggle with marketing and advertising.
But what if I told you that what you’re going through is perfectly normal?
That’s right. It is.
A slight shift in your approach might be the first step to getting the results you need.
Let me explain.
Marketing isn’t complicated. People are complicated.
It isn’t always possible to know how your target audience will respond to a marketing message. In fact, developing a successful campaign on the first go-around is rare.
When a campaign doesn’t work, companies scrap it and go back to the drawing board. And that’s exactly where they go wrong.
Instead, you’ve got to experiment, try new things, make a few changes here and there.
Most of our brand audit clients want to get more leads and sales. Before they came to us, many of them would invest more money in the marketing budget to get results. But we showed them another way to solve the problem.
Now, I’ll ask you the same thing I ask every brand audit client that wants to improve marketing ROI:
Do you want to know how to get more new customers with fewer dollars?
If you want the answer to that question, keep reading this post. You’ll learn about conversion optimization strategy and how hiring a conversion optimization consultant can transform your marketing efforts.
What Is Conversion Optimization?
Before we go any further, let’s define conversion rate optimization (sometimes shortened to CRO).
Conversion optimization is a process designed to get potential customers in your target audience to take a desired action.
There are too many conversion optimization techniques to count. That’s because even the slightest changes can make a significant difference. In fact, the process never ends and could go on forever.
A CRO consultant uses a variety of optimization strategies, data sources (i.e., Google Analytics), and relevant experience to do their job. For example, changing your website’s design, navigation—even the colors of calls to action—can make a significant difference.
Conversion rate optimization is most often associated with websites and digital marketing campaigns and their ability to generate leads. But you can use optimization strategies to improve conversion rates for almost anything related to an online business. Emails, newsletter sign ups, and directory listings are examples. Conversion rate optimization can also apply to traditional campaigns, such as print and TV ads.
But why should you invest in conversion optimization?
Think about it this way: let’s assume your website’s current conversion rate is 1 percent. If you can increase that number by just 1 percent, you’ve doubled engagement—without spending another dime.
It’s true that you may only see incremental increases from CRO. But the compounded effects from those minor improvements can be impressive.
What Is Website Optimization?
Improve website performance with this easy-to-understand introduction to website optimization. Learn key tips, ideas, and tactics that will get results.
Search Engine Optimization vs. Conversion Rate Optimization: What’s the Difference?
Search Engine Optimization (SEO) and Conversion Rate Optimization (CRO) are two essential components of digital marketing. While both aim to improve website performance specifically, they focus on different aspects of the user experience.
SEO is a process designed to improve company website sales channels. Technical diagnostics, on- and off-page optimization are examples of SEO tactics. The goal of SEO is to increase visibility on search engines and drive organic traffic to a website.
While SEO focuses on building website traffic, CRO focuses on turning that traffic into leads or customers. Both are important because they work together to increase visibility for an online business and generate more revenue.
Conversion Rate Optimization Is a Strategy
Optimizing conversion rates requires a strategic and systematic approach. It’s not a one-time effort or a random series of changes. Instead, it’s a continuous, data-driven process that leverages industry best practices and multivariant testing.
Though CRO can be technical, the concept is simple. Conversion rate experts make a series of minor changes and records the effects of each. Over time, you'll see what causes your customers to respond—either positively or negatively.
To make the task a little easier, CRO consultants study user behavior data and other conversion analytics. This information helps them understand the conversion process, psychology of specific customer segments, and what optimization tactics they might respond to.
For example, some studies suggest that certain colors (such as red) generate higher clicks when used for website buttons. But that doesn’t mean all effective digital marketing sites use red. The color selection comes down to your brand’s color palette, industry, customer preferences, and other factors.
What Is Conversion Rate Optimization Consulting?
Conversion rate optimization consulting leverages user behavior and trends to figure out what motivates people to buy a product or service. Conversion consultants also have experience with multivariate testing and testing tools that make the task easier and faster.
Using insights from analytics and other data, CRO specialists recommend increasing conversions. These could be anything from page views, website form submissions, or ad clicks.
What Do Conversion Rate Optimization Consultants Do?
A CRO consultant looks at every aspect of a marketing strategy to make sure everything performs at the highest level. While the list of areas included in conversion rate optimization consulting is extensive, here are some of the most common:
Websites and Landing Pages
Conversion rate optimization consultants will uncover and any problems with the user experience and correct them. Broken links and slow page loading times are examples of issues that prevent websites and landing pages from getting more conversions.
A consultant can also tell you what website visitors do when they land on those pages. You can use these insights to increase overall conversion rates on the website. This is especially helpful for e-commerce businesses.
The Customer Journey Experience
The customer experience plays a critical role in lead generation and sales conversions for an online business. CRO consultants help companies build out their customer journey, from awareness to advocacy. This includes testing the sales funnel, revising content for SEO copywriting standards, and evaluating how users interact with the brand.
Pay-Per-Click Advertising
It’s easy to spend a fortune on paid ads without getting results. A CRO consultant can help companies optimize PPC ads. They do this by testing ad groups, keywords, and other components of advertising campaigns to find out which ones might have the greatest impact on conversion rates.
Sales and Service Processes
A company’s sales and service processes should align. A CRO specialist looks at sales analytics, CRM data, and other data to uncover issues between the sales and service departments. Then, brands can fill the gaps (i.e., improvements to quality assurance) to increase customer satisfaction and sales conversion rates.
Testing
It’s impossible to optimize anything without testing. A conversion rate optimization consultant has extensive experience with testing.
A/B testing and multivariate testing are used to figure out which variation of a marketing asset performs better. While they may seem similar, there are some key differences between the two.
A/B testing (split testing) involves testing two different versions of an asset against each other to see which one performs better. This is typically done by randomly splitting traffic between the two versions and measuring which one has a higher conversion rate. A/B testing is a great way to test minor changes, such as button colors or the wording of a headline.
Multivariate testing is used to compare multiple variations of unique elements on an asset simultaneously. This allows you to test a larger number of variations to see how different combinations perform. Control webpages can be used to test combinations of headlines, images, and calls-to-action. The results show which version of a page gets the highest conversion rate.
Benefits of CRO Optimization Consulting
In simplest terms, businesses can optimize ROI by increasing revenue and lowering expenses. Marketing is one of the largest expenses for small businesses and big brands alike.
The amount of money allocated to marketing varies from one type of business to another. But according to the 2020 CMO Survey, companies spend an average of 8-15 percent of their revenue on marketing and advertising. B2C companies spend more, on average, than those in the B2B sector. Likewise, marketing accounts for 11-17 percent of the total annual budget for businesses across the board.
In other words, it takes a lot of money to feed the marketing machine.
Conversion optimization keeps costs under control because it works on both sides of the ROI equation.
How to Measure the Results of Conversion Rate Optimization Consulting
There is no way to know if a CRO strategy works unless you track it. But you’ve got to do more than track visitors to your website. CRO consultants work with companies to develop relevant KPIs (key performance indicators) that will help them monitor short-and long-term results.
The key is to examine the cause-and-effect relationship between a CRO tactic and the result. We recommend changing one element at a time. Then, you can observe the results over a set period (i.e., 30 or 90 days) to measure the impact.
For example, let’s assume we want to see the effect of changing the color of your website’s call-to-action button. Once the change has been made, we would wait at least 30 days to assess impact, depending on website traffic levels.
Customer Acquisition Cost (CAC) is one of the most telling factors businesses can use to assess an optimization strategy. You can calculate CAC using the total dollars spent and the total number of new customers gained within a specified period.
Here is the CAC calculation formula:
Customer Acquisition Cost Total Cost of Sales /
Number of Customers Acquired
With this formula, you can see how efficient your brand is at turning a prospective buyer into a paying customer.
These are examples of how data analysis helps a conversion rate expert reduce the cost of customer acquisition.
To illustrate, let’s assume your company spends $1,500 to get one customer (CAC), and your monthly marketing budget is $10,000. Based on these numbers, your business should get six or seven new customers each month. If the annual revenue generated per customer is $3,500, then your business will make $252,000 each year on those new customers.
Here’s the math:
6 new customers per month x 12 months = 72 new customer per year x $3,500 generated per customer = $252,000
Of course, the total acquisition cost is $108,000 (72 customers gained at $1,500 each). This yields a net profit (before COGS) of $144,000.
Now, let’s look at how conversion rate optimization can shake things up (or should I say, down).
If you can reduce CAC to $1,200 (from $1,500), the same budget of $10,000 should yield eight or nine new customers. That’s an average of two more new customers each month with the same investment.
It gets better.
If the annual revenue per customer is $3,500, then your company has turned an additional profit of approximately $84,000 per year.
Again, let’s look at the math:
2 additional new customers per month x 12 months = 24 new customers per year x $3,500 = $84,000
This means your brand can increase ROI by 58 percent.
You can also break down CAC for each sales funnel channel to make a comparison. From there, you can decide which sales channels yield the highest ROI. That means you can allocate more resources toward those that perform best and eliminate the ones that don’t.
This is the type of data-driven information brand executives need to make informed decisions about their growth strategy.
You Might Need Conversion Rate Optimization Consulting If…
Conversion rate optimization consulting can help you break through growth barriers and reduce expenses. But how do you know if you need a CRO consultant?
Here are some reasons to consider:
You want an objective perspective.
A conversion consultant can give you and your team an objective, unbiased analysis of your brand’s performance. Most companies have a difficult time making an honest assessment because they’re too close to the business.
For example, if someone on your team has contributed to the company’s website design, they probably feel good about the final result. But what if some of your website’s design elements are to blame for low conversion rates?
It happens all the time.
A CRO expert can give you the unbiased feedback you need.
You’ve run out of ideas.
Paid ads. Discounts and promotions. Marketing agencies. You’ve tried them all, but no results. If that sounds familiar, then it might be time to get some help. Optimization consulting could be exactly what you need to get the breakthrough you’ve been looking for.
Revenue is flat.
Increasing revenue isn’t easy. Sometimes, the root cause of revenue growth goes unnoticed because it seems so insignificant. But conversion optimization can help you uncover even the smallest details that could be handcuffing your brand’s performance.
You’re struggling to compete.
Are you slowly falling behind the competition? If so, it might be time to consider getting help from a professional CRO consultant.
A consultant can help your company reduce expenses and increase profit. This means you’ll have more money available to improve your competitive positioning.
You want to optimize the business’s operating costs and ROI.
Companies are always looking for ways to improve the bottom line. One of the best ways to do that is through conversion optimization.
A CRO consultant analyzes a company’s digital strategy and shows them what to do to lower expenses while getting better results.
Conversion Optimization Consulting
Consulting services for emerging or established companies that want to increase ROI on their digital marketing plan.
The Brand Auditors: Boost Profit with Conversion Optimization Consulting Services
Many companies struggle to meet their growth goals because they need to convert more potential buyers into paying customers. Yet, they aren’t sure what they need to do to make that happen.
At The Brand Auditors, we have a proven track record of getting results. Using our CRO services, clients have been able to:
- Boost sales
- Improve the user experience
- Target the right audiences
- Turn data into growth
- Stay ahead of the competition
If you would like to learn more about conversion rate optimization consulting, click the button below and schedule a free call.
Are you ready to find out how a brand audit can transform your business?
Our brand audit process is a comprehensive analysis designed to help companies increase ROI and reduce marketing expenses.
- Increase ROI on lead generation and sales conversions.
- Reduce marketing expenses.
- Strengthen brand positioning to become more competitive.
We guarantee satisfaction or get your money back! Schedule a discovery call with a brand auditor to find out more.
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