A massive jump in your conversion rate will come from solutions to problems that are unique to your online store. Special fixes to increase your sales could be improving a poor quality product, decreasing the product price because your visitors are comparison shoppers, refining the checkout process, or having high-resolution product photography because an important feature was previously unseen.
How do you find these revenue-impacting growth opportunities?
You ask the right question at the right time! “Successful people ask better questions,” said performance coach Tony Robbins, “and as a result, they get better answers.”
You discover what matters to people by hearing from them what matters. WebEngage makes this simple with a variety of quick-to-integrate widgets that you can trigger at the perfect time.
Offline stores have the benefit of face-to-face conversation with people. You need a system that gets people talking when it matters most.
I have increased the sales of online stores for seven years asking the right website survey questions to the right people. One store had a product where people were asking if it would work for them. People believed their circumstance was unique even though the next guy was in the same situation. I told a story to empathize with the reader and tweaked the product guarantee to provide reassurance to instantly boost sales by 50%.
Here are my favorite simple questions to pump life into your flat-lined sales.
1. Where did you first learn about us?
2. What are you unsure about with your purchase?
3. What other information would you find helpful on this page?
4. What other options were you considering before buying from us?
5. What convinced you to buy from us?
1. Where did you first learn about us?
The best way to identify the source of most of your sales is with e-commerce tracking in Google Analytics. Even with the perfect analytics setup for your store, you can miss where someone first heard about you.
The first discovery point could be a radio advertisement or conversation with a friend. Someone can learn about your store from an unlinked mention in a popular forum that leads some to Google search your brand name. Analytics tells you the sale originated from organic search, but really it was the forum post.
If most origins of discovery come from an offline customer word-of-mouth referral, you’d learn the social nature of your product. This presents multiple chances to skyrocket sales. Diamond Candles discovered that people use candles with friends, so they growth-hacked the process by creating an unusual experience where a ring reveals itself once the candle is burned. The customer then wears the jewelry that leads to more conversation and referrals.
Clusters of communities exist everywhere. When you ask visitors where they first heard about your store or product, you can brainstorm valuable ideas to hack growth and learn where you need to be.
2. What are you unsure about with your purchase?
A fantastic question to ask on your cart page. Sometimes you can also trigger it when the person stays on a product page for more than two minutes.
The average cart abandonment sits around 65%. This means 65% of people who add an item to their cart do not complete their purchase. Cart abandonment is a big revenue-suck for e-commerce.
Common responses I’ve seen to this question include:
“Delivery cost too high.” The shipping configuration was wrong for New Zealand residents.
“I got frustrated and gave up.” I couldn’t find any cross-device issues segmenting analytics reports, so we conducted a usability test. Turns out a lot of people have problems with the “Update” button on the cart page of many stores. Christian Holst found users expect fields to auto-update and there to be one button at checkout.
“Cheaper at XYZ”. Gave me the idea to lower product price for the month. Profit for the product jumped 10%.
Be proactive in your cart abandonment rather than reactive with just abandoned cart emails. You will also get product-specific questions where people question if the item in their cart is right for them. Run the e-commerce customer survey question on your cart page to learn a lot.
3. What other information would you find helpful on this page?
The question is suitable on any page of a website, not just an e-commerce product page. If you put it on your about page, you could learn people are searching for your contact information. Even though your contact details are on a contact page, adding them to the about page may boost conversions from the added trust.
If you don’t have a section on your product pages that let people ask questions, a website survey that pops up after one-minute provides interested visitors the opportunity to ask a burning question. You then take the answer to their question and integrate it into the product description. The continuous improvement will jump up your conversion rate.
4. What other options were you considering before buying from us?
Oh, I love this question in competitive markets. People can buy from Amazon, eBay, offline, or another online competitor. All this is just for the same product.
Sometimes your competitors are more than those who sell similar products. A store that sells espresso coffee machines is in competition with others who sell substitute methods to make coffee. If the website survey leads you to discover your customers consider a drip machine, a page on your store that compares the pros and cons of various styles of coffee machines could increase sales.
The goal of the question is figure out what you need to do to tip over interested visitors into becoming a customer.
5. What convinced you to buy from us?
The ultimate question to ask on the order confirmation page. Answers to this question will give you ideas to position your store – a bit like the previous question.
Too many start-up stores try to do everything. The result is mediocre results everywhere. But when you find your biggest buyers and know what they require to buy from you, your marketing becomes effortless. Do more of what is working for you.
Want to run your own customized Website Survey? WebEngage can help you do so. Request A Demo!
Diksha Dwivedi
Vanhishikha Bhargava
