Making the case for optimising your mobile site with split-testing

Websites that use split-testing regularly will gain an increasing advantage over their competitors. By steadily increasing their conversion rate, they’re able to get higher returns for the same advertising spend and that means they can invest more in advertising and grow their market share.

Today, split-testing is especially relevant for mobile commerce. We’re at a stage where many companies will have a mobile version of their website that they serve to visitors from smartphone or tablets. But a lack either of focus or understanding of the opportunity means that very few websites are split-testing their mobile sites. And as mobile commerce grows, companies that split-test have a huge advantage.

But mobile conversion optimisation is hard. It forces you to focus on priorities. With limited screen real estate, you need to ensure that your content is well structured, persuasive and accessible.

8 Tips for mobile conversion rate optimisation

Here are…

A review of the options to avoid 'showrooming' and connect with customers digitally when they are in-store

As retailers figure out how to incorporate the ever-changing omnichannel and added extra credit card processing security, they will also need to think about the Internet of Things [IOT] and how it fits into the retail experience and marketing budget. Some retailers are using digital in-store to enhance the shopping experience of their customers. But implementing these devices could be costly and time-consuming, especially if they fail to produce results for the retailer. But we must recognize that customers have overwhelmingly connected lives. In their daily journey, they are shuttling between their homes and work in a constant connected state. This connected state has an effect on their shopping behaviour. Customers will search online, comparing prices, promotions, ratings and reviews.  Internally, the customer may debate things like the difference between shipping costs versus the cost…

Learn to love The Logic Sandwich

To successfully take people through a whole buying decision, you need to find the right balance between satisfying their emotional and logical needs. The human brain has two halves: the left side of the brain is rational, considered and thoughtful, the right is creative, intuitive and spontaneous. To really get someone on board with your brand, you need to appeal to both sides of their nature. In short, you need messages that tick their emotional and logical boxes. [caption id="attachment_35506" align="aligncenter" width="600"] Are you serving up a Logic Sandwich?[/caption] Whatever you’re selling and whomever you’re selling it to (in the vast majority of cases), you are selling to a person: a human being. And, real people are primarily driven by their emotions. Even when what they articulate is a logical motivation for a purchase, there will be…

10 hidden factors that could be affecting your Conversion Rate

Many elements come into play when you are seeking to improve the conversion rate of your website as part of a site conversion optimisation strategy. You may already appreciate the importance of testing major changes such as the offer, call-to-action buttons, placement of product pictures and headlines. However there are other technical features of a landing pages, which if not implemented correctly may also damage your conversion rate. In this article I define 10 factors which are less well known but could easily be compromising your success. The examples I will include cover both classic landing pages for lead generation, in B2B for example and also Ecommerce sites.

Ten steps to improving conversion on your website

1. Utilizing a CAPTCHA

Everyone is familiar with these...

A lot of web users hate CAPTCHA codes, which…

A step-by-step guide to integrating Facebook with an online store

You will know that worldwide, Facebook is the largest online social network, there are over 1.5 billion active Facebook users. This data from Global Web Index on active social media network platform active usage  shows the continued dominance of Facebook. How can retailers best take advantage of all these Facebook interactions? This post looks at Facebook fan engagement for e-commerce websites specifically - I hope the examples I show will give you some new ideas.  The Smart Insights Guide to Facebook marketing has more details and guidance with retail examples too. We will explore how to structure your page and what types of status updates to choose in order to gain the most relevant and loyal audience of your future customers. You will also find out what applications work best. 1. First…

How does your web timeline compare?

You have almost certainly heard that today marks the 25th anniversary of the invention of the web by Sir Tim Berners Lee and of course, CERN are celebrating this - see their timeline of how its evolved. This screen grab of the Next desktop computer used by Tim Berners Lee also shows how far the experience for users has evolved - no need for mobile responsive sites back then! [caption id="" align="aligncenter" width="550"] Screenshot of the original NeXT web browser in 1993 (Image: Berners-Lee/CERN)[/caption] On Smart Insights we mainly discuss how marketers can take advantage of the commercial advantages of the Internet. Many of these have been facilitated by the interactions between users now possible via social media as Tim Berners-Lee stressed in his interview with the Guardian this week. "The web's billions of users are what have made it…

5 key insights to create the best experience for your smartphone and tablet audience

You'll know that usage of smartphones and tablets, and the revenue and engagement delivered by them, is skyrocketing. In Q3 of 2014, 25% of global traffic to e-commerce sites came from mobile devices (10% smartphones, 15% tablets) according to Monetate.

That’s up 3% in a single quarter. Meanwhile, eMarketer predicts that the value of UK m-commerce in 2013 will have reached £6.61 billion.

Understanding and optimising the customer journey and experience for these active mobile audiences has become an imperative for mainstream multichannel brands, as well as pure-play digital brands. Happily, there are simple ways to do this. Here are five steps I would start with ...

Insight 1. Define 'mobile'

Organisations, analytics reports and the media use this term inconsistently. Be clear whether it just refers to smartphones or whether it's an umbrella term for all handheld…

6 practical tips to improve response from emails read on mobile devices

With the current growth in use of mobile devices, from smartphones to iPads and a variety of tablets, mobile email design has become a vital consideration for 2014 if you want people to be able to read and respond to your email marketing campaigns

In fact, according to these Litmus mobile open statistics, 51% of email opens are on a mobile device, and some brands see upwards of 70% of their emails opened on a mobile, while 80% of people will delete an email if it doesn’t look good on their phone. Yet even with all this growth in mobile email, 58% of email marketers are still not designing for it, and MarketingSherpa reports that 31% of marketers don’t even know their mobile email open rate.

Design your email marketing for a mobile device

So…

Which factors are the main reasons for shopping cart abandonment?

Cart Abandonment specialists, Cloud.IQ have released a new infographic with some fascinating findings regarding how and why our customers are abandoning their purchases and how we can leverage this opportunity to generate more sales. Some stats of interest: 88% of online shoppers who abandon online purchases before completion are open to being emailed by retailers afterwards.. 35% actually say they will actively welcome these emails For every £100 spent on driving customers to the site, only £1 goes into converting them To see all the stats and the full infographic, view it here.  …

6 Best Practices for increasing conversion for retail E-commerce websites on mobile devices

Recent research by IMRG and Capgemini on Ecommerce sales trends in the UK stated that 23% of all online retail sales in Q2 2013 came from mobile devices. And of these, tablets accounted for 85%. The dramatic headline was:

"Sales via Desktop flat-line as sales via mobile devices now account for all online growth"

However, an interesting turning point here is that, 2013 saw smartphones go through a greater rate of growth in terms of mobile transactions. This being the case, you will know that it has become  critical for online retailers to optimize their e-commerce websites for mobile.

Improve your e-commerce website for mobile usage

Here’s a list of issues to consider, or best practices, based on our experiences, that will help you provide a better shopping experience that meets the expectations…