For high-street retailers, encouraging people off the street to browse the shelves is just the first part of the story. The real job is to prompt them to move from the shelf to the till! The same is true for online businesses, whether B2C or B2B. Once you encourage people to visit your website, great, you’ve got an opportunity to convert them into leads, but how do you progress them along that journey to becoming customers?
In this article, we’ll look at effective lead conversion strategies that will help encourage your website browsers to take that crucial next step.
Web content is crucial for making conversions. You need to create mixed media content for each page that provides genuine value to your audience and resonates with your target market. This doesn’t have to be rocket science, just research the search queries/keywords that might draw your ideal customer to a particular page and answer these questions in a clear and concise way.
Make your content actionable, informative, engaging, and relevant to your niche. High-quality content positions your business as an authority in your industry, making them more likely to want to find out more. However, it’s important to note that writing web content is not the same as writing blog articles. Web content should be far more concise and broken down into lots of short paragraphs and bullet point lists with informative H2 headings to enable readers to quickly ‘skim’ the information they need. A large wall of text is more likely to deter a visitor than encourage a lead.
Landing pages are concise, simple web pages designed and optimised for conversions. Unlike your pillar pages, which will typically cover a large amount of information, landing pages are focused on a single keyword, product, or promotion. The information on your landing pages should be clear and super-concise, with a strong call to action (CTA) throughout all the content with a short form in exchange for a free downloadable guide/brochure, demo, or to send a query – this form will help capture that lead information. They should be optimised for mobile devices, minimise distractions with no navigation or limited navigation away from the page, and include trust signals like testimonials and/or certification badges that matter to your ideal customers.
People want to do business with a company they can trust, but how do they know if they can trust you? That answer is simple – because other people have placed their trust in you before. Social proof is based on the psychological principle that people tend to follow the actions of others. By showcasing social proof on all key pages of your website in the form of testimonials, case studies, ratings and reviews from Google, browsers can see that others have had a positive experience with your business. Awards, professional memberships, and certifications are also strong measures of social proof, especially in the B2B market.
A live chat feature allows browsers to ask questions about your products and services in real time, usually via an AI Chatbot – think of it as a virtual robot shop assistant. Customers can ask questions and get immediate answers from the AI without having to wait for a response via email. The live chat feature can also track the movement of browsers around your website and provide insights into their interests and priorities. Remember, to really hone in that trust, this bot should always have the ability to transfer the user to a member of your team in case the bot is unable to answer their queries, levelling up that trust and giving this feature a personal touch.
Lead capture forms allow you to request your website visitors' contact information, such as their name, email address, and phone number. You can then use this data to nurture them through the sales funnel and convert them into paying customers, e.g. through email marketing. To make it as easy as possible for customers to give you the means to keep in touch before they leave your website, place a lead capture form on all necessary pages of your site, not just the ‘Contact page’ or landing pages; this includes, service pages, your blog page so the browser can subscribe for more, etc. If there isn’t a relevancy on a page for a form, use a CTA button on each page that the user can follow to bring them to a landing page or the contact page, encouraging them to convert into a lead.
Our website conversion services at JDR Group can help you increase lead generation and sales conversion for your business. To find out more, please get in touch or download our free guide all about how to generate leads from your website, today.
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