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Creating Certainty in Uncertain Times, Part 4: Optimize Your Conversion Paths

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Confession: I’m over this year.

Coronavirus. Lockdowns. Record unemployment. A global recession. Fires. Floods. Oh yeah, and it’s an election year. 

But we’re here now. While we can’t change reality, we can absolutely change how we see things and how we deal with challenge.

This series is all about creating certainty – in sales, recruiting, and cash flow.

You need to build a sales and recruiting engine that powers your company, enables your salespeople and recruiters to achieve greater results (without incessant cold calling), and strengthens your business so that you thrive in the months and years to come. 

Not sure where to start? This series will walk you through the steps you need to take – but if you missed the beginning of this series, start there!

Related Posts in This Series:

Creating Certainty in Uncertain Times, Part 1: Define Your Positioning 

Creating Certainty in Uncertain Times, Part 2: Define Your Brand

Creating Certainty in Uncertain Times, Part 3: Build Your Visibility (And Authority!)

How to build your sales and recruiting engine

Step 4: Optimize conversion paths

Okay, it’s time to get a little geeky. But to put it bluntly, your website is probably not doing its job. Or at least not doing it as well as it could. 

Conversion path optimization is about getting more of the people who visit your website to take action by downloading content, opting-in to a newsletter, requesting information on your services or applying for a job. 

So how do you get more of your website visitors to take action? 

First, you’re going to need to dig into Google Analytics. You want to look at your entry and exit pages. These are the pages people first come to when they visit your website (entry pages) and the pages they were on when they left (exit pages). 

Ideally, every exit page would be a “thank you page” where you are thanking the visitor for the action they just took to contact you, apply for a job, etc. But most likely, you will find that your home page is your biggest entry and exit page. You will also have lots of individual job posts and blog posts that are great entry pages, but then people leave those pages without contacting you. And you’ll probably find that you have thousands of people leaving your website without taking any action. 

Once you know where people are coming in and where they are leaving, you can start to optimize those pages.

Here’s a quick, simple plan to improve your conversion path optimization: 

  • Brainstorm calls to action. When an employer or job seeker visits your website, what are you offering? Is there content to download? A newsletter subscription? A free consultation? The ability to quick apply with your company? The more ideas you have for CTAs (calls to action) the more you can test those CTAs to see what works and what does not. 
  • Start with your exit pages. Are there clear CTAs on these pages? Are there other things you could add to the page to get people to take action, such as: a button or graphic with your CTA, on exit pop-up or fly-in that presents an offer, or trying a new CTA if the one you have isn’t working. 
  • Next, ensure there are strong CTAs on entry pages. A visitor to your website will give you 3 to 8 seconds before they take action or leave. If you look at each of your entry pages, will people understand the content on the page within this timeframe? Is there a CTA on these pages to take them deeper into your website or to get them to take action? For example, does your home page have a job search widget right near the top to allow job seekers to get right to searching jobs? 
  • Re-engage people after they leave. Using retargeting PPC, you can have advertisements (and CTAs) follow people who visited your website after they leave. You can have these ads on social media, like Facebook and on Google where your ads can appear on more than 2 million websites that are part of Google’s display network. 

Conversion path optimization is about having great offers, and then testing your content, graphics and methods by which you promote those offers to see what works best. At a minimum, it’s about ensuring that every web page, job and blog post has a clear CTA included.

Up Next: Integrating Content

Digital marketing isn’t everything – our industry is too competitive to ignore the role and importance of salespeople and recruiters. My next post will share strategies for integrating content into your sales process. But, if you can’t wait until then, check out the full article here!

 

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