Comments on: Website conversion calculator

By: David Sealey

David Sealey — Fri, 24 Dec 2010 09:05:32 +0000

Thanks for sharing my Conversion Calculator. Building a HTML5 and JQuery version of the tool is on my long-term to do list. I absolutely agree that my tool is simplistic. In fact I’m happy with it being that way as I use it with new clients to engage their interest.

Company owners tend to only think in terms of the bottom line. “How much money will the site make?” It’s for these people that the tool was created

Our skill as Conversion Rate Optimisers/Digital Marketing Consultants is to take that top level goal and do the detailed work to wring extra converions from the website.

Great comments and tool from Matthew Tod and thanks again for another great blog post Dave.

All the best

David Sealey
http://twitter.com/sealeyd

By: Dave Chaffey

Dave Chaffey — Mon, 20 Dec 2010 13:49:41 +0000

In reply to Matthew Tod.

Thanks Matthew for giving your advice on applying these types of models. It’s useful to remind us that model=estimate and they are only as good as the assumptions and the degree of granularity used. As a reminder to ask difficult questions about any model you are presented with like this definition of model: “a hypothetical description of a complex entity or process” which seems to apply well to website conversion with site visitors of different needs, levels of awareness of brand and service, different referrers and taking different numbers of visits through time to evaluate a product or service!

I like your advice to base improvements of conversion on micro-steps, since I think there is often an unrealistic “finger in the air” expectation of overall improvements in conversion rate through site redesigns while a more detailed review of potential increments of conversion for steps such as add-to-basket, collect new customer details, take payment, etc will give a more realistic figure.

Do you have any sources to share on benchmarks for those micro-conversion steps?

Thanks again, Dave

By: Matthew Tod

Matthew Tod — Mon, 20 Dec 2010 13:06:21 +0000

Thanks for picking out the Logan Tod & Co tool, we do find it very useful. If I might I would add five more key things to this post:
1. Define a model that is right for your business, everybody is different.
2. Make sure you populate it with accurate data, not a easy as it might seem!
3. Segment the data you use so you get a real sense for what the impact might be, for example an improvement to a checkout process has a much bigger impact on prospects than customers who have previously bought via the existing checkout process
4. Benchmarks do matter and are hard to find. Overall conversion rate benchmarks tend to be useless as they are never a like for like comparison, so we tend to look at benchmarks for each step of the process
5. Estimating improvement lift is hard to do! Hopefully you can find enough within your own data and experience to do this. Needless to say the most common error is over estimation!

Thank you again
Matthew

By: Jamie Gavin

Jamie Gavin — Fri, 17 Dec 2010 09:13:42 +0000

A little basic – but sometimes you need that. It’s very easy to get bogged down in the strategic & creative elements of digital strategy and overlook the bottom line for the cllient: to sell more stuff.

I whole heartedly endorse this.

By: Dara Bell

Dara Bell — Thu, 16 Dec 2010 23:12:03 +0000

Hi Dave,

I would agree with making companies see what they are missing is a good strategy. Simple conversion rate models.

Dara