Are you looking to boost your online sales? There are many small changes you can make to your website to increase sales, even if you maintain the same amount of website traffic. This process is called Conversion Rate Optimization (CRO) and is a highly measurable part of Internet marketing that will help you sell more products online.

Here are our top 21 tips to help your business’s online sales flourish:

1. Ensure every product has its own page.
2. Feature unique product descriptions – Don’t just cut and paste the manufacturer’s copy.
3. Highlight user reviews – Not only will they give you more content for your products, but they’ll also help encourage other people to buy.
4. Use a simple shopping cart system – The more pages and clicks between the “Add to Cart” button and payment, the more opportunities people have to abandon their cart.
5. Ask for customer reviews – Three weeks after the transaction, email your customer and ask them to leave a review of the products they purchased.
6. Offer incentives for reviews – Give clients more of a reason to leave reviews using incentives like giveaways or discounts.
7. Monitor how people consume your pages – Use Crazy Egg analytics to discover how people interact with your sales pages. Look at how far they scroll down, what they’re clicking on, and more.
8. Create product tours or product review videos – These will help drive up conversion rates as they allow people to take a good look at your product.
9. Interact with customers – If something’s out of stock, offer to take customer details and let them know when you have it available again.
10. Monitor your site speed – Make sure your website is fast, aim for three seconds of loading time. For every extra second it takes, you lose an impatient customer. Take a look at your website speed using Google Analytics.
11. Monitor what people search for on your site – You might find demand for products you don’t yet carry, or that people often misspell certain product names.
12. Create a blog – This is where you can talk about your product range, discounts and offers, and exciting new products you’ll be stocking soon.
13. Test your checkout page – If you only take PayPal as payment, assess the design of your checkout page. Do you look trustworthy?
14. Offer a money-back guarantee.
15. Let clients know who they’re buying from – Add your street address and sales phone number to each page.
16. Find the right shopping cart engine – Looking for a budget shopping cart engine with a lot of bells and whistles? Consider using Shopify. This Canadian company continues to innovate their shopping platform, letting you concentrate on providing the best products and customer service possible. 
17. Check social media – Look at platforms such as X, Reddit, Facebook, and so on. Are people complaining, praising, or searching for your products? Engage with them.
18. Split test your product page – For example, if you send 50 percent of tomorrow’s traffic to a page with a red “Add to Cart” button and the other 50 percent to the same page with a green button, which page sells more products?
19. Add tracking codes – A lot of customers will visit your site each day, look at a product, add it to their cart, and not check out. Look at adding tracking codes to your website to monitor which products sit dormant in carts and create a reason to push people to buy. This could be as simple as reducing the price by five percent.
20. Experiment with different ads – When using Google Ads to drive customers to your product page, don’t just have a single version of the advertisement. Instead, make 5, 10, or even 50 versions and track down which drives the most sales.
21. Target the right demographic – Meta advertising is great at driving traffic to your Instagram or Facebook pages but not so great at driving them to make a purchase. If you want to use them, ensure your ads are targeting your main demographic. And remember to include images in any advertisement as they’ll catch users’ attention.

Bonus Tips

22. Optimize Product Page Layout

Don’t be afraid of having too much information about a product on one page. Break up text with headings and insert “Buy Now” buttons in prominent places as it grows. Remember, you’re looking to answer potential customer objections about why they shouldn’t buy your product. So, the more information, the better.

Here are some things to consider including on your product pages:

• Product images
• Description – Make sure it’s unique and not copied from another source
• Tech specs
• Expert store reviews
• User reviews, ratings, and images
• Product video reviews
• Downloadable user manual
• Pro and Con list – Not every item is perfect for every customer
• Percentage discount – How much was this product last month or last year?
• “What’s Included” Section – Are there extras or tools included in the product box?
• Warranty and shipping information and options
• “Customers also bought” Section
• “Related Products” Section – If your customer gets to the bottom of the page and isn’t sold, try to interest them in another product before they leave your site. 
• Product Summary –  Include a small image with a summary of product information and a “Buy Now” button as a last-ditch effort.

23. Avoid Distractions

Think of your product pages as a giant funnel. You’re pouring customers in at the top and hoping to get them out via your payment page at the bottom. Every time you introduce a distraction, you’re making a hole in the funnel. 

Here are some things to avoid when creating your product pages:

• Pictures of unrelated products
• Confusing navigation
• Pop-ups or advertisements – Having too many advertisements can make it difficult for customers to focus on your amazing product.
• Auto-play videos or sounds – Give users the option to play the content and provide a mute option.
• Cluttered design
• External links and social media icons – While promoting your social media profiles is important, too many links can lead customers away from your page. Only include the most important ones.

Imagine using your site as if you were the customer. Are there too many distractions on your page? Does it accurately display the features and benefits of your product? Make sure to regularly test and edit your page based on feedback and analytics to improve CRO. 

Although minor, these modifications will greatly impact sales and help bring your business to the next level.

How Small Business BC Can Help Your Business

SBBC is a non-profit resource centre for BC-based small businesses. Whatever your idea of success is, we’re here to provide holistic support and resources at every step of the journey. Check out our range of business webinars, on-demand E-Learning Education, our Talk to an Expert Advisories, or browse our business articles.