understanding your conversion funnel

UNDERSTANDINGYOUR CONVERSIONFUNNEL

Chris Edwards @ChrisEdwardsCE

#WPORL @ChrisEdwardsCE

Hi, I am Chris Edwards

•Website Developer 17 years •WordPress Developer for 5 Years •Digital Marketer/SEO for 10 Years

Follow me on Twitter: @ChrisEdwardsCE


Outline For Tonight’s Talk

•Conversion Funnels 101 •Tracking Your Funnels •How to Deal With Drop offs

We have a lot to get through, please hold Questions to the end.

CONVERSION FUNNELS: THE BASICS



What is a Conversion Funnel

A Conversion Funnel is the path a user takes to become a converted user. This can be a purchase, sign up or lead.


Why Should I Care?

Funnels give you a visual representation of the conversion between each step in the path. Use this data to:

Identify drop off points Be aware of bugs See what works


Ok, Cool. What Do They Look Like?

HOW TO TRACK FUNNELS



What Can I Use to Track Funnels

Many analytic platforms allow the tracking of your funnels. We will cover how to setup funnel tracking in Google Analytics and Hotjar.


What Should My Funnel Be?The key is to build your funnel ‘backwards’. Ask your self, what is my final goal or conversion? Now, just work backward to where your goal starts.

Be careful taking the funnel all the way back to the homepage. Not all your visitors will come in through that page. Rather, go back to where your conversion flow starts, i.e. a product page.


Google AnalyticsGoogle Analytics allows you to setup goal funnels. These must be destination based goals (no event based goals).

Pages visited in the middle of a funnel will still count.

Step 1 -> Not a Step -> Step 2 -> Step 3


But What About Events?

Google Analytics allows you to setup goal funnels. These must be destination based goals (no event based goals).

For this reason, Google Analytics can be limited in the data provided. This is where other tools such as Kissmetrics or Mixpanel come into play.


HotjarHotjar works the same as Google Analytics and is very simple to setup.

When combined with visitor recordings, you can watch as visitors drop out of your funnel.

Since Hotjar is not attached to goals, it is quick to make several funnels.


But How Can I Track AJAX

AJAX forms such as Gravity Forms will load without changing pages.

For these, you will want to fire fake pageviews, known as virtual pageviews with JavaScript. hj('vpv', '/fake/path');

ga('send', ‘pageview’, ‘/fake/path’);

HOW TO DEAL WITH DROPOFFS



AHH! One of my Steps Has A Steep Dropoff

Look at your conversions from step to step and identify where most of your visitors are dropping off. This is where we need to focus some efforts.


Why Did They Drop Off?To fix a problem, we must first know what is causing it. There are several ways to do this.

Bug Check On Page Surveys Heatmaps Visitor Recordings A/B Testing

Let’s Combat This!


Check For Bugs

Run through and do a full QC of the steps where people are dropping off.

Don’t forget to browser test as well!


On Page Surveys

Ask questions at funnel drop off points.

How can we help? Are you looking for something we

don’t have? Do you need assistance? How can we improve?


Heatmaps

Learn what is being clicked

Find cold spots What are they looking at? What are they reading?


Visitor Recordings

Watch the visitors. You can even watch Hotjar funnel steps.

See their mouse movements Identify long pauses Identify “lost” vistors Look for bugs


AB Test!

Run an AB test to try different variants of each test. Some AB Test tools will integrate with Mixpanel and Kissmetrics funnels to make it easier to identify which ones improved your funnel.


Is He Done Yet?Conversions Funnels are very easy to track, yet, these are often over looked. Take some time to setup a simple conversion funnel and take control of your business.

There is no such thing as having too many funnels being tracked. Funnels can be as simple as 2 steps all the way up to 20+ steps. Key is, TRACK THEM!

THANK YOUChris Edwards @ChrisEdwardsCE

Questions?

understanding your conversion funnel

Small Business & Entrepreneurship