3 Simple Ways to Listen to your Customers & Boost Conversions

Customer centricity has been an established business strategy for several years. No doubt you’ll have read countless articles and emails informing you about the benefits of becoming a truly customer-centric organisation. However, adopting a customer-centric mindset is a big culture shift for many businesses. We realise it can be a challenge to know where to start, that’s why we’ve put together our top tips to help you listen to your customers and boost your online conversions.

1. User surveys, a quick and easy way to get started with your UX research

Our first tip is to adopt user research and surveys. They can be quick, simple and easy to set up and depending on how you phrase your questions, you can gain valuable qualitative and quantitative data from your user surveys that will help to improve your user experience.

3 key takeaways for a successful user survey:

• KISS – K.I.S.S. or “Keep it simple stupid” is an expression we live by here at Maginus. After all, complexity is the enemy of execution. If you ask recipients to spend 40 mins answering 50 questions, they simply won’t do it. Keep it to a minimum. Be open and up-front in terms of how many questions you want your recipients to answer and give them a guestimate for how long it’ll take.
• What’s in it for me? If you’re an Ecommerce business, chances are you’ll have plenty of products that you can offer as an incentive. Failing that, why not offer a discount – “What irritated you about our website today? Get a 5% discount off your next purchase by answering these 5 quick-fire questions. Not bad for a few minutes out of your day”.
• Use scoring and feedback techniques – by mixing up the type of questions you present, you’ll get both quantitative and qualitative data. The good thing about quantitative questions is that they can be mapped on a graph – meaning you can get MOM or YOY comparisons. Whereas, questions based on opinion will undoubtedly give you more valuable and in-depth feedback but are harder to compare year-on-year

2. Listen to your Customers to Boost Conversions

If you aren’t talking to your users already, start today. Invest time in understanding who your customers are and what they think of your user experience.

Whether you like it or not, your users already have an opinion on their website experience and your brand from the moment they land on your site. But are your users’ first impressions and responses in line with your vision and goals? Do you know why users choose to shop with you over the competition? Why did those users leave before completing the sale?

Many businesses can see what is happening on their site but don’t prioritise the time to find out why and understand what factors are influencing user behaviour. They are a fickle bunch and it doesn’t take much to distract them. People will naturally take the path of least resistance when shopping online and generally don’t notice all the information and little details that you, or your marketing team, have slaved over. To overcome this hurdle, there are a broad range of qualitative and quantitative research methods you can undertake from user interviews to remote user testing. With several competitively priced tools available online - you can gain valuable insight quickly and easily in just a few days.

How to get started:

• User Sessions - One of the easiest ways to get started with user testing is to watch user session recordings. Make a start by signing up for a free HotJar account and see how users are using your site
• Usability Test Checklist - Nielsen Normann Group also have a strong Usability test checklist to help you make the most of your user testing sessions
• First Impressions Count - You can quickly track users first impressions of potential designs using Five Second Test.

3. Thinking of re-platforming? Think again.

Understanding your customers pain points will help you reduce any friction and ultimately lead to better conversions. If you’re already thinking of re-platforming, what better place to gather insights than your current website! Listen to more voices and destroy the silos in your business. Collect customer feedback and insight from your customer service team who can report back on your customer complaints department.

Our advice:

• Adopt usability tests - Usability tests are great for you to get buy-in from stakeholders. It’s one thing to hear about issues users are having, but nothing beats actually seeing your customers struggle to get through the checkout. Before launching head-first onto your new Ecommerce platform, there may be quick-wins you can implement without needing to re-platform or valuable insights that can inform your new site’s design. The user research that you can carry out on your current site to help you analyse known problem areas that need attention. We find that user research is invaluable in the preparation for a re-design and as part of a regular UX check-up. Ultimately it will help you optimise the user journey and increase Ecommerce conversions in the process.
• Accept that you are not the user - Your business must accept that you are not creating the website for you, but for the end-user. The most common mistake that companies make from the outset is neglecting the wants of their users and instead they focus on what they think their users want or what they want their users to do. Avoid this approach at all costs. Instead, validate your prototypes, identify issues and carry out thorough user testing. Then continue to test, iterate and test again as you improve your website over time.
• Don’t try and do everything at once - At Maginus, we conduct testing at all stages in the website’s lifecycle. Our approach of Research – Design – Test – Iterate – Repeat - leads to a backlog of key areas where we focus our attention on. Prioritisation is key and having an action plan of areas to focus will help you set clear objectives.
• Carry out a User Experience or Ecommerce Audit - Before making any changes or reviewing new website designs, we recommend you do an audit of your current site and the key user journeys. This will give you the statistical foundation to compare the impact of your choices before and after go-live. At this stage it’s worth defining what success looks like for you.

We believe an excellent UX is no longer a ‘nice to have’. Ecommerce managers can’t afford to sit back whilst the digital landscape evolves around them. We believe that technology combined with strong UX and design should always support businesses in achieving their strategic goals.

If you feel unsure about where to start on your UX journey or if you want to find out how to increase your conversion rate - then why not request your bespoke Ecommerce audit. Alternatively, drop us a line on 0161 946 0000.

About Maginus

For retailers – big and small – for whom success depends on growing online, we provide what it takes to sell better online. We do this by delivering class-leading Ecommerce websites that drive online growth and sales fulfilment solutions that facilitate next day delivery and customer service excellence.

We are independent and technology-agnostic but with close partnerships to several leading technology companies so we can always recommend the most appropriate platform for our customers' needs.

With a 20-year heritage in technology implementations, we take pride in helping our customers achieve long term benefits from the solutions we provide. We can do this, because we've done it before, for people just like you.