Benchmarking in 5 Words:
Goals, Action, Action, Action, Action
CRO Benchmarks
How well is your Website performing? What are the important measurements for your business? Is it just the number of sales? All businesses use, jargon like Key Performance Indicators to judge how well they are doing. But ‘Benchmarking for Conversion’ is a simple thing to do.
Statistics and Website Conversion
“Eighty-two point six percent of statistics are made up on the spot.”
– Vic Reeves
When you are in the online marketing business you get used to all manner of statistical information. How much of that information will grow your business? I knew a very senior manager at Apple Computer who drilled down into every morsel of information for the Websites he managed. Did his drilling produce any more business? No.
Action This Day
Statistics are meaningless if they are not creating an action. Yes, a benchmark statistic is useful to tell how well your site is doing. For instance the number of unique visitors per month and improving them but that’s not an action. 10% of our visitors are clicking on further information. Now you can action that?
Breaking Down the Channels
The more you break down your information the easier it is to find actions for your Website. Do you track by traffic type?
– Pay Per Click ads (Google Adwords)
– Organic search
– Banner advertising
– Print advertising
– Affiliate programme
– Social Networking
What is the conversion rate for each of the above? The type of traffic will convert in different ways. Once you have established the difference in conversion rate between these channels you can take actions. Is PPC giving you a return? Is your organic traffic constant each month? Does your affiliate programme convert the same as it did this time last year?
Start at the Top
Start with your biggest revenue/lead channel, see how far you can break it down and discover the actions that can help the conversion rate of your Website.
If a statistic doesn’t provide you with an action, park it and move on.
All the best,
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