How important are website conversions to your business success?
Exactly how do they impact your bottom line?
Website conversions are important—they are defined as anything that happens on your website that contributes to your business objectives, for example, making a purchase, completing a form, or subscribing to a newsletter.
When visitors are convinced to buy products or avail of the services, it always translates to more revenues and business growth.
But what happens when conversions are low?
It can mean lost opportunities and reduced business performance.
But….
Perhaps you have asked yourself once or many times what is holding my website back from converting visitors into customers?
At some point or another, you start noticing particular problems.
That is why, in this article, we will not only state problems but also offer useful recommendations.
Here, I’ll detail post-conversion, the five biggest website conversion killers, and what can be done to correct them.
We’ll identify potential problems, including slow web page loading, poor usability on a mobile device, a complicated check-out process, lack of trust indicators, and inheriting a bad user experience, to seize the opportunity and grow.
Being aware of these and knowing how to avoid them will help you fine-tune your website and enhance users’ overall experience with it. Thus, increasing website conversion rates will enable you to achieve better results in 2024.
1. Slow Page Load Times
Has it ever happened to you that you clicked on the link to a website and then started waiting for the page to open?
This brings us to the next question: how much patience do you have, or, in other words, how long are you willing to wait?
Research has indicated that, on average, users want a website to load within two seconds at the latest; if it takes three seconds, they may leave the website.
Long loading times harm the usability of any website since it ultimately cause high bounce rates and low engagement levels.
But that’s not all there is to the story—sluggish loading time also sinks your SEO.
That’s why, in this case,
Google’s ranking factor states that website page speed is an essential factor, making websites with slow pages rank lower in the search results, hence less visibility and free traffic.
Common Causes
What exactly causes these frustrating slow load times? There are several common culprits:
➢ Low-quality images can greatly reduce the pace of your site, while high-resolution images that are not optimized can also slow it down.
➢ When a page contains many JavaScript files, the browser tends to be burdened, slows down the load time.
➢ Bloated or poorly written code can create unnecessary processing delays.
So, how can you fix these issues and speed up your website?
✅ Compress and resize images without sacrificing quality to reduce load times.
✅Remove unnecessary characters from your code to streamline and speed up loading.
✅ When a CDN replicates content across multiple servers worldwide, the distance the data has to travel is cut down, and users worldwide can load your site faster.
✅ Allow caching so the browser may download some of your site’s static files and not require downloading every time a user visits your site.
It is surprising how these simple solutions can greatly enhance the page speed, thus user satisfaction, and increase the SEO ranking.
2. Poor Mobile Optimization
Do you know that some websites are almost impossible to control through a mobile device and may take considerable time to do so?
In light of this trend, mobile devices are now commonly used to access the internet currently contributing approximately 70% of all the web traffic.
If you fail to adapt your site to the mobile platforms, then this is a definite loss for you regarding website conversion rates.
Mobile users need a ‘Responsive’ design; if not, they will immediately switch to a competitor’s website.
Common Issues
What are the common issues that hinder mobile optimization?
➢ One such design flaw is the inability to fit the layout to screens, as navigation becomes an arduous task, especially for mobile users
➢ As with desktops, slow loading speeds affect users, and they leave before they see your content on mobile.
➢ In the case of mobile usage, large and messy submenus and links are quite inaccessible and can frustrate a user, which is not ideal.
How to Fix Them?
What can you do about these problems, and how can you make your site mobile-friendly?
✅ Make sure your website layout stays responsive across all platforms and orientations: large, small, horizontal, or vertical.
✅ Compress image sizes, enable browser cache, and reduce the code base for mobile device load speed.
✅ Improve the navigation, make the buttons and links larger so they can be easily tapped with a finger, and optimise the content display for viewing on mobile devices.
3. Why a Simple Checkout Process is Crucial?
It has been found that the number of conversions is inversely proportional to the number of steps in the check-out process.
Sometimes, when paying for the items is complex or time-consuming, customers get discouraged and leave.
On the other hand, having a clean and working form optimized for checkout will help customers to finalize their purchases, increasing your sales and website conversion rates.
Common Problems
What are the most frequent issues that complicate the checkout process?
➢ Customer convenience may be decreased due to multiple steps that need to be completed before making a purchase.
➢ Making the customers sign up first before they could check out may discourage other customers from making a one-time purchase.
➢ Forms that are difficult to read, are too long or have inconsistent labeling are likely to cause customer attrition.
How to Simplify Your Process?
What steps can you take to reduce the number of customers who abandon their carts at the checkout stage?
✅ Simplify the process of buying a product; there will be fewer steps in the purchasing process. Don’t make your checkout process longer than a single page.
✅ Allow customers to make purchases without creating an account. Offer account creation as an option after the purchase is completed.
✅ Only ask for essential information and use clear, concise instructions. Autofill and validation features can also help improve form usability.
✅ Provide your customers with information on their stage in the checkout process by displaying a progress bar. This prevents them from having high expectations and getting frustrated easily.
If those problems are solved and these changes are introduced, you will unilaterally upgrade your checkout process, customer experience, and website conversion rates.
4. Lack of Trust Signals
In your opinion, how much can one rely on a website while making an online purchase? Trust is one of the most valuable assets that can enhance sales or act as a deal-breaker.
This way, customers will be confident about the website’s security and credibility and will be more likely to make a purchase.
While the absence of such signals creates a sense of doubt and suspicion and ultimately results in cart abandonment. It indicates that customer trust is crucial in increasing the conversion rate and consumer loyalty.
Common Trust Issues
What common trust issues can deter customers from completing a purchase?
➢ If the website link lacks SSL encryption, customers may feel that their personal and payment information is unsafe.
➢ People may question your products’ or services’ quality and reliability without reviews or testimonials.
➢ If the return policies are easily accessible, customers may feel that the extra step of returning a product may be too much of a bother if they have a problem with their purchase.
How Can You Fix Them?
How can you address these trust issues and build a more trustworthy website?
✅ Make sure your website is configured to use SSL encryption to prevent exposure of the customer information. Security badges and indicators should be visible so clients are not afraid of losing money.
✅ Provide customer feedback sections in the form of review/rating stars and testimonials on different product pages, as well as on the main page.
✅ Ensure that your return, refund, and privacy policies are visible to the customers. Make sure they are clear and simple and linked from more than one page on the site.
✅ Use trust symbols like secure payment signs, money-back guarantees, and verified seller badges to provide a perception of the security of your site.
5. Poor User Experience (UX)
Do you take user experience (UX) into account while interacting with visitors and encouraging them to complete the purchase?
A good UX experience is essential to ensure visitors stay longer on your site, dig deeper, and eventually become consumers.
Even worse,
Poor UX can push visitors away, increase bounce rates, and thus greatly decrease the conversion rate.
When viewers don’t have any difficulty getting around the website, they can spend more time on it and complete the intended actions.
Common UX Problems
What are the common UX problems that can negatively impact your website?
➢ Overcrowded designs are equally baseless because visitors can be easily distracted by different items on the site and excel at comprehending what they are in quest of.
➢ If a user cannot navigate your site without much difficulty, they will easily get bored or frustrated and thus leave.
➢ Some pop-ups that overlap with the content may cause inconvenience to the user and lead to their exit from the site.
How to Fix Them
What things can be done to solve these UX issues and achieve improved user experience?
✅ Make sure your website design is clean with a lighter page layout and lots of white space.
✅ Check that the layout of your website is logical and easy to understand for those who would like to navigate through your site. Clearly outlined menus should be used, and, if possible, a search bar should be added to improve the rate of finding what users are looking for.
✅ Limit the use of pop-ups, especially if they interfere with the general operations of the site. It is advisable to use timed or exit-intent pop-ups that show up only when the user leaves the website.
✅ When publishing a website, ensure that you create the website with the user’s experience of the website in mind. Make it convenient for them to get from one section to another and achieve specific goals like buying or filling in a form.
If you pay close attention to the areas mentioned above and make significant alterations to your website’s UX, users will engage more with your site, spend less time bouncing off it, and increase your website conversion rates, thus increasing your website’s success.
Recap of Common Website Conversion Killers
In this guide, we’ve explored five major issues that can hinder your website’s ability to convert visitors into customers.
These common conversion killers include:
- Slow Page Load Times
- Poor Mobile Optimization
- Complicated Checkout Process
- Lack of Trust Signals
- Poor User Experience (UX)
To increase the conversion rate on your website, it is necessary to resolve these problems.
Google recommends these five ways to help build better websites: page load times, mobile-friendliness, user interface, especially during checkout, trust, and user experience. These make the user happy, leading to better conversion rates and, hence, business success.
Use the following checklist: audit the site for the issues mentioned, then make the recommended changes. If you strengthen some of these aspects, you can guarantee your visitors a better experience, gain their confidence, and make more sales. Begin improving your website right now to feel the enhancement of your business progress.