Conversion rate: whether you are thinking of opening an online store or you already have one, for sure you have come across this term. But what is the conversion rate of an ecommerce? How is it calculated? And above all, how is it optimized?  best database provider

Conversion rate of an e-commerce: what is it?

According to the definition given by the Google Ads Guide , the conversion rate is:

“The average number of conversions per interaction with the ad, shown as a percentage.”

Almost similarly, the conversion rate of an ecommerce  is:

The ratio of the number of visitors to the website to the number of visitors who perform an action, i.e. conversion .

This conversion can be represented by completing a purchase, subscribing to the newsletter, requesting further information, and so on.Basically, any type of action that demonstrates an interest in the business. Once the visitor has been converted, we are talking about lead generation.

How is the customer conversion rate calculated?

To calculate the customer conversion rate on your store, you need to know how many people come to your site each month.

Let’s say your site receives 10,000 visits from individuals every month. Of these, 200 make a purchase.

To calculate the conversion rate of your ecommerce, you will need to divide the actions performed by the visits received, and multiply the result by 100.

So, in our example, the calculation will be:

200: 10000 = 0.02

0.02 x 100 = 2%

Your store’s conversion rate will then be 2%, which means that 2% of visitors who come to your ecommerce make a purchase.

What is the optimal conversion rate?

The conversion rate varies by industry and business model.

The conversion rate of ecommerce in Italy is around an average of 1.6%.

The research carried out by the Digital Innovation philippines mobile directory observers also showed that 43.9% of visitors leave the website of an ecommerce within a few seconds.

Here is a brief recap of the average conversion rate of ecommerce for the most popular sectors (source: ShippyPro )

How to increase the conversion rate?

The campaign is getting a lot of clicks, but is the conversion rate low?

A low conversion rate can be an indicator of one of these problems:

• your offering is too expensive for the market, or not valuable enough for your audience;
• Your site design is not intuitive and it is difficult for people to take action.

How to solve these problems?

Start by thinking about your offer and pricing strategies. If what you offer is truly irresistible and in line with your competitors’ offer , more and more people will want to get it.

Once you are sure that your offer reflects the needs and demands of your target market , you can move on to optimizing your site’s design.

There are several things you can do to make your site more intuitive and to encourage visitors to turn into customers.

• Test each section of your site and experience firsthand the browsing experience experienced by your visitors.
• Make sure it’s clear right away what your business is about.
• Increase the size of the buttons and calls to action , and try changing their colors.
• Use only high-quality images .
• Try adding a compelling video or content to your landing page .
• Make sure your site is mobile-friendly.
• Make it easy for people to contact you.

These are just a few proposals, there are many ways to optimize your site to increase the conversion rate of your ecommerce.

Let’s see some of them in more detail.

Conversion Rate Optimization (CRO): Improve ecommerce conversion rate

Strategies and tips for increasing the conversion rate of an online store travel under the name of Conversion Rate Optimization (for friends, CRO).

Keep in mind that any improvements you make to your site, however small, will improve the browsing experience of your users and therefore contribute to the increase of the conversion rate.

For now we will just take a look at some simple tips that you can follow to do Conversion Rate Optimization.

High-quality images and videos

Always use high-quality images and videos, both on the landing page and on your product pages.

Think about your online shopper experience. What idea would you have of an ecommerce with poor quality photos presenting the products ?

When you shop online, photos are the only way you can understand the quality of the product. You can’t touch them with your hand.

That is why it is so important, for the customer but also for your conversion rate, that the photos and videos you choose are of the highest quality, so that visitors know exactly what they will receive.

Free shipping

Do you offer free shipping? Whether you’re shipping your products yourself, or relying on services like ePacket via dropshipping, tell your customers that the price they see under each product is the real price, with no added surprises at checkout.

If there’s one thing customers love, it’s transparency.

Make your offer clear right away, so your ecommerce visitors know what to expect.

Plus, seeing immediately that an ecommerce offers free shipping will entice visitors even more to stay on your site and complete their purchase, increasing your conversion rate.

Smooth checkout process

One of the most critical moments of the purchasing process is undoubtedly that of the checkout.

That’s why it’s a good Conversion Rate Optimization strategy to run as many tests as possible to ensure your customers have a smooth and smooth checkout experience.

If the checkout process is too long, complicated and unintuitive, you could lose a lot of customers who would have already been ready to buy.

Checkout without registration

Speaking of smooth checkout: how many times have you had to make an online purchase and don’t have time to fill in all the fields necessary to register on that site?

It also happens to your customers. That’s why you should always offer them the option to continue shopping even without being registered on your site.

Always think about your online shopper experience. How many times have you clicked on “Continue without registering”? I, personally, more than one.

Offer the same chance to your customers, to increase the conversion rate and reduce the cart abandonment rate.

Abandoned cart

Precisely because the moment of checkout is one of the most delicate steps in the purchasing process of an online store , it often happens that potential customers abandon their cart without completing the purchase.

Why does this happen? Perhaps you are asking them to enter too much information, or are the shipping costs too high for the price of the item they are buying?

A good practice of Conversion Rate Optimization is certainly to include in the cart a summary of all products with the cost of shipping included. You could also put a counter that warns the customer how long it is to reach the threshold for free shipping!

Also remember to optimize the shopping cart page with the product recap for a mobile view. Large images, legible fonts: this will be an extra help to improve the conversion rate of your ecommerce.