Fail Hacks: 6 Amazing Tricks to Kill Your Conversion Rates

Sometimes, the best way to learn how to do something is to tell you what not to do. So, in this article, I describe the best way to kill your conversion rates. Then, I will explain how it should be done properly.

I make my living as a growth hacker. I learned my trade at Google and refined my skills at Uber. The core of my job is exploring what works by experimenting.

Take conversion, the act of transforming site visitors into paying customers. From testing websites for 20 years, I know what generally works. I also know that some things never work. Just to make my point, below I describe 6 “fail hacks” that keep your conversion rate as small as possible.

Approximately half of all traffic on websites is generated by mobile devices. Because of this, it is important that the mobile experience of a site is excellent.

You don’t want high, mobile bounce-rates because the page is badly displayed on smartphones. For example, pages that are rendered with miniature fonts are a conversion disaster!

This really happens! There are websites that employ “great” headlines such as “Big Data Examples: Analytics and Conversion”. You may think these texts are written by artificial intelligence, but it is actually the work of humans who think they are SEO-savvy.

Instead of writing great copy, they stuff their pages and titles with keywords. They don’t understand that Google is much too advanced to fall for this nonsense. And because of this, the most important users will quickly turn away from your site.

Roughly 12% of web users surf the web with small-player browsers such as Firefox and Opera. A “great” way to turn a considerable part of your audience away is to optimize your website for Chrome and Safari only.

Creating friction at the first touch point with your customer is the worst thing you can do! A user who wants to download a white paper is sometimes requested a whole laundry list of personal data. This increases the difficulty at the entry threshold in such a way that many interested parties will drop out.

According to Dutch law, websites must request permission from visitors for the placement of cookies. Fines can be huge. The Dutch public television and radio NPO was fined 25.000 Euros for non-compliance.

Though cookies can help you identify new prospects, without getting permission from the user, that information can cost you dearly in the long run.

A warm lead will turn cold very quickly. A call-back after 2 months is a sure way to be ineffective!

Now you know what not to do, the right way to act is very simple. It is almost the opposite of the fails described above. So, these are the proper steps to take.

1. Create a website that displays beautifully in all browsers that have at least a few percent of market share, i.e., Internet Explorer, Edge, Opera, Firefox, UC Browser, Safari, and—unavoidably—Google Chrome.

2. Create a mobile version of your website.

3. Of course, you must use HTTPS. This extension of the Hypertext Transfer Protocol secures communication with your customers. It is also important for SEO reasons.

4. Your copy is primarily aimed at people. You follow the SEO guidelines as much as possible but know that these are secondary to getting your information across to real people.

5. In the first contact with the lead, only ask for a name and an e-mail address. Then build up the relationship patiently, partly based upon a profile that you continue to supplement with the help of marketing automation.

6. Ensure your cookie and privacy policies explicitly state what type of data you’re collecting, how you store it, and how you plan to use it. Make sure you ask your visitors to accept this policy before they enter your website.

7. Streamline your business process. For example, the marketing department, which collects leads, has to make arrangements with the sales team to ensure the timely call-up of customers.

At RevelX, we know how to transform great ideas into leads. If you need our expertise, please make an appointment with one of our experts.