For any marketing website, conversion goals are the single most important feature, so understanding what conversion goals are is the first step in building an effective web marketing campaign.
A conversion goal is basically a step in your sales process. Specifically, it is the ‘next step’ that you want your customers to take when they visit your site or complete a previous step.
As we talk through this, remember that a conversion goal and a sales process is not necessarily tied to the sale of a product; we could easily be talking about supplying a service, generating a membership, or asking for simple participation. In this context, your ’sales process’ is the collection of steps you want your visitors to complete, and a ‘conversion goal’ is a milestone of that process. Bare in mind, too, that a conversion goal can be the completion of a single step such as the visitation of a specific page, or the completion of the entire process such as a sale or a signature.
In a nutshell, a conversion goal is the specific task you can measure that demonstrates when you have achieved success. The easiest way to come up with your conversion goals is to ask yourself ‘What do I want my visitors to do when they come to my page?’
Examples of conversion goals can include any of the following:
- Completing a form
- Making a payment
- Forwarding information
- Subscribing
- Leaving a comment
Note that on a website the measurement of a conversion goal is in loading a specific page. For instance if your conversion goal is to complete a form, the measurement of that goal may be the loading of a ‘Thank You’ page that is triggered when the visitor hits the submit button. In this way you are measuring the results of an action that confirm the action.
When it comes to blogging, you’ll want to think through your conversion goals each time you write. Ask yourself how your subject is going to support your conversion goal, and how you can direct your readers to complete it. In this way you can support your conversion goals with links, calls-to-action, and supporting information.
Every post should contain some form of direction toward your conversion goals, and you should be focused on measuring them for success.
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Tags: blog copywriting, blogging, Conversion Goals, Copywr, online marketing
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Spot on, Cary. A thoughtful reminder of a specific, marketing process task that’s critical and often overlooked. I think the pattern for many of us is that we forget to ask ourselves what “the goal” is each time we touch somebody along the digital engagement continuum. There should always be a goal. That doesn’t necessarily mean selling something and collecting money each time. It simply means having a purpose. Everyone is looking for ways to better measure the effectiveness of their online efforts, yet we forget to put the mechanics in place to help with that measurement. Great specifics. Thanks.