What is a conversion?
” A marketing tactic that encourages a customer to take a specific action. In e-commerce, conversion marketing is the phrase used to often describe the act of converting a customer who browses your site to a paying customer:” Webopedia.
If you look at the first phrase you will see the word “encourage”. We are not trying to force a reader to do something, we are encouraging them to do something.
And the second phrase is more forceful in its description and is directed more at your own store.
My definition of a conversion is simply getting a result. It does not mean getting a sale. It means getting a conclusion to a meaningful conversation.
And a meaningful conversation is when your reader connects with your content and anticipates that end result. And the end result is what you want people to do after reading your content.
How often do you apply this in your blog posts? When was the last time you asked the reader to do something?
The End Result.
A result could be any of the following;
- Clicking on an Affiliate Link.
- An opt-in email form.
- Add to cart option.
- Directions to the location of a physical shop.
- Add a comment.
- Ring this phone number.
A conversion does not necessarily mean, ” Go buy this now” It is not the salesmen mentality, it is a conversation with someone. You want to converse with your reader, you want to establish engagement with your readers. The intent is engagement first and then the end result last, whether it is just adding a comment or clicking on a link.
Conversion = the end result of a conversation.
Placing your Call To Action in your Content
Don’t be Pushy
Do you start selling straight away in your post? It is like someone who knocks on your door and says buy this, it’s great!. What is your first reaction? Ahh, no thanks.
But if they had taken the time to demonstrate it wouldn’t you be more receptive to what’s on offer? As long as they are not trying to sell every 5 minutes you will listen and the more benefits you see the more willing you will be to buy.
If you inform and educate your readers, the sales will come. Show the sizzle in the sausage and they will buy or do what your intention is. But do not go, buy, buy, buy every 5 minutes. That is not how we talk and you shouldn’t do it in your post.
Drop-in your intention casually, don’t do the hard sell. You don’t like it, why should your readers. Place your first call to action subtly midway in your content. So how do we get your readers to convert?
Mapping Out Your Conversion Strategy
There are several ways to do this, but you may want to focus on just one way first. Let us look closer.
How do we get our readers to travel from the left side to the right side? Awareness, Consideration, and Decision. These can be placed within one blog post but can also be placed across three blog posts.
The State of Awareness.
Your readers may have identified a symptom of their problem. It might be, I am writing a lot of content but am not getting any sales. They are aware they are doing something wrong, not getting sales.
So your blog post might be ” Why is your content not getting sales” And that covers the awareness stage.
The State of Consideration
The consideration area is when the reader has identified the problem and is actively looking for ways to solve their problem. They want to know, how to make sales from blogging.
So your blog post could be as simple as ” How to make sales from Blogging” And we haven’t even asked for a sale yet.
The State of Decision.
The decision is that your reader has an understanding of their problem and how your solution can help their need. They understand that they are not making money from their website, maybe because the content is not great or there is no call to action.
And the solution you show them resonates and they see it as the answer to their question. and your blog post might be something like ” how to write awesome content that converts”
A single or three step Blog Post?
One Step Post.
You could do this all in a single blog post. you could start by asking, Are you a good writer but people aren’t buying your products. How do you convert your readers to customers, etc.
And the decision part of your post could be ” here is how to mitigate your losses and increase your blog post earnings”
Then you could write; Here are some tips and resources you can use to improve your ROI. Next, add the features and benefits and what works for you, and click here to find out the latest price.
Three Step Post.
Or you could break down each step into three different blog posts. Each one leading into the next post.
For the first question, you might write a bog with the below heading.
” Why is your content not getting sales”?.
- Is your content informative?
- Are you getting readers?
- Is your SEO working for you ?
- Do you have a call to action?
- Are you adding infographics?
And you can break each section, Awareness, consideration, and decision down in the same way and link back to each page.
You could also do a YouTube video of the above and include that in your posts or use the above to do an email marketing campaign.
And the decision blog could be your review or recommendation on how to solve this problem. How to convert your content.
But you also need to first understand what is your conversion intent.
Understand your Intent.
It is all very well putting up a lot of content on your website, but if you don’t know what you want your readers to do at the end of your post, you are not being as effective as you could be.
Know where you want to send your readers and what you want them to do next at the end of your blog post.
Most people who are new to online marketing go straight to the decision stage as if everyone has made up their mind that they want to buy. But think about how you buy when you walk into a shop. You want to find something you like, you want to be satisfied it will do the job, and only then will you be willing to pass over your hard-earned cash.
Look at the awareness, consideration, and decision as a sales cycle. If you jump in too fast and ask for the sale you will just scare your reader away. But that does not mean you can not jump from awareness to decision, as each person is different.
Conclusion.
I would challenge you to try to do a three-step conversion process and see how it affects your conversion rate.
Who am I?
My name is Stephen and I am the author of this post and owner of Kool Affiliates
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