How much traffic you get on your website is one of the metrics used in the SEO world to measure how successful it is. But, it shouldn’t be the only measure you use.
Conversion rate is a far better indicator of a successful website and is the percentage of visitors to your site that complete a desired goal – such as making a purchase, filling in a contact form, or subscribing to an email list.
1000 visitors a month sounds amazing but if only 10 of those people complete the desired goal your website simply isn’t effective. There are several reasons why a high traffic website might not be converting into genuine leads and sales but there’s something else to consider here – whatever you’re doing to get those visitors on to your website is working!
So, don’t throw the baby out with the bathwater.
A lot of business owners come to us with complaints that their website isn’t converting well and they want a completely new website, and we often advise that this isn’t the way to go. You risk losing valuable traffic, domain authority and trust with your audience with a complete redesign.
What you can do however, is figure out why there’s a disconnect between your traffic and your conversion rate and look at making some tweaks and changes to your website to correct it.
So let’s take a look at what could be preventing your website from generating sales, and what you can do about it.
1. Your visitors are expecting something different
Picture this. You’re exploring the local restaurants in your area as you want something new and interesting to try. You land upon one that fits the bill well so you make a reservation and eagerly await the fantastic meal you’re about to receive. When you pull up in the car park however, you realise it’s not what you expected at all, it’s actually little more than a burger shack. So, you get back into the car and high tail it out of there to one of your tried and trusted favourites instead.
This is often what happens with your website traffic.
They read the meta description on Google search results, or your ad copy, social media post, etc and think it sounds fantastic. They click through to your website and it’s…well…not what they were expecting at all. For instance, they may read the meta description for a blog post about diary management services but when they click the link discover it’s actually talking about a time management course instead.
That individual may have been looking to buy diary management services and was at the information gathering stage but because that website was talking about something different that Google user will go back to search results and to a competitor instead, meaning a potential lead has been lost.
One of the clues that this might be the case with your website is a high bounce rate.
It wasn’t a case that the blog post and website wasn’t good enough or that the copy used to attract that visitor was wrong, but that there was a disconnect between the two.
This is why even your highest traffic blog posts and pages might not be converting as you’d expect. They are attracting the traffic yes but after a few seconds they’re gone again because it wasn’t what they were looking for.
Few of us like unexpected surprises, so setting the right expectations and then satisfying them is crucial to a good conversion rate on your website.
If you’re generating high traffic and it’s not converting then consider if there’s a disconnect between what you’re promising and what you’re delivering somewhere along your website user’s journey.
Here are some examples of where your website and marketing might be disjointed:
Voice and tonality differs between the advertising and website copy – for example, a social media post that tells a story personal to you is attracting traffic but your website is in formal third person.
Design is different between the advertising and website – for example, if your ads and social posts are in feminine colours and featuring photos of women but everything on your website is in bold blue and suited businessmen.
Your advertising is promoting a particular product or service but the link goes to a different page – don’t just send folk to your home page. Ideally, each social media post, advert, etc should be about something specific and going directly to the relevant page. Remember that you’re taking your website users through a journey from attraction to sale, so don’t give them any chances to get lost or distracted along the way!
The best way to fix these particular issues with high traffic low conversion rates is to really get inside the minds of your dream customers and ensure there is consistency between your advertising, social media and your website. What are they expecting and are you providing it?
2. Are you using the right keywords to generate traffic
This carries on with the theme of disconnect but is one of the biggest reasons why you might have lots of traffic with few conversions.
Most people aim for the highest volume keywords and search terms for their website. Thousands of visitors will mean thousands of sales, right? Wrong, as you’ve probably discovered if you’re reading this blog.
Using relevant keywords is the key to traffic to converts.
You might get thousands of visitors for a keyword like “clinical psychologist Derby” but they’re not turning into enquiries because you only offer services for diagnosing neurodivergent conditions in adults, and most of the visitors are parents wanting help for their children, or something else entirely. Although the keyword describes what you are, and people are searching for it on Google so you’re getting traffic sent your way, it’s not directly relevant enough to convert those visitors into paying clients as they were looking for something else.
Long tail keywords are the key here. “clinical psychologist for adult autism diagnosis in Derby” might have fewer people searching for it each month, but those people are looking for the exact service you’re offering and are therefore much more likely to contact you for help.
The best way to find the long tail keywords you need for your website is by using the information you’ve collected on your target audience aka your dream clients, and put yourself into their shoes. What are they looking for? How are they going to search for it? How much detail can you put into it?
Generally, the more detailed the better, as in the example above specifying autism or neurodivergent conditions rather than just “clinical psychologist”. Adding location, niche or industry terms, even gender and profession to keywords can tweak them into a more relevant form that yes, won’t attract the same volumes of users but those that do come your way will be more likely to buy from you.
Do use a reliable SEO keyword tool to help you with this – it’s useful for seeing what your competitors are ranking for too but don’t copy them, they probably have a different target audience to you. We prefer to use SEMrush but if you’re on a budget, UberSuggest is a good start.
3. Technical issues with your website
You might be doing everything right with your design, copy and keywords but you’re still not getting those conversions. Have you considered that there may be some technical issues going on with your website?
When was the last time you checked your website was working ok?
When websites are first developed they’re tested throrougly across a range of device types and monitor sizes to ensure the site is working as it should, but that’s often it. Unless the site is completely down and we’re alerted to it by our web hosts or a customer, we don’t often look at how well the website is working on a technical level again.
The problem is, especially if you’re using WordPress, things can go wrong at any time. An update to a theme or plugin can create a technical issue immediately but unless it’s obvious, you’re probably unaware of it.
Technical issues that might be affecting your conversion rate include:
- Broken links
- Pages not loading or slow to load
- Not optimised for mobile phones
- Contact form not working
- Plugin conflict preventing a feature from working correctly
- Pop-up preventing access to a page
Google has some fantastic tools to help you figure out if there are any technical faults with your website. PageSpeed Insights will alert you to any issues making pages slow to load, and Google Search Console has some great tools to help with checking for mobile responsiveness, how bots crawl your website and the information they take away from it, and a handy link checker too.
If potential customers are unable to access your website you’re not going to be able to turn that traffic into sales, so this so do get into the habit of checking that your website is working as it should on a regular basis, at least once a month.
4. The data you’re analysing is unreliable
Where are you getting the information from that shows the traffic your website is receiving?
You should be saying Google Analytics, but have you set it up correctly? Mistakes like having the tracking code on your website twice (in the code and then again in a plugin) can duplicate data, making it look like you have more visitors than you actually do, for example.
If you’re getting the data from a third party, it’s worth going into Google Analytics yourself to track things.
Remember, that if you don’t filter out your own IP address, GA will count your own visits too, so if you’re checking your website frequently you could be inflating the visitor statistics. Make sure you filter out your IP address, and the addresses of anyone else that may work on or check your website often such as a virtual assistant, social media manager, SEO team, web developer, marketing team, copywriter, etc.
You can track your conversion rate directly in Google Analytics by setting up goals which is the absolute best way to see what’s going on with your website. You can also see where people dropped out in the buying process.
Check out this guide to setting up Google Analytics the right way for your business.
5. You’re not asking for the sale
If you’re not making enough sales from your website, take a second to ask yourself if you’re actually asking people to buy from you.
- How strong are your calls to action?
- How many CTAs do you have? On each page?
- Have you tried testing and tweaking your CTAs?
We know that asking for sales can be hard to do when you’re not a salesperson. It can feel icky almost, but the psychology of website use is a little different to what we’re used to. We’re told to think of a website as a shop window, and in a shop people know to go to the till to checkout their goods but we don’t tend to have that with a website, especially a service oriented one.
Your visitors tend to read the page and that’s it!
Unless there is a clear call to action taking them to the next step – buy now, call now, get our info pack, etc. You need to have a clearly defined checkout process in place on your site for every visitor. It doesn’t have to be a checkout as such but a clear route from entry to exit that involves a conversion – filling in an enquiry form, signing up to a lead magnet or email list, arranging a call back, etc.
Whatever conversion looks like to you, i.e. what you want your visitors to do – you need to be directly asking for it. Remember that the interest is already there or they wouldn’t be on your website, you just need to be taking the relevant steps to move them into the buying process.
And taking a segue there, how about asking us to help you with your high traffic low conversion website? We’ve got the SEO, copywriting and digital marketing expertise you need to get your website generating more sales and enquiries for your business.
So go on, drop us a message now and let’s get the ball rolling to increase your website conversions and sales.
