Marketers’ Focus On Conversion Rates Appears To Pay Off

Marketers have shown a growing awareness and interest in conversion rate optimization (CRO), according to a recent study, “Conversion Rate Optimization Report 2015.” The resources, time and budget businesses are dedicating to CRO appears to be paying off, as over a quarter (27 percent) of companies said they were ‘very’ or ‘quite’ satisfied with their conversion rates, up by 23 percent compared to last year.

The seventh iteration of the Conversion Rate Optimization Report, produced by digital business research and training provider Econsultancy and multichannel personalization company RedEye, looks at the conversion strategies and tactics organizations are using, as well as the tools and processes employed for improving conversion rates. The research is based on a survey of nearly 900 digital marketers carried out between July and September 2015.

In the seven years of the survey, businesses have grown more likely to have the right processes in place and to have adopted a structured approach to conversion rate optimization. Almost half (46 percent) of client-side respondents say their companies now have more than one person directly responsible for improving conversion rates, the highest proportion since 2009. Additionally, more than three-fifths (64 percent) feel they have “quite a lot” or “a great deal” of control over their conversion rates, the highest percentage in the last six years.

“Improvement rates have plateaued over the past three years [one percentage point change over this period] but satisfaction shows significant increase, which begs the question, why are people so satisfied with this lack of improvement?,” says Garry Lee, CEO of RedEye. “Companies are starting to be braver in their testing and as a result accept that not all of these more daring tests will work. They are prepared and even satisfied when this happens. Whereas previously failed tests were considered unacceptable, now they’re part of the process. This is a real reflection of the growing maturity of the industry accepting that we’ve probably eaten all the low-hanging fruit and need to start getting braver and smarter in our future developments.”

The full 2015 Econsultancy / RedEye Conversion Rate Optimization Report is available for download here.