MAPPED OUT
Ever feel like your marketing strategy and business plan is a maze of endless to-dos? MAPPED OUT is your GPS to breakthrough growth, minus the headaches. Think of us as your savvy road trip companions who've not only survived the marketing wilderness—we've mastered it.
Lauren and Aurrie here, battle-tested marketers who've built businesses from the ground up. We're ditching the fluff and corporate-speak to give you the real deal: strategies that actually work, stories from the trenches, and those "why didn't I think of that?" moments that'll transform your approach.
Every episode is like having coffee (or a stiff and needed drink) with that marketing friend who tells it straight, shares their secret weapons, and genuinely wants you to win. Whether you're dreaming up your next campaign or feeling stuck in the daily grind, consider this your official permission slip to simplify, amplify, and enjoy the ride. Buckle up—your marketing journey just got a whole lot more interesting.
MAPPED OUT
EP 133 | Conversion Chat: How to Increase Website Inquiries & Sales
On this episode of "She's Busy AF," we're diving into the topic of website conversions (in a totally fun and ready-to-test way). Tune in for actionable advice on boosting conversion rates for both e-commerce and service-based businesses and learn more about the importance of data in shaping business strategies.
HOW TO CALCULATE YOUR WEBSITE CONVERSION RATE VISUAL EXAMPLE: https://www.loom.com/share/8b35507602ff486aa72aa701d81c5682
Find Lauren Loreto/Brand Good Time online:
- Our website: brandgoodtime.com
- Follow us on Instagram: @brandgoodtime @shesbusyaf
- Connect with Lauren on LinkedIn: www.linkedin.com/in/laurenloreto
Timestamps
- The importance of understanding data (00:00:17)
- Understanding website conversion rates (00:02:21)
- Optimizing website conversion rates (00:04:37)
- Visual cues and user experience (00:12:46)
Topics discussed
website conversions, e-commerce, service-based businesses, marketing agency, data, user experience, storytelling, content marketing, web design, development, conversion rate, website traffic, service providers, e-commerce businesses, conversion goals, compelling story, calls to action, user testing, web audits, business success, website strategies, optimization.
Welcome back to another episode of she's Busy AF, a podcast dedicated to helping creatives, entrepreneurs and brands smash barriers and scale. I'm your host, lauren Loretto, founder of Brand Good Time. We are a high-energy, dynamic marketing agency that focuses on content, marketing and web design and development. This episode is special. It is special for a few reasons. One, I'm a data junkie nerd, whatever you want to call it. I absolutely love numbers and what they do to inform your business, what they do to inform your marketing, everything, and so this episode is like a little bit of a nerd out on numbers, but I promise you I'm going to make this fun. I promise you I'm going to make this fun because I know, at the same time, some people aren't numbers people or you get confused by it, and also this is a podcast. So, like, how am I going to do a good job of like, talking and showing numbers? Don't worry, I figured it out. So this episode is dedicated to those who want to see more stuff happening with your website. You want to see more people inquiring, you want to feel like all those hits you're seeing to the website might turn into a sale in some way, shape or form, and so we're going to talk about this from both an e-com and a service provider point of view, but the majority of the sentiment of this episode is focused on service providers. Just but just know, if you are an e-commerce business listening to this, where you have product, don't tune out, because there's a lot of valuable information in here. So, yeah, not to make things confusing, but listen, just listen regardless. This is a great episode around website conversions in general, so without further ado, let's dive in. Okay, so I have a fun exercise for you, and if this is not something you're in a position to do right now you don't have your computer up in front of you. It's okay. You can definitely come back to this episode when you're able to sit in front of your computer. I still have really great tips towards the end here.
Speaker 1:But to baseline this entire conversation, we first need to understand what is your conversion rate. Okay, so, backing up to something that we hear a lot at brand good time when we're on sales calls or just dealing with clients, is that my website doesn't really generate leads or conversions. You know it's not really making sales, so form submissions are more of a pleasant surprise for the service based business inquiries we get, and that's okay if you are out and about networking or generating leads in the DMs and seeing sales and happy with those sales. But what if I told you, if you have a website, it can be incredibly powerful for lead generation and it should be incredibly powerful for lead generation. I know you know this, but today I'm going to give you some guidelines to show you how. And it all starts with knowing your conversion rate. All right, now, stick with me.
Speaker 1:Conversion rate is the number of action takers. So whether that's a form fill or a booking, booking, a call or an inquiry, whatever that may be phone calls, it's that total number divided by the number of visits to your website unique visits. So when we're looking at analytics tools, it'll usually for websites, it'll usually say new users versus total sessions, and so we want to look at individual users. So whatever that number is, that's like individual users. So take that number of action takers. So let's just say that's I don't know, I'm so bad at it off the top of my head math, so we're just gonna wing this. So let's say it's one action taker divided by number of unique views. So let's say that's 100. You are going to divide those numbers and then multiply it by 100, because obviously that number is going to be a point in zero, zero whatever and To multiply it you'll get an actual rate. So if we're taking one divided by a hundred, that's a 1% conversion rate. When we, once you like, multiply that and Let me tell you why 1% is not good.
Speaker 1:Okay, so I also have a loom video. By the way, it was something I included in my newsletter a couple weeks ago. Go to these show notes if you want to see, like, a visual breakdown of how to get these numbers and also, like because I was doing it on Brand-good time, my business I was able to actually show you guys some insight digging and data digging as to why, like, the numbers were skewed, which is always good to know. It's really good to be on a pulse of, like what the numbers are and what they're doing. I'm gonna stop rambling, but go click the link in the show notes if you want to take a look at, like how, how you actually calculate that number. I pull up a calculator and everything, so it's if for the visual people listening to this, go click on that. But that number, we just got one form fill for a hundred visitors to the website on a month, on any given month, is a 1% conversion rate.
Speaker 1:As a service provider, you want to aim for 3 to 5%. So if your website's not converting 3 to 5%, we've got to look at some things. 2 to 5% is what you want to aim for in the e-com space, so the barrier to entry is a little bit lower. And then 3.68% was the 2023 average for us habits. So if you're not sure which number to use or you just kind of want to aim for something that's not between this and this, 3.68 is a great number to aim for. If you are falling lower than those ranges or falling lower than that 3.68 conversion rate, it might be a good idea to consider how you can optimize your site and or drive more qualified traffic to it. By the way, at bring the time, we offer web audits and, typically speaking, if you feel like your conversion rate is not great, we can take a look at your site and help you provide some like user journey perspective.
Speaker 1:Um, another good thing to do, which was what we do with all of our website clients before we launch our User testing, is user testing. Grammar is hard and so we will. We will cherry pick people from the audience of the client. You know so like the ideal audience of the client that we're working on, and have them run through the site and provide feedback. Are there any sticking points? Um, you know where our calls to action clear enough, or you get in the information you need and nine times out of ten, you know we don't have that many edits. Um, we pretty much nailed that from the beginning. But if that's not something you feel like you can have access to, we are a great resource too. We understand a lot of different audiences, so feel free to reach out if you're interested in the web audit.
Speaker 1:But back to the episode. Let's talk about how to improve these conversion rates. So I have three big tips and, yeah, write them down, write them down, consider them, and here we go. Let's dive into the first one. So, typically speaking, when we see a site with pretty low conversion, it's because the conversion goal the client to the client is not super clear. So multiple calls to action can be confusing for consumers. When you're telling them to Read more, learn more, like If you're telling them to book a call in one place or fill out a form in another. You want to make it very consistent In how you're telling them to get to where they need to go. So suggestion here is take out anything that doesn't support this.
Speaker 1:Another suggestion is consider shortening text heavy areas by hiding them behind accordions. So if you are going to have a very long explanation, like a very long bio or a very long product description, consider hiding, like a lot of the text, majority of the text, like let people decide if they want to learn more or not, because that's going to further validate them and like what they're looking for and if, when they get that information, then they will reach out and so it's really giving them a glimpse, giving them a place to dive into. And we call that like an accordion, so something where you might see, like read more behind that should be a call to action. So once they're like expand that information, okay, they've clicked it, they've expanded the information that tells you that they really are, they're interested in some way, shape or form. If they're ready for a conversion, it's going to happen right there, and so then at the end of that paragraph you would just say click here to book a call or click here to inquire.
Speaker 1:Another thing is try out different verbiage for calls to action that essentially lead to the same thing. So on our website, we have a couple different. One of them is like pull up a seat to learn more, or pull up a seat at the bar or book a disco call. Those all lead to a call booking page, and, but we're just trying different ways to get people there, and I know I've talked about this in the past, but we use tools like hot jar to see, like, what people are actually clicking on and what's more enticing. You have to take those things with a grain of salt, though, because if in one section, I'm walking you through our process and telling you to pull up a seat at the bar, and another section I'm just saying you know, make us, your marketing team, book a disco call. They're two different things, like you are prompting with different information. So, again, take it with a grain of salt. Figure out where are people converting more, and is it because of the called action or is it the section of the information that they're receiving? So, just to recap, making your conversion goal super clear when are they going? What are they going to do when they get there? Try not to confuse people.
Speaker 1:The next thing is to tell a story and provide a journey, and this is actually much simpler than I'm letting on. I know it can be daunting to look at your site and be like how do I tell a story? What kind of journey am I going to provide? I'm going to go through two scenarios service based and product based. So service based consumers really want to visualize themselves in the process and I kind of described this above. So providing processes and step by step scenarios can easily accomplish this. We do this on the brand new time website. If you go to either of our service pages, you'll see that it's got step one, this, step two, this Like you want to make it so easy for them to see where they'd fall in the process and exactly how it works. It eliminates a ton of confusion, it eliminates a lot of questions and it makes it to where they, when they get to the point of inquiring, it's really just a matter of like. Maybe they're just have a couple questions on pricing or payment schedule or um, or like you know what information you'll need from them, stuff like that. But really allowing them to visualize themselves in the process is going to help you generate more conversions.
Speaker 1:If you are product based, we live in a world where everyone shops online and there are basic conventions that consumers are programmed to look for so the price add to cart button, the actual cart, etc. So all of those things need to be super clear and intuitive for your end consumer. I mean pretty much every e-com site can like functions in the same way and so confusing your consumer is not suggested. Trying to get really crafty and creative with where you place buttons not suggested. Make it very obvious. Make it very obvious clean. You'll see a lot of E-comp sites are usually like white background, clear buttons, very structured product detailed pages, measurements, like all of that. Like you really want to make that very intuitive for your end user. And again, this does not have to be complex. You can trust designers like us at Branger Time with the creative side of things. If you're worried about, like, wanting an experience, we got you Shameless plug, okay.
Speaker 1:Last thing here for generating more conversions is making calls to action utterly, utterly obvious. I know we kind of talked about calls to action before, but I'm going to talk about the visual side of this now. So visual cues are everything in the purchasing process, and so we have a. I have like four tips for you here. Number one play with color, but carefully. So let's just say that your brand suite has five or six colors. Perhaps you save your brightest color to use for buttons only and only use that color for buttons across the entire website. We've noticed noticeably more conversions. When we, when clients do this on their websites and when we build websites like this, because it becomes more intuitive as someone's moving through your site, they're going to know yellow equals like go somewhere Weird psychology things.
Speaker 1:Another thing is animation. So animating certain elements strategically will guide consumers' eyes exactly where they need to go. So I'm talking when you're scrolling on a page and something slides in or appears slowly or has a typewriter effect. It's because you want them to really consume that information or see what's happening as a result of that information or element. It's guiding your eye in the right place. So that's something you want to keep in mind when building your website or optimizing. It is what? Where do you really want to draw attention? In the same vein, playing with text hierarchy is also advised.
Speaker 1:My best piece of advice for conversions is to pretend your website is going to be visited by the ultimate skimmer, and this is me. Hi, I am the ultimate skimmer, so I'm going to go to your website and I'm probably just going to read your headlines and if the headlines enticing enough, I might read like the paragraph copy underneath. But if, by the time I get to the end of the page and the headlines haven't told me everything I need to know, I'm probably not going to take an action. There's a lot of people like that. So the best way to do this is to read all of your biggest text out loud. That's what a headline is, the biggest text, what calls out to you the most, and only that. If a point is not made or if directions unclear. Consider playing with your headline copy and we see this issue a lot with people like you can get really crafty with what is called out, but at the end of the day, it should take your user on a journey and end them somewhere where they're ready to take an action.
Speaker 1:And then the last piece here with calls to action are play with space. A busy website can be really really off putting. This is like design 101. I remember being in design school and learning the importance of negative space and how there can be such thing as too much white space on a page. Where there's no elements. There's no text whatever, but it's almost like when you're pausing in a conversation, when you're speaking to someone, and you take a pause before you start your next sentence. It's because you really want things to sink in before you move on to the next point. And it's kind of the same thing with websites. You really want people to think about what they're seeing, but also, from a psychological point of view, you don't want to overwhelm them with information or visuals where they don't know where to go. So pause is important, pause in the visual sense for websites here is negative space. Make your website easy to navigate and easy to convert and you'll see more conversions.
Speaker 1:Implement those three things I talked through, which, just to repeat again, are making your conversion goals super clear, telling a story, providing a journey and making your calls to action super obvious and the user experience very, very clean. Are you wanting more eyeballs on your website? I know you are, I know I do, and it's something we do on a monthly basis, where we're auditing our website and seeing how can we generate more conversions, where are people falling off or where are they not clicking or where are they clicking. It's really important to be assessing these things routinely and if you need help with this, we are here for it. We offer web audits as a service. You'll walk away with a full document of conversion focus optimizations that you can implement today. Or if you have a show it website or a WordPress website, we can help you implement those too.
Speaker 1:So thank you for tuning in to another episode of she's Busy AF. I wanted this to be quick and snappy and easy for you to go, sit down in front of your computer and start crunching numbers with. So please do that. It is like one of my core missions to make sure that businesses out there are converting through their website because it is an owned tool. Social media your social media could go down any second of any day. You don't own that, but your website is yours, and so if you can drive traffic there and you can convert people there, you will have a sustainable business in the long run. So again, thank you for tuning in.
Speaker 1:Hope you enjoyed this episode. Check out all the links in the show notes as relevant, and good luck. If you liked this episode, please, please, please, leave us some stars. Tell us how you feel about it. It really helps us get in front of more audiences, more people just like you who need to hear the good word of data. And again, if you need an audit, if you're interested in that at all, you can reach out to us on Instagram, at brandgoodtime. You can find me on LinkedIn at Lauren Loretto, and you can also shoot me an email, lauren, at brandgoodtime. I'd be happy to chat. We'll see you on the next one.
