Conversion Rate Optimization Best Practices & Tips

CRO best practices and tips from 10 experts

We put together our favorite conversion rate optimization best practices, tips and tricks from different industries and perspectives to make the most of your CRO efforts.

*some quotes have been shortened for brevity

Make sure conversion UX and copy are aligned

“Conversion copywriting does not solely deal with the words, but is deeply intertwined with UX and how those words are displayed. You MUST connect your conversion copywriting with your UX/design work. Otherwise, the siloed disciplines will pull in different directions."

Joel Klettke, Case Study Buddy

Social proof is a shortcut to conversions

“Social proof like reviews and other user generated content (UCG) is digital word of mouth, showing your potential customers that your brand is reputable and other customers have had brilliant experiences. The main driving force behind social proof is the bandwagon effect, and someone is more likely to copy an action if they see someone else doing it.”

Lilliana Miller, CRO & UX specialist, Underwaterpistol

Find out where users are paying most attention

“Heatmap tools allow you to see how your visitors are browsing your online store. In particular, you will learn which elements are attracting their attention and which elements are being ignored. You can then run A/B tests to see if you can improve your visitors’ interaction with specific elements of your website.”

Leanna Serras, chief customer officer, FragranceX

Personalize, personalize (and personalize)

“If you can do anything it should be website personalization. Only 1/3 of companies are investing in it, and yet 90% of users love personalization. Companies can expect at least a 15% lift in conversion rates as a result. Think about the last time you were on Amazon or your Kindle and you were not only recommended something based on your interests, but you were cross sold something that was relevant to your purchase.”

Tiffany daSilva, growth marketer & digital marketing consultant, DaSilva Consulting

Keep conversion front and center

“No matter what product, service or CTA you’re pushing, it should be front and center within the first few lines of your page. The chances are, a large portion of people who have landed on your page have probably already made up their mind and are just looking for social confirmation. Providing a small snippet and link to your offer within the first few sentences, you capture the large number of people that fall into this category.”

Mark Webster, co-founder, Authority Hacker

Take voice of customer (VoC) customer feedback further

“VoC consists of complaints from the customer. It will always pertain to a bigger set of customers when you extrapolate what the other customer is actually talking about. We can identify those struggles and pain points from a customer lens and help holistically instead of having to look at these issues in silos where you just put a Band-Aid on the wound.”

Vijay Honnalagere, senior experience Specialist, Verizon

Don’t make assumptions, test your hypotheses

“It may even appear that your cart abandonment rate is the issue when you look at your analytics, but qualitative analysis, such as user testing, will probably show you users are getting frustrated way before they abandon their carts. Your cart was "just bad enough" to be the straw that broke the camel's back.”

Mike Belasco, president and CEO, Inflow

Optimize forms to their best versions

“Whether your form is a checkout funnel or application or anything else, you have to become obsessed with that form and the individual fields within it because they can be one of the largest sources of struggle for your users and you have to make their experience as easy and frictionless as possible to maximize conversions.”

Laura Hunter, manager of e-commerce user experience, Mason Companies

Keep load speed down

“Higher bounce rates are toxic for both conversions and search engine performance. In fact, the load time of your website matters throughout the purchase cycle. That is, users expect your website load speed to be top-notch, right until they complete a purchase. Users expect a lightning-fast, seamless experience throughout your website.”

Source: Shift4Shop

Have one source of digital journey analytics

“A comprehensive digital experience analytics platform empowers organizations with a single source of truth to help achieve a better overall customer experience with increased revenue and long-term loyalty.”

Yaron Morgenstern, CEO, Glassbox