Before debating the benefits of both CRO and SEO, let’s first discuss their main uses in today’s digital environment. SEO (Search Engine Optimization) is frequently confused with CRO (Conversion Rate Optimization). They’re both optimizations, they both can improve your overall ROI (Return on Investment), and still, they’re extremely different from each other.
Conversion rate optimization experts are mainly preoccupied with the process of increasing conversions on a specific site. On the other hand, SEO experts are definitely worried about improving the flux of traffic to a website. Both SEO’s and CRO’s objective are to increase the sales and ultimately improve the profits of the brand.
Here’s the thing. SEO is an extremely important active strategy that every business must plan and implement. However, when using SEO and only SEO for improving the volume of sales, you will barely be able to measure and predict your actual and future ROI. Therefore, your budget predictions will be a mess and you’ll barely know how much you need to spend next.
On the other hand, Conversion Rate Optimization (CRO) is much easier to track, organize, and work with. You will easily be able to calculate your ROI, as you’ll compare the baseline conversion rate with the new conversion rate (after you’ve made a change to the page/site.)
CRO or SEO?
The answer is both. Most webmasters become obsessed with driving more traffic to their websites that they completely forget about CRO. The challenge is to keep them balanced, to work with both at the same time, and to give them the same importance.
Yet, this post is more inclined towards CRO, as we feel that many marketers and webmasters neglect the incredible yet real benefits that an effective conversion rate optimization can bring to a website.
Let’s take a theoretical example.
Let’s say that Website X generates $10.000/month
It has a 2% average CR
The marketing-to-revenue ratio: 4:1 for the SEO investment.
So basically, whenever you invest $100 in SEO, you’re getting an ROI of $400. This equals an ROI of 300%, based on purely SEO metrics. Even though the 4:1 is a bit too promising to be taken as a perfect example, let’s leave it so.
Now. Let’s say you’d like to invest $3000 at a 4:1 marketing-to-revenue ratio, which would eventually lead you to a generous $12k ROI. Pretty great right? Most marketers stumble upon a 2:1 or 3:1 ratio and they believe that their job is finished.
Let’s continue our example and see what could happen if you’d invest those $3000 in CRO instead of SEO. As you already know, conversion rate optimization relies on testing, measuring, and optimizing your website and pages. The purpose? To turn more website visitors into prospects/customers as a result of a better-optimized sales funnel. The better your products/strategy/website/landing pages are the better your CR will get.
So if you’d put $3000 into testing, measuring, and optimizing, you could probably scale your CR up to 40%. What? 40%? Are you crazy? How could that be possible you may wonder… Bear with me so I can finish the example.
Imagine your CR growing from 2% to 40%. So at every 100 website visitors, you’re gaining 40 leads/sales instead of 2 leads/sales. So if you optimize your CR– let’s say, for the sake of non-believers – up to 30%, even if your website traffic has significantly dropped because you’ve stopped pushing traffic through SEO, your overall performance and profits will exponentially increase.
“Here’s the great thing. While investing in SEO can be also profitable and stable, CRO is a much more secure and long-term investment. Once you’ve optimized your website and offers, you can focus on SEO and bring more people into a more-professional sales funnel that will present a much higher CR and therefore a much higher profitability”, says John Davis, Marketing Chief at a popular assignment writing service called AssignmentMasters.
Several Aspects that Destroy Your CR (Conversion Rate)
If your conversion rate is low, you should really look at the following aspects. See if you’re doing anything wrong from the things listed below. If you do, immediately make a change. With one decision, you can boost your overall CR and sales on an immediate basis.
- Your sales funnel is not good enough. That means that very few website visitors reach the page where they’re supposed to actually buy something because they either got distracted, bored, or uninterested.
- The user’s experience is too complicated. Your website’s too confusing or it gives too many options. Keep it simple and on point, as the attention span of an internet user is extremely low.
- You’re bringing non-targeted, non-relevant traffic to your website. Check your strategies and traffic channels again.
- Your website loads very slowly, it has bugs, and it’s annoying.
- Your website shows lack of professionalism. Wrongly cut images, bad spelled text, or poor copywriting on the sales page could be few of the aspects that ruin your CR.
- CMS configuration issues.
- Errors in payment, pricing, and shopping cart.
If you recognize something from the list, it means you have a problem. In fact, this problem is going to damage your conversion rates and therefore your overall gross revenues.
Key Takeaways
Before you leave, I’d like to reemphasize the importance of balancing the two aspects on a consistent basis. In order for your online business to thrive, you’ll have to bring highly targeted traffic, which is not the simplest thing to do when we’re talking about organic traffic that comes from search engines. Only an effective SEO optimization will bring your site to the top.
Yet, in order for you to nurture that traffic in the best possible manner, your conversion rate optimization efforts must be persistent enough. Whenever you’re looking to grow your profits and revenues, remember that having a great CR along with a great flow of steady traffic is the best possible balance and objective that you should look after!