The 5 Asks of Conversion Rate Optimization
We as internet marketers are always asking our visitors to do something. We ask them to engage, we ask them to click, we ask them to convert. We’re very needy marketers aren’t we?
In order to get more visitors to do what we ask, we employ tactics from tried and true direct marketing and call it conversion rate optimization (CRO). These methods do work and more visitors take more action and buy our products. In so doing that changes them and changes the story they tell them selves about who they are.
Here’s an example of what I mean.
People who buy an Apple product care about design or become people who care about design and individuality. The product, be it an iMac, iPhone or any of the other iProducts out there or yet to come is irrelevant. It’s the story in our heads about ourselves that the product enforces or creates. The iProduct changes who we are, by changing or bolstering that internal story. We are in effect changed.
This is an extension of the “Commitment And Consistency” principle of Robert Cialdini. We have committed to the purchase of iPhone, then an iPad, then an iMac and on and on, and now we must be consistent with who we are or have become because of those purchases. We’re no longer someone who buys a new computer, were someone who is an independent spirit.
So if what we buy changes us by changing our internal stories, then what we do is also an influencing factor on what we become.
And as Internet marketers what we do is, conversion rate optimization. Then what is CRO asking us as Internet marketers to become?
The First Ask
Internet marketers who do CRO are more sophisticated and intelligent than the average marketer.
Our internal story is beginning to take shape. We’re smarter and better and happier about ourselves for optimizing, this is an easy ask we comply with naturally.
The Second Ask
CRO Internet marketers are data driven.
We’re being asked to become logical by the numbers, to make decisions rationally that are backed by data, relying less on hunches. We may not be prepared for what CRO is asking of us here, but as we get deeper into optimization and run more split tests we will need to face off against this ask at some point.
The Third Ask
CRO is asking us to be smarter, better marketers than our peers.
We can no longer accept success or failure for that matter without knowing why. We must understand what makes our visitors tick and why this particular hypothesis won over the others. Learning is quickly becoming how we keep score against our peers.
The Forth Ask
More ROI and bottom line focused is more important to us than ever before.
No longer is this a concern of the CEO or wall street, this is now our job as marketers to be bottom line focused. It’s how we measure our impact on the value we add.
The Final Ask
We are being asked to be more accountable.
No one else is responsible for the numbers. We are either contributing and making a difference or we become useless and out dated. Success is riding on our shoulders and it is our burden to carry.
This is certainly a lot to ask of us, and will change who we are and who we become, but I feel this new breed of CRO marketers are up to the task and we will al become better for it in the long run.
So, what else is CRO asking of you as an Internet marketer?
What’s important to who you are?
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