What's a Good Conversion Rate in eCommerce?

Conversion rate optimization (CRO) is perhaps the most crucial factor to keeping your digital doors open.

Think of it as the gas mileage of a car. The better it is, the further you can shoot forward, while spending less to get there. CRO propels your shop to new heights and converts your marketing spend into profits.

CRO is at the forefront of all the work we do for our clients from design to development and ongoing support. It’s so important, we published a white paper called “Achieve Conversion Rate Optimization and Wicked Growth Using Shopify Plus”. If you think you would find this even remotely beneficial, send us an email at team@simplistic.com and let us know you're interested.

Mouthful of a title aside, and unlike fluffy, blah-blah white papers out there, ours is brief and punchy, getting right to the core fundamentals you need to know. 

Calculating CRO

Before we discuss acceptable conversion rates and stellar ones too, we first need to understand how to calculate it in the first place.

CRO is calculated by dividing the total number of conversions by the number of visitors and multiplying by 100.

Here is a realistic example. An online cosmetics retailer converts sales on 240 bottles of toner last month with 6,500 visitors coming to this product page. We divide 240 by 6,500 and multiply this number by 100 (240 / 6,500 x 100 = 3.69%). A 3.69% conversion rate would be an impressive goal to strive for and is significantly higher than the average eCommerce rate.

Are you hitting the mark?

Conversion rates vary drastically by industry. For point-of-sale and legal services, conversion rates can reach up to 7%. But this isn’t the case for most industries, especially eCommerce which has become saturated in almost every category.

We live in a digital world and therefore, we shop in one too. 

Recent data and surveys show that the average conversion rate for eCommerce shops sits at around 2.86%. This might feel like a puny percentage, but if your products and margins are priced correctly, and you’re driving a steady flow of traffic to your site, you can grow and scale and work wonders with a conversion rate of 2%.

Obviously, a $3,000 treadmill will perform differently than a $3 box of stickers. Yet, the same principles apply for how to sell something online and achieve the ultimate goal, a customer getting to the checkout cart and beyond.

Conversion rates fluctuate not only with consumer behaviors and spending habits, but also with the time of the year, and the constant iterations your shop should be making along the way.

Look at the subtle fluctuations in conversion rates month-to-month across eCommerce as an industry from 2020 to 2021.

E-commerce conversion rates are still at an all-time high as the global pandemic ushered buyers out of physical stores and onto devices.

Target training

You can’t hit the mark, unless you have been practicing your aim, over and over again.

Your shop’s conversion rate can change with one seemingly inconsequential tweak to how you layout your home page or prompt a consumer to make a purchase. Take a peek at how Shopify instructs merchants on how to increase conversion rates.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vNIcSMLyutc

A/B tests are vital in identifying what works better for your site and implementing changes accordingly. Half of all marketers employ A/B tests and the act of testing has quickly become the preferred method for achieving CRO.

According to a 99 Firms article, Dell, the computer technology company, reportedly tested over 10,000 landing pages until selecting one that rocketed their conversion rate up by 300%.

Don’t be afraid to alter anything on your site in order to make it better. Nothing is set in stone and there’s no perfect formula. 

From the site layout to the copy on each page to the placement of buttons and the sizes of photos, everything is fair game and can be done better. 

Consider yourself an obsessive artist, your e-commerce shop being your most coveted work. You constantly poke at, probe, and alter its appearance, never feeling fully satisfied and always finding room for improvement each time you return to it.

If there was ever a formula to achieve CRO, it would be this: constant iteration.

Size yourself up and keep moving

Stay up to date by reading marketing publications and resources like Shopify and Smart Insights to understand how your shop is performing within your category and the greater e-commerce industry as a whole.

Run A/B tests and track your data using Shopify Plus to get accurate insights on what works and what doesn’t. 

Nerdy as it might sound, CRO strategies light our team up more than a double-shot first thing in the morning. So shoot us a quick note if you want to get the conversation going. We love this stuff.