10 Reasons That Your Conversion Rate Is So Low
We've all seen businesses that have plenty of visitors but not so many actual customers. Even if the business is very user-friendly, it can lack specific encouragement must-haves that may lead people to the purchase, which, in turn, results in a low conversion rate.
It can happen because you don't pay enough attention to specific aspects of your business. For example, your CTA might not be that engaging, your message might be unclear, or your checkout process might be too hard to understand.
Here we will break down 10 popular reasons that might impact your website performance, ultimately affecting your business’s conversion rate. Examining these factors can lead to achieving a better conversion rate, which is exactly what you are looking for.
Table of Contents
1. What Is The Conversion Rate?
2. 10 Reasons That Your Conversion Rate Is So Low
What Is The Conversion Rate?
The marketing metrics might be different for each project, business, and website. And each such metric depends on the campaign goals.
Conversion rates are the ones that help measure your success and see if you do everything right. We recommend you set achievable goals. This will help you create a plan and upgrade your marketing game.
Among conversion rate metrics, there are plenty of particular metrics that create a bigger picture of your business. For example, purchase rate, website registration, newsletter subscription, contacts submission, etc.
The rate depends on your traffic and the niche your business is in. Of course, if you sell the latest fashion trends of high quality, you'll have better rates. But if you do your business right and target the right audience, you can get profit from any niche. However, if you see your stats and don't understand why your rates are low, or you want them to be higher, we suggest paying attention to the following reasons. Explore them and plan how you can fix them later.
10 Reasons That Your Conversion Rate Is So Low
Reason 1. Your Website Isn't Mobile-Friendly
More than half of all users use their phones to find information, shop, or talk with their friends and relatives. According to Statista, by the end of 2021, 55% of all users will use their phones on a regular basis.
If your Website looks like a desktop version even on a mobile phone, there is a high chance that the users will pick another website to achieve what they want.
More than that, Google indexes mobile-friendly websites before the desktop version. So if you don't have one, you will appear on the pages that no one even checks when looking for something specific.
Reason 2. Your CTA Isn’t Engaging
A call to action is essential for any website that sells services or products. It is supposed to encourage each user to take the action you want them to. In most cases, it includes buying something, signing up, downloading a file, or starting a trial. For sure, you've seen such buttons and texts all over the Internet.
The truth is, it is not only the position of buttons and texts that is important. It is also the actual text that asks users to take a specific action. It has to be attractive and describe everything that will happen but in a short form.
What’s more, during the era of personalization, you should make sure that all texts are not generic but persuasive and client-oriented. There are plenty of similar CTA texts all over the Internet, and people might get CTA-blind in many cases, meaning they simply won't notice such texts.
If you are not sure about your CTA, you can make tests with different texts and buttons to see which one works best. Start your message with simple verbs like "get", "give", "earn", etc. They sound easy, and people won't have a feeling that they have to do a lot of things to get your services, products, or freebies.
Reason 3. Your Website Copy Is Hard to Understand
Your CTA button will work only if your website is easy to understand. We mean the texts, ideas, and information you share. Make sure to create the content your visitors will enjoy and find interesting, entertaining, and helpful.
Don't forget about your audience: learn what they like, their habits, and action patterns. This will help you create the content that will be the most suitable. And the better the content is, the more chances you have to encourage users to take action.
Make sure to state that you understand the issues and goals that your users face. If you run a fashion-themed store, write about the necessity of nice and modern clothing. If you sell goods for a healthy life, write about the importance of taking care of one's health. We do not suggest you use texts that might scare users, so you can get profit because of that. Even though this might work, you won't get loyal customers that will buy from you time after time.
You are here to offer a solution to users' issues, and help them achieve their goals and dreams. Be gentle, kind, and client-oriented. This is the true way to get life-long clients.
For a long time now, you can see the storytelling trend. This helps to create one story where users recognize themselves. Try this tool if you are able to integrate it into your business.
More than that, you can use one popular tool to create a powerful copy. Have you heard about the AIDA formula?
- Attention. Get users' attention in the very beginning;
- Interest. Keep users' attention with interesting content;
- Desire. After you have users' attention, you need to create a sense of desire for your solution;
- Action. This is where your CTA starts to work. Create the CTA that is visible and personalized.
Don't be afraid to experiment with your texts and search for the perfect copywriter who understands your audience and knows all the necessary tools to engage users.
Reason 4. You Are Offering Something Unclear
To sell products or services, you have to show what exactly you are selling. If you can't express your offer in several words, people won't understand it and may seek alternatives.
We hope you've heard about UVP, which stands for Unique Value Proposition. It includes one or two benefits that your service or product has that others don't have. There’s no need to repeat everything that every other business has. Focus on unique things that you offer. If you sell dark chocolate that everyone else sells as well, find something that will make it stand out. It doesn't have to be something that exists. It can be something that gives users a unique feeling when they eat your chocolate.
Many businesses don't stand out from others, but they find something that makes people choose them. When every sports brand has started working with sportsmen, Nike chose simple people and continues to encourage them from day to day. Do the same. Find something unique and highlight it.
Reason 5. Your Website Audience Isn’t Right
Your low conversion rate might not be satisfactory if you target the wrong audience. Before launching your website and starting sales, you have to learn everything about your audience. Such knowledge is the key to your sales. Learn who and why people use or might use your product, where do they live, what do they like, what their routine looks like, and how you can integrate your product into their lives. All of this information will help you create a useful and engaging website that will stimulate your audience to spend money on your products or services. You have to connect with your customers and understand how exactly your product or service solves their issues.
This will help you create the user experience, write the right copy, predict the behavior, and lead to the purchase that will not only be profitable for you but for your audience as well.
Reason 6. Your Checkout Process Is Hard to Understand
Not a single person enjoys a hard-looking checkout process. Some stores even have several pages that need to be filled in to finish the checkout. That's way too much. The more you ask for, the fewer chances that people will finish their purchase. Try to stick to the most essential questions that are crucial for the shipment and payment.
After creating your website, go through the whole checkout process yourself and ask your colleagues to do the same. Get feedback. Also, make sure that there are no bugs or errors that might cause damage to personal information. Your customers trust you with their information, and it is your duty to keep it safe.
Reason 7. Your Website Has Too Many Options
There is a phenomenon called Overchoice. It means that when people have way too many choices, they won't pick anything in the end. Imagine yourself standing in front of a shelf with hundreds of different jams. We bet that you won't pick any. The truth is that you need to suggest several options for the user to get one. Complex decisions won't work in favor of your business. Try to offer three options, signing one of them as "the best deal", and watch the magic happen.
Reason 8. You Don’t Have a Social Proof
If you are starting your business, it is important to show people that you are a reliable business with high-quality services and products.
It may be quite risky for some customers to buy from a new business that has no reviews. Some people might even have never heard about you. So try to share your business with your partners and friends, ask them to test it, and write a review. Make sure to post them, so others see them. This will help new visitors understand the quality of your services and products, which leads to a purchase.
Also, try to get recommendations from the thought leaders in your field. This will make a huge impression and will work the best.
Reason 9. You Work On Increasing Visitors, Not Customers
Quality over quantity should be your number one goal. We've all heard about the technique where you try to get as many people as you can where some of them might get interested in your products or services. This is a false way to get purchases. You should learn where your audience, as we've mentioned before, usually spends their time on the Internet and show your campaigns there. Don't waste your budget on random campaigns that will bring you random visitors. This is especially crucial when you build a service-based business that works in a particular area, as you won't need potential customers from other areas or cities.
Reason 10. Your Customers Don't Know What You Want From Them
Each page or each message should have only one particular call to action. There shouldn't be several on one page. And that has a strong logic behind that. If you ask one person to take different actions or do something at once, there is a high chance that nothing will be done.
Take your steps, plan your website, and build action priorities. Of course, there are pages where you can offer options like software versions, etc. But here, you need to make it easy to understand. Be sure to work with designers that will highlight the most important parts, so users notice them.
How To Fix These Situations?
Each of these issues can be fixed with simple actions and some strong will. We are sure you can do this since it's not that hard. We, Claspo, can help you with that if you are looking for a team of professionals.
We recommend our How to Increase Mobile Conversion Rate article, where you can find out how to solve these issues.
Start Addressing These Issues Now
All the above-mentioned reasons are very typical for every niche. Such knowledge comes with years of practice and marketing passion. Sometimes it's hard to notice wrong things in your business, and that's why you need specialists like us. And that's ok.
Stop asking yourself, "why is my conversion rate so low". Let's build your business together and solve issues that stand in your way of getting high conversion rates.