More traffic doesn’t always equal more conversions.
A lot of people try to drive more revenue through their website, by investing all their marketing budget in paid ads. While paying for traffic guarantees an increase in traffic, when it comes to quality lead conversion, more is not always better.
On top of that, your website could actually have a negative effect on the good traffic, turning potential customers away rather than drawing them closer.
So what’s not working?
Why More Website Traffic Can Damage Your Brand
There are various factors that contribute to low conversions, despite a healthy amount of site traffic. From having a solid lead nurturing or paid search strategy, to the overall user experience on your site, there are a few key things to check off before throwing budget behind more traffic.
Issue 1: Your Website is Ugly and Outdated
On average, sites should convert around 2% of total visitors to leads. Sites using paid search to send traffic to their site, should expect even higher, around 30-60%.
If you’re not hitting those numbers, something is wrong.
If visitors bounce before they become leads, you don’t have a chance to nurture them into customers.
Sending traffic to an outdated website is just asking to be ignored.
While a “pretty site” won’t always improve your conversion rate, having organized content and information makes a huge difference.
What’s Wrong With It: Over time, design evolves. Without ongoing evaluation and optimization of your site, your site can look dated and behind-the-times. First impressions mean a lot, so if the first impression of your website is “old,” or “outdated,” that’s not good.
That impression will be attributed to everything under the umbrella your brand.
What To Do About It: Keep your website fresh and optimized. A growth-driven design strategy can help keep your website feeling fresh, but also work on optimizing conversion rates and site performance over time. The days of launching a website and leaving it be for a few years before repeating the process are over.
Issue 2: Your Buyer's Journey is Flawed
People get frustrated easily. So if you bring them to a confusing website, without a clear conversion path, they will bounce out of frustration. Getting them to come back is almost impossible.
If you’re not converting website traffic into customers, your buyer’s journey could be flawed.
A website needs to support every stage of the buyer’s journey, giving the user the content they want, when they want it, how they want it.
What’s Wrong With It: Visitors equate your brand with frustration. They’ve likely already eliminated your brand as an option to help solve their problem.
How To Fix It: Design your website around the ideal user experience based on what the customer wants. Every page should have the logical next step, and no page should end in a dead-end.
Issue 3: You Have No Lead Magnets
Just because you’re bringing in a lot of traffic, doesn’t mean it’s the right kind.
Anonymous traffic that leaves anonymous doesn't do you any good. You want to bring in traffic of course, but you also need to tell whether or not it’s the right kind of traffic.
Creating lead magnets is one of the most effective ways to learn about incoming traffic.
- Who are they?
- What do they want?
Offering lead magnets the visitor feels are valuable is a great way to convert leads. Without them, you both lose: you miss out on a potential lead, and the visitor leaves with little value added.
What's Wrong: Not all traffic is ready to buy. If you don't have any lead magnets, those people will leave and probably never come back.
What To Do About It: Build relevant lead magnets that appeal to your buyer personas. Focus on answering their questions, and providing education and value in order to match the content to where they are in the buyer’s journey.
Lead magnets just not performing? See how you can repurpose and give old content a second life in our Repurposing Toolkit: Why & How to Repurpose Content.
Issue 4: Your Paid Ads Are Irrelevant To The Page
It’s a common mistake for people spend thousands in ads, only to send them to the homepage or generic landing page. If the page doesn’t align specifically with the ad they clicked on, they’re back at square one.
What's Wrong With It: The ads say one thing, the landing page says another. Visitors get cognitive dissonance and bounce, resulting in wasted spend.
How To Fix It: Create ads and landing pages that fit together. Whatever you promise in the ad, needs to be delivered on the landing page. The focus should be on anticipating the visitor’s need, and providing a way for them to fulfill it.
When it comes to developing a paid search strategy, it’s crucial to understand the searcher’s intent and to craft a message that matches it. There needs to be a clear conversion path, one that makes it intuitive and logical for a visitor to move forward with your brand.
Issue 5: Your Lead Nurturing Sucks
Not having effective lead nurturing strategies in place is often the main cause of low customer conversion rate. In the instance you do have a decent volume of TOFU leads, you shouldn’t just hope they become customers.
If you’re not going to invest time in following up with leads in a meaningful, why spend to obtain leads in the first place?
What's Wrong With It: Website visitors aren’t being nurtured effectively, so they don’t have any reason to move forward with you.
How To Fix It: Establish a strategy of frequent communication with your leads, with lead nurturing tactics such as targeted content, email nurturing tracks, and multi-channel nurturing.
Issue 6: A Bad Message
If your website doesn't resonate with your target audience, you won't get customers.
From your ads, to your homepage, and throughout your entire website, everything needs to flow. There needs to be an information architecture, with concise, impactful copy and messaging.
When visitors come to your site for the first time, they need to “get it.”
Whatever your value proposition is, it needs to be easy to understand. This is where using too much marketing jargon or fluff doesn't work in your favor.
What's Wrong With It: Visitors don’t know what you do, or fully understand what value you provide.
How To Fix It: Identify the goal of each page from the perspective of the visitor. Make sure the promise of that page is delivered in easy-to-understand language. For instance, don't have a page about pricing that doesn't include a price.
Issue 7: Your Landing Pages Are Confusing or Boring
You have great traffic, and you’re using lead magnets. Still, you’re not getting leads. So what’s the problem?
Even if you’re providing the content potential leads seek, if your landing pages don't clearly communicate value, they won't convert very well. For landing pages to be effective, there needs to be a clear call-to-action, a valuable offer, good copy and visuals, and an easy way to convert.
What's Wrong With It: The landing page doesn’t clearly articulate the value of the offer, so qualified visitors leave don't convert.
How To Fix It: Keep landing pages simple, uncluttered, and the message clear and focused. Only ask for required information, and make it really easy for the visitor to understand the value of the offer, and convert.
More Website Traffic Doesn't Mean More Conversions
Even when you've got steady streams of traffic, your job isn't done. Once visitors land on your site, it's up to you to deliver a helpful, intuitive experience. To accomplish that, you don't need a huge budget.
Instead of fixating on bringing in more and more traffic, focus on your consumer. By providing a genuinely helpful experience through consistent lead nurturing, a solid site design, good content, and the right messaging, you can clearly show your value and expertise.
Really zero in on improving your inbound marketing methods with Conquering the Inbound Marketing Mountain. See how you can refocus your inbound strategy and set goals that drive you forward.
