Ecommerce conversion optimization has become well established over the past few years. But it is not adopted by all merchants because of the perceived time and difficulty.
For merchants that use WordPress platforms, plugins can simplify difficult and time consuming tasks. In this article, I’ll review key conversion rate optimization tips, as well as 10 WordPress tools and plugins to help with the process.
A/B and Multivariate Testing Plugins
- Visual Website Optimizer WordPress Plugin. A/B testing is at the heart of conversion rate optimization for ecommerce. It compares your improved page elements against the originals. A/B testing is where the theories are put to test. One of the most popular testing platforms is Visual Website Optimizer. You can add it your WordPress site without touching a line of code.
- Optimizely WordPress Plugin. Optimizely is one of the easiest A/B and multivariate testing platforms. From the second you hit Optimizely’s home page and are prompted to test any URL and experiment with the design, you realize how user-friendly it is. Once you create an Optimizely account, install this plugin and drop in your product code to get testing.
Customer Feedback Tools
- Olark Chat. Olark live chat puts you in front of shoppers while they are considering a purchase on your site. This is the best time to answer questions. There is a WordPress plugin for Olark, but it’s not developed by the company. Olark’s own WordPress integration guide instructs that you simply drop the code into a text widget.
- Qualaroo Customer Surveys. Qualaroo helps you understand the difficulties your shoppers have on your website. You can ask qualitative questions to get the answer to why visitors aren’t converting. Qualaroo has a small minimized bar that sits at the bottom of your website and nudges your customers at certain points of the sales and lead-generation process. The insight you glean from visitors will help you to make smarter A/B tests and permanent user interface changes. There are no Qualaroo WordPress plugins to my knowledge. But Qualaroo provides a simple guide for adding the code to your WordPress header.
Product Page Plugins
- Cloud Zoom WooCommerce Extension. High quality product photos are now the standard for ecommerce shops. You can show high quality detail of your products with the Cloud Zoom plugin for WooCommerce, a popular WordPress ecommerce platform. When shoppers hover over a product image, they can see the details, similar to what Zappos does for its product images. A shopper that can see more about your product right on your product page is more likely to convert and complete the sale.
- WooCommerce Review for Discount Extension. WooCommerce has plenty of helpful extensions. The “Review for Discount” extension encourages visitors to leave reviews and then receive a discount once completed. Reviews add trust, credibility, and unique content to your product pages. Discounts entice shoppers to make a purchase before the discount expires. Both are excellent methods for increasing your conversion rate.
Personalization Plugins
- WP GeoIP Country Redirect. When you have shoppers from different countries with different languages and currencies, it’s key to direct them to the relevant pages to reduce the bounce rate. With the “GeoIP Country Redirect” plugin you can direct visitors from specific countries to the pages you want them to see first. This is a must have for sites that cater to an international visitors.
- Jigoshop Wish List Plugin. Jigoshop is a popular WordPress ecommerce platform. The Jigoshop Wish List plugin allows shoppers on that platform to create wish lists of their favorite products. Many of us have experienced Amazon’s clever use of wish lists, when it shows products that shoppers have added to their wish lists to entice the shopper to add them to the cart. With this plugin, Jigoshop users can help shoppers personalize their experiences and create wish lists.
Checkout Tools
- WooCommerce Points and Rewards. The checkout process is where many conversions are lost. Once the shopper sees the total price and starts filling out information, he can get impatient and abandon the cart — sometimes for good. You can encourage the sale by offering discounts with WooCommerce Points and Rewards. Set the points to whatever scale you want and have customers redeem these points for discounts or special offers. It’s an innovative solution to cart abandonment.
- McAfee Secure. Security is not specific to WordPress ecommerce. It is critical to all ecommerce sites. Show shoppers that their sensitive information is safe by integrating web security safeguards like McAfee Secure into your WordPress site. Along with SSL encryption, web security safeguards scan your site for vulnerabilities and malicious threats, to help protect customer data, which will likely increase your conversions.