The 4 CRO errors
Error nº 1: ZECRO Effect
Sometimes it does not matter what you do on a website, the conversion rate will remain with no chage. Even if you leave the test active for a long period of time you will not get final results.
In these cases is necesary to see the variables that can alter the user behavior in the new website variation, what scientists know as a sensitivity analysis.
Imagine that you are in an industrial control room, in front of a machine with thirty buttons. In theory, each of the buttons does something. When you squeeze one of them, something happens. However, now imagine that some of the buttons are not connected. Even if you press these buttons again and again nothing will happen. In your website the same thing may happen, some of your pages or page elements may be like these disconnected buttons, which only generate frustration and a bad user experience.
Not all page elements will change the number of orders you receive.
An obvious example would be to change the elements of a page that does not receive visitors. For example, the page “Legal notice”, no change you make on the page will increase your earnings, basically because it is not connected to your conversion goals. This is an obvious example, but your site will have many other “disconnected buttons.” Even, in some cases, you may discover that your homepage or homepage is a disconnected button.
The sensitivity analysis tries to change variables and detect which of them are connected to the objectives of your web page and which are not.
Experience tells us that on a website, many of the elements on the page are not connected to anything and do not affect the conversion rate. We call the “disconnected buttons” “ZECROs”
How can you detect this problem?
You know you have this problem when nothing you do on a particular page (or page element) impacts the conversion rate.
All your tests are not conclusive; none of the tests stands out as the winner. For example, you may find out the changes you make in the customer opinions section do not imply any variation in the conversion rate and that we are in front of a ZECRO.
Another illustrative example might be when we go to the theater. Although at the entrance of the theater has announced the work, most if not all the attendees have decided to buy the tickets because they have read good reviews, because a friend has recommended the performance, or because they will have seen advertising in press.
If for any reason it is decided to change the poster at the entrance of the theater and put the poster of the performance that will start within a week, the conversions will end up being the same. In this case the poster at the theater entrance will be another ZECRO.
¿What can you do?
- Step 1. Keep in mind that sometimes you will be working to perform tests that will have no effect on the conversion rate.
- Step 2. Identify where conversions are coming from and when they are actually happening. This is the most important point.
- Step 3: Ask clients when and where the persuasive content was. Then find ways to improve, duplicate and amplify that content. Do not give up because said content is not in the most convenient place for you.
A good example of this phenomenon is the Dropbox example. People often ask why the Dropbox home page contains a registration form and little else. The answer is simple, because when someone arrives at the Dropbox homepage, they are already convinced thanks to the image and brand recognition. And it’s when users arrive at the Dropbox home page, it is possible that they have already used their services. Maybe a friend sent them some files, so they know what it is. Or maybe he has explained to you what can be done with the tool.
So, what Dropbox has discovered is that the home page is not where the conversion happens. Therefore, the best thing the Dropbox home page can do is skip the installation process. The Dropbox marketing team can focus its conversion efforts on identifying where persuasive content is, on improving virality and customer satisfaction, among others.
In conclusion, it is absolutely essential that you identify what and where is the persuasive content in your business.
Error nº 2: Recurring customers
When doing the tests, you must bear in mind that recurring users can alter the results. This mistake happened to our first client, we made many changes to the page we wanted to improve, we knew that there would be a substantial improvement in the conversion, however at the time of seeing the results we saw little difference with the old pages. We are left to pictures.
When analyzing the different sources of traffic and the profile of the visitors, we realized that recurrent users accounted for 90% of the visits on the website, who came to the site to buy the products that had run out. Then it is obvious that none of the changes we could propose would affect any.
In conclusion, if your company has many recurring users, every time you try to increase the conversion rate of new customers, make sure to filter only new customers and debug your data. Otherwise, your variations in the conversion will be altered by the recurring customers.
Error n° 3: Creation of optimization team for the appropriate CRO conversion rate
When we talk to a potential client who is thinking about starting to work with us, we require that he has the following attributes:
a) Centralize responsibility: must internalize a Project Manager responsible for increasing the conversion rate that is responsible for the entire project.
b) Authority: The team must have the authority to make the necessary changes in order to increase the conversion rate.
This implies:
- Being able to make changes autonomously
- Take decisions
- Invest money
- Do whatever it takes to keep the project moving.
This authority is often missing from the conversion team because the person who has the authority delegated the project to people who do not have it.
c) Skill: the person or persons who are part of the conversion team must be able to do the work themselves or control those who can. These are the designers, writers, programmers and analysts.
If you are configuring a conversion team, make sure that the team has all three attributes.
In addition, we strongly recommend that this team does not consist of more than 5 people, because otherwise, a team that is too large takes much longer to make decisions, make changes and obtain results.
If one or more of the described attributes are missing from your computer, fix it!
Error nº 4: Prioritize aesthetics of the website above functionality
Without going any further, the Amazon website has a nice aesthetic, but in no case would you define it as a beautiful aesthetic. The reason is that its design is largely functional.
Exactly the same thing happens with most of successful web companies, 100% digital natives (that is, companies that are successful thanks to their websites, not the companies whose websites are being financed by other activities). You only need to look at Twitter and Facebook. All of them have a functional design.
Now let’s see what you might call a nice website:
For example the Rolex website. It looks polished and elegant, like most websites that it’s main purpose is the brand instead of functionality or sale. Now imagine how difficult it would be to make changes to any of these websites. They are so complex and worked that it would be very expensive to move or modify certain aspects of the page. There would be many considerations about the design of the site, the text and the other components.
We often hear our customers say that they would like their website to be functional and beautiful, as if Amazon, Twitter and Facebook had not considered doing so. The reason why native digital businesses prioritize functionality over aesthetics is that changes can be made in a much more agile and faster without relying on meticulous design work that consumes large budgets. While functional websites can make changes on a recurring basis, so that functional websites are much more optimized than aesthetically beautiful websites.
¿What should I do now?
- If you have more questions and want to know how we work and the possibilities of improvement of CRO that your website has, request a first FREE analysis and one of our consultants will contact you shortly to advise you.
- If you want to continue reporting on this topic and many more you can download our ebook on the basic fundamentals of CRO to start optimizing the conversion rate in your digital business. You also have many other articles in our current blog where you will find references on this topic and many more.
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