Blue chalk dark bg

Honest Marketing report - Banner image

Brands that take a stand: Marketers who match consumers’ desire for purpose come out on top 

[Get the report here](https://business.trustpilot.com/guides-reports/build-trusted-brand/brands-that-take-a-stand?cta=banner)


Get more out of your customer reviews with our case studies, webinars and videos. Find the latest trends to promote your company in search and manage your online reputation.

Turn Browsers into Buyers - Trustpilot Blog

Reviews - Turn Browsers into Buyers

consumer experiences matter

For an eCommerce site, personalized customer experiences are all about tailoring the shopping experience for each individual customer or potential customer. These are the types of experiences keep your customers returning to your site for more.

Leaders in Consumer Experience deliver, on average, [17%](https://econsultancy.com/blog/68069-customer-experience-drives-revenue-growth-but-marketers-lack-cx-skills/) of revenue growth within 5 years, whereas poorer consumer experience departments deliver only 3% over the same period.

Improved consumer experiences have become one of the main key success factors for retailers to win and retain shoppers. Indeed, today, a totally satisfied customer contributes [2.6](http://infoquestcrm.co.uk/about/case-studies-2/) times as much revenue as a somewhat satisfied customer, and 14 times as much revenue as a somewhat dissatisfied customer.

So how do you make sure your shoppers’ expectations are met and exceeded?

Virtual Reality could be the answer...

### What's a personalized consumer experience?

The best way to explain this is to put you in the shoes of your local brick-and-mortar retail store owner. Picture yourself knowing the names of every single person who comes into your establishment. Sounds personal, right?

Now, imagine yourself knowing which of your products each one truly loves, and which are considered their favorites. You understand exactly which language they speak and the offers and deals they jump on regularly. Your memory bank keeps up with every single item they’ve ever purchased from and you know when they’ll need those items again.

This is possible, without needing perfect memory. Having all of this data on your customers allows you to create a personalized and customized consumer experience that matches their wants, desires, and needs. With that, comes the ability to plan each step a consumer needs to take in order to get them to make a purchase from your store.

Personalized consumer experiences can also extend post-purchase, allowing you to keep in touch with them even after they’ve made a purchase. So, every once in a while, you could simply send them a quick note to see how their purchase is going or let them know about new product launches and current deals and sales on items you know they actually like.

### Make each individual purchase a customized consumer experience

For an eCommerce site, personalized consumer experiences are all about customizing the shopping experience for each individual customer or potential customer. These are the types of experiences keep your customers returning to your site for more!

No doubt, [personalizing your customers’ online experiences](https://www.shopify.com/partners/blog/when-should-you-personalize-the-ecommerce-experience) could be the key to taking your site’s revenue over the top. According to Shopify:

* 75% of online shoppers like brands to personalize their offerings and messages
* 74% of consumers get frustrated by content that isn’t relevant to their lives
* Your online conversion rate can improve by about 8% with personalized online consumer experiences

By implementing this marketing tactic, you’ll continue to succeed and win for years to come!

### The benefits of personalizing your consumers’ experiences

Most online retailers have already implemented some type of customer personalization strategy. But for a site to flourish, you need to graduate far beyond simple entry-level tactics. Getting past structural obstacles and various barriers allows you to come up with strategies that are tailored to your product, your industry, and your type of customer.

A survey recently conducted found that 55% of online users in the US ranked Amazon as the [#1 digital platform](https://www.emarketer.com/Report/Personalization-Retail-Latest-Trends-Challenges/2002008), citing them as having the “best personalized consumer experiences.” Other online moguls, such as Google and Netflix, have invested heavily in personalized experiences, knowing its value. They’ve customized content as well as recommendations, driving click-through rates through the roof.  

These days, most online shoppers prefer to use mobile devices to browse for products and savvy shoppers expect their suggestions to be relevant to spend less time browsing. They want to find what they’re looking for quickly and, repeat shoppers like to easily find products they’ve purchased in the past..

### How to implement personalized consumer experiences on eCommerce sites

Online shopping is the way to go for most consumers. This requires a different approach for retailers who are used to having brick-and-mortar locations. When shopping at brick-and-mortar locations, consumers can see products up close, touch them, try them on, etc… But, when shopping online, your customers need to be able to ask questions and voice concerns about your products because they can’t physically interact with them.

Struggling to find a creative way to personalize your consumers’ experiences on your eCommerce platform? How about giving them the ability to chat with your customer service team in real-time? Now, that’s a valuable way to provide support that feels personal and makes consumers feel valued.

One of your goals as the owner of an online business should be to prevent your customers from becoming frustrated between the browsing and buying stages. Making purchases on your site needs to be enjoyable, painless, and most importantly, fast.

### 5 quick ways to implement personalized experiences for online eCommerce customers

__1. Personalized customer communications__

One-size-fits-all style emails aren’t personal enough to reel in valuable clicks. In order to build a loyal customer base, you need to invoke those fuzzy, warm feelings that create connections.

Yes, you should send out regular emails to keep in touch with your followers. But, know what your goals are in preparation for you emails. Are you looking to grow the number of subscribers on your list? Optimize click-through rates? Or increase traffic to your site?

One way to encourage this is to create multiple lists or groups. This allows you to send your customers newsletters that actually bring value to their lives. You’ll also be able to create multiple personalized landing pages, so each group ends up on a webpage that’s relevant to them personally.

__2. Offer relevant discounts & coupon codes__

As an online eCommerce site, your overhead costs are generally lower than brick-and-mortar stores. Plus, your platform completely automates the selling and buying processes, saving you time and money. So, why not extend some of those savings to your loyal customers?

Personalize the types of discounts and coupon codes you offer your customers based on past orders and future needs. For example, those who purchased printer ink six months ago might need a refill. Make sure their discounts specifically relate to their past purchase in order to stay relevant.

__3. Engage your target customers with video content__

Instructional videos are great ways to increase your email subscribers. You can personalize many different types of videos to meet various customer needs, including:

* Product-specific tips and tricks
* Strategies relevant for your audience
* Product tutorials

Use videos to educate your customers online about your products, your business, and their interests. Make sure you keep videos engaging and entertaining. Here are some ideas for making instructional videos for your eCommerce site:

* How your products work
* Useful ways to use your products
* Unique uses for your products
* How your products differ from the competition
* Ways to NOT use your products
* Funny anecdotes and bloopers sent in by customers who use your products

Post your videos on your eCommerce site, social media networks, even email newsletters. This will help grow your subscribers over time.

Why? The simple answer is, video content engages online users, and instructional videos allow you to connect a human face to your brand. This increase in brand engagement helps increase conversions.

Providing a personalized consumer experience with video content will help you give your customers the confidence they need when buying online. 

If you'd like to learn more about the importance of trust signals when building personalized experiences, give the piece below a read:

The importance of trust signals in the customer buying journey

Why personalized experiences can boost conversions

Why an omni-channel strategy can help you succeed

Today, omni-channel strategies standardise messaging, approaches and marketing, so that the customer can move from channel to channel whilst keeping their experience as consistent as it can be. This approach often leads to success. Here's why.

Before 2020, many traditional consumer businesses and new companies were already moving away from models that are shop-centric and geographically-focused, to ones that are customer-centric and virtually borderless by adopting a virtual presence. After lockdown, this is likely to become even more true.

However, migrating to a customer-centric strategy isn't all that easy. It means excelling in engaging with consumers across all channels: web, mobile, social and in-store. Omni-channel strategies standardises messaging, approaches and marketing, so that the customer moves from channel to channel whilst keeping their experience as consistent as it can be.

Aberdeen Group Inc. claims that companies with the strongest omni-channel strategies retain, on average, 89% of their customers, as compared to 33% for companies with weak omni-channel strategies.

This approach represents a change that empowers not only consumers but also online retailers, who enjoy numerous advantages over brick & mortar shops. This begs the question: how will retail stores, both large and small, survive digitalisation, especially coming out of lockdown?

## Retailers must catch up with omni-channel consumers

Consumers are leading and shaping the move to online and retailers are lagging behind. As the global consumer refines their approach and adopts new technologies, even when retailers catch up, they find themselves behind the trend once again.

To become more flexible and adapt to new behaviours, they must have a better understanding of their customers and their needs in order to change the way they market their products and run their stores.

[An omni-channel presence](/reviews/build-trusted-brand/why-an-omni-channel-experience-is-your-best-christmas-present) matches messaging and ensures there’s no disconnect across channels. Brands with a disjointed message across digital and traditional channels (commonly known as a multi-channel approach) could end up losing ground in the market.

When first confronted with in-store shoppers researching products and comparing prices on their mobile devices, bricks & mortar shops worried whether they could compete with online retailers. These retailers might think they don’t have the technological infrastructure, the money, or the staff dedicated to meet consumers at their preferred digital storefront.

But the task isn't as impossible or expensive as it may seem.

For shops who anticipate and adapt to these changes, there are great possibilities and changes ahead. The survivors will be those who have recognised the omni-channel trend and are constantly looking for ways to improve their customer experience in an omni-channel way.

Here’s how retailers can jumpstart their online presence to catch up to the competition and increase their sales.

## Breaking down the online/offline mentality

Offline businesses allow face-to-face interaction, which ultimately creates better customer relationships. Online businesses don’t allow face-to-face interaction, so customers can not physically see a product. Offline businesses usually target a specific locality, whereas online businesses reach a wider audience.

But with bigger companies now playing on both fronts, it’s time for smaller businesses to break down the online/offline mentality and create a seamless flow of information from store to shelves to online resources for consumers to use throughout their buying journey.

Shopping has become a 24/7 activity that is easily conducted through a multitude of devices. Today, everything is interactive, and when it comes to meeting consumers’ omni-channel needs, the storefront is no exception.

By meeting consumers on both physical and digital channels, retailers can improve the shopping experience for browsers. One of the most powerful tools retailers possess in their crucial quest to integrate both offline and online operations is to integrate a digital presence in their brick & mortar shops.

According to Forrester Research, 54% of all retail transactions are influenced by the web, showcasing how physical store locations and web interactions are a must for all retailers.

By following the omni-channel trend, retailers can augment the shopping experience in stores by offering the information consumers need within easy reach, whether in-store or on a device. This creates a unified brand experience that allows consumers to begin the customer journey regardless of channel.

The Apple Store is a great example of the potential value that stores hold in providing the right kind of shopping experience for consumers who visit physical shops. The website directs consumers to make an in-store appointment via an online tool, and in-store “geniuses” often redirect customers online when faced with issues like out-of-stock products. The process is smooth and easy from the consumer’s perspective, and showcases the brand’s expertise.

Apple store genius bar

Another great example is Benefit Cosmetics. Initially founded as a beauty boutique named The Face Place, the now-famous brand is one of the corner shops that has observed rapid growth thanks to its focus on digitalisation.

Benefit Cosmetics has put its data to use by intertwining the online and in-store experiences. Customers can book appointments online, through an interactive and personalised website. 

With hundreds of stores everywhere, customers are still able to pick their local branch, and pick their beautician, which still allows them to build a relationship with Benefit’s store associates. By letting their customers book a service online, employees have access to customer information, which helps them deliver a seamless experience from online to offline channels.

Benefit offline appointment online booking

But what new technologies could help small retailers unify their in-store experiences with online ones?

## How small retailers can improve their digital efforts

Creating loyalty through clienteling can be a game changer for small retailers. Turn store associates into brand advocates by giving them access to customer information and inventory anywhere in the store. Allow them to connect with their customers on a deeper level by understanding their needs and preferences thanks to existing data. Unique integration of clienteling apps enables both customer interaction and customer satisfaction.

Opt for inventory management systems that enable store-to-store or store-to-customer shipments. Customers should have the ability to shop in-store and preview their favourite product, whether it’s available or not. This removes the unfortunate scenario where a customer doesn’t want to walk away with the product from the store. By offering them an option to order it online on the spot or schedule a delivery online, you’re reducing any friction that may lead to an unfulfilled sale.

In-store beacons that deliver mobile coupons based on location are also a great way to start integrating a digital presence in your brick & mortar shop.  

Implementing these new technologies can be a challenge for small merchants whose budgets are limited, but retailers need to invest in digitalisation and respond to today’s consumers’ needs or else they’ll be left behind, struggling for sales.

Smaller budgets can start with in-store Wi-Fi, in-store pickup, in-store customer reviews, or scannable coupons for in-store savings.

Empowering sales associates can help enhance customer experience and stand out from the competition. 83% of consumers believe they’re more knowledgeable than retail store staff so associates need to be able to answer detailed questions about products. Providing ways to make accessing product information as easy as scanning a bar code is essential in giving them the ability to answer customer questions. Associates with access to past purchase information or details could also help them make more informed recommendations to customers.

in-store tablets

Consumers and shoppers are looking for as much transparency as possible about the products they’re interested in. Think in-store tablets, virtual reality, demonstration videos, user guides, and even QR codes, a trend which seems to be growing as lockdown measures start to ease.

Giving them the opportunity to access information from in-store devices can encourage shoppers to make a purchase by streamlining the customer experience.

## To sum up

Small retailers with physical stores must find a way to continue evolving and engaging with consumers. Integrating an omni-channel strategy and delivering a relevant, individualised experience across all touch points will help break the online/offline barrier, no matter the size of your business.

In the rush to digitise the entire shopping experience, many have ignored some of the important aspects of shopping, such as the relationship between employees and shoppers.

The more you can make your experience feel like a seamless transition from your website to your store, the more comfortable your customers will be shopping with you.

Many industries are affected by these changes, and a few big brands are choosing to migrate towards an omni-channel customer journey, making sure the customer experience is equally as good at every touch point of the journey.*

If you'd like to find out more about the importance of customer experience, and why social proof can influence consumers at all touchpoints, click the link below to read our latest report.

Why and how social proof influences consumers

How an omni-channel approach can lead to success

maintaining conversions as shops reopen with the help of social proof

Social proof is a great way to boost conversions whether you're looking at sales onsite, email CTR, or ad performance. Here are 6 examples to inspire you to use social proof to improve your conversion rate right away. 

In short, any positive comments about you, your company or your product are considered social proof.

It might be a concept as old as marketing itself, but the rise of social media and the current economic landscape have enhanced the importance and effect social proof can have on conversion rates. 

Today, leveraging other people’s opinions helps convert more. That’s why, social proof, by providing third-party validation, helps make businesses more trustworthy.  Indeed, a [Canvas8 and Trustpilot study](/reviews/build-trusted-brand/4-things-every-business-owner-should-know-about-the-state-of-reviews) found that 89% of global consumers check online reviews as part of their online buying journey, and 49% of global consumers consider positive reviews one of their top 3 purchase influences.

As many countries start easing their lockdown measures, some brick and mortar shops are preparing to reopen soon. But with consumers doing most of their shopping online at the moment, we could see an overall dip in online conversions when high street shops reopen this summer.

To help eCommerce businesses, we’ve put together 6 ways brands can use social proof to boost their conversion rate.

## 6 Social proof examples to boost your online conversions as brick and mortar shops reopen

### 1. Reviews and ratings

Today, [consumers rely on online reviews](/reviews/build-trusted-brand/4-things-every-business-owner-should-know-about-the-state-of-reviews) when making buying decisions online. This is why every business should leverage reviews as social proof. 

The same Trustpilot and Canvas8 study found that, today, 55% of consumers would prefer to use an open and transparent review platform, and 49% of consumers believe many dishonest brands are guilty of manipulating customer reviews to improve their reputation. 

On an open platform, anyone is free to write a review as long as they comply with the guidelines set out by the platform, and verified, genuine customer feedback can not be edited or deleted by companies. If you’re considering using a review platform, opt for an open one, which shows authentic and real reviews from customers.

Displaying online reviews on as many channels as possible (social media, online shop, paid ads…) is a great way to boost customer confidence throughout the buying journey. Here are some ways brands have found success leveraging reviews as social proof before:

fabletics online reviews homepage

jewelers mutual reviews at checkout

Harry's instagram ad with reviews

### 2. Live or dynamic data

Helping your consumer make a decision based on the wisdom of the crowd can be challenging, but providing as much live or dynamic data as possible can make a huge difference to your conversion rate. Here are a couple of things we recommend including on your product pages:

- The number of visitors currently looking at the product page
- The number of people who bought this item over the last 24 hours
- Other items consumers who have looked at this page ended up buying
- Bestsellers of the week or month

Instilling urgency throughout the customer journey can be a powerful way to increase your company’s conversions. 

Here are some examples of how you can leverage live data as social proof directly on-site:

social proof example live data 1

social proof example live data 2

### 3. User-generated content

User-generated content (UGC) describes any form of content such as reviews, blog posts, discussions, photos, or videos created by customers and publicly available to others.

Research shows that UGC is considered to be [50%](https://www.adweek.com/digital/millennials-trust-user-generated-content-50-traditional-media-infographic/) more trustworthy than traditional marketing. For this reason, word of mouth has become one of the most powerful tools out there, making customer advocacy one of the best things a business can invest in. 

Daniel Wellington makes good with their Instagram account by asking customers to share photos of themselves wearing one of their watches using the hashtag #DanielWellington, and picking the best photo every day with the hashtag #DWPickoftheDay. This gives customers an incentive to participate and improves visibility for the Daniel Wellington brand.

social proof example UGC 1

And Daniel Wellington isn’t the only brand leveraging user-generated content to boost their marketing efforts. GoPro also shares their customers’ pictures to promote their products on social channels.

gopro social proof UGC 

Using customers to generate content is a great way to engage with new visitors, boost loyalty, and showcase social proof on your marketing channels.

### 4. Media mentions

If your business has recently been mentioned in the media, you might want to consider adding the mention to your website.

From TV ads to magazine features or even newspaper shoutouts, if your brand has been mentioned in the press, it will build up your credibility and trustworthiness for new visitors and potential customers, pushing them to buy from you faster.

The famous Australian beauty brand Sand & Sky feature their press mentions on their homepage to build credibility at the top of the funnel.

social proof example media mention

### 5. Influencer endorsements

In the last year, we observed an [11% decline in trust globally](https://uk.business.trustpilot.com/reviews/build-trusted-brand/4-things-every-business-owner-should-know-about-the-state-of-reviews), with only 71% of people admitting they trust consumer brands. That’s why self-promotion simply isn’t enough for businesses out there. To gain consumer trust, brands need third-party validation.

Finding influencers or micro-influencers to do brand endorsements may seem like a challenging task, but it will most likely help you build brand awareness, grow your business, and therefore increase your conversions. 

Micro-influencers are more approachable and usually have a niche area of expertise, which means you’re more likely to get their attention when contacting them, and get their audience’s attention when promoting your brand. 

If you’re no longer considered a ‘small’ company, targeting bigger influencers might be a better option for you. Influencer approval can come in the form of paid endorsements or unpaid ones. Sending some of your products or offering a free service to an influencer could lead to free social media publicity. 

Sharing specific content through ‘famous’ influencers also means your audience is more likely to be interested in what you’re sharing, which will help boost your conversions.

The bigger the brand, the easier it gets to partner with ‘celebrities’. If you’re no longer considered a ‘small’ company, consider targeting bigger influencers or celebrities, [like Aveeno did](https://youtu.be/C0_dzQhSz4Y).

### 6. Customer stories

Last but not least, customer stories or long testimonials are known to provide high value social proof. They’re a great way for businesses to showcase what other customers have achieved with their help. They’re also a great way to let visitors know what to expect from using your business.

Highlighting success stories not only builds credibility earlier in the customer journey, but also provides valuable third-party validation to new visitors. Some of our favourite ways of sharing success stories is social media posts and short videos! 

HiSmile has a whole Instagram account dedicated to their customers’ stories and testimonials, with real results from real people.

HiSmile stories and testimonials page

As brick and mortar shops start to reopen this summer, online shops’ conversion rates might take a toll. These 6 social proof examples should help you keep converting your traffic as life slowly gets back to normal.

If you’d like to learn more about the importance of trust signals in the buying journey, read our free report below.



Why And How Social Proof Influences Consumers

6 Social proof examples to boost online conversions as shops start to reopen

boosting your conversions in difficult times

If your conversion rate isn't budging, or worse, dropping, these 7 eCommerce tips might help you get through these difficult times.

Online shopping may have taken over completely in the last couple of weeks, but many industries still remain in the dark. Growing your bottom line during this crisis means you’ll need to focus on increasing and optimising your conversion rate, which is far from simple in times like these.

Like most eCommerce businesses, you might be looking to optimise your conversion rates without spending too much money, and without looking desperate, because desperation kills conversions. You might be getting enough traffic right now, but boosting conversions doesn’t end at increasing traffic. If your conversion rate isn’t moving, or worse even, is dropping, these 7 tips will help you try new ways to boost your overall performance as shopping behaviours continue to change.

## 7 Tips to optimise your eCommerce conversion rate

### 1. Offer free shipping

Did you know that shipping cost is the number one reason for cart abandonment ([25%](https://www.barilliance.com/cart-abandonment-rate-statistics/))? [9 out of 10](http://marketingland.com/e-commerce-report-9-10-consumers-say-free-shipping-no-1-incentive-shop-online-180280) consumers admit that free shipping is their biggest incentive to continue shopping online. If you’re charging for shipping in these difficult times, chances are you're losing some of your sales to your competitors. With shops being closed for the foreseeable future, we recommend offering free shipping to all customers, with no minimum order amount.

This doesn’t have to be forever, but whilst times are so uncertain and all shops are closed, offering free shipping is a good way to boost your sales.

H&M free delivery and free returns covid-19

### 2. Create a discount

Now more than ever, consumers have taken a hit financially. With so much job uncertainty right now, shoppers are more likely to buy from stores which offer discounts and promotional offers to their customers.

Discounts are perceived by consumers as a way to get a product of higher value and better quality at a lower price. Indeed, the feeling of getting a bargain or a good deal is likely to make consumers buy a product they wouldn’t necessarily have bought at full price. 

This is because of the fear of missing out (FOMO). Most of the time, consumers don’t know how long the promotional offer or discount will last for. This creates urgency and will push people to make a buying decision quicker than usual. In other cases, retailers determine a certain amount of time for which the discount will be valid for (e.g. 20% for 48 hours). This also creates urgency, and pushes consumers to buy from your website before the deal ends.

Given the current situation, setting up discounts regularly or for extended periods of time, is likely to help you see a real change in your conversion rate.


Reiss discount

### 3. Donate to charity

Times of hardship can bring out the best in human nature. Communities are coming together and people are going out of their way to donate money to those affected by the crisis or in real need of support.
Many businesses have recently been donating some of their products or offering their time and services to help out the community. 

If you’re looking for a way to help, why not give a small percentage of each sale to charity? Customers are more likely to shop if they know their online shopping is helping support key workers, patients, or people in need. Being a more human brand is a trait every company should embrace, and this could make a real difference right now.

James Allen donations covid-19

### 4. Address uncertainty with additional information

In these difficult times, it’s important to address any possible uncertainty with as much information as possible. We highly recommend creating a COVID-19 FAQ page, with new information about shipping, delivery, extended returns, and more.

Marks and Spencer covid-19 information

Providing additional information will give buyers enough confidence to trust that you are the right brand for them right now. Product description is also extremely important. Make sure your product copy is clear and reflects your brand image. Your customer should have no questions left once they’ve read the product description. Don’t forget to add visuals on there too. The more visuals you include, the more chances you have of converting consumers. 

Companies that use custom imagery actually have [7 times more conversions](http://bandwagoncreative.com/infographic/) than companies who don’t. And they don’t have to stop at photos. Why not add product demonstration videos, product reviews or customer testimonials directly on your product pages? This will help answer any questions your potential customer might have at this point of the journey, reducing the chances of them continuing their research elsewhere.

### 5. Optimise your checkout process

Did you know that having to create a new user account is the second biggest reason for cart abandonment ([22%](https://www.barilliance.com/cart-abandonment-rate-statistics/))? If you don’t offer guest checkout yet, this might be the right time to consider it. It can help keep all consumers stay engaged, whether they’re repeat shoppers or first-time consumers. Adding the additional step of account creation can create friction for the user, as they probably won’t want to create a new account every time they order from a new website - which is likely to be often right now.

Single-step checkouts are also one of the easiest ways for existing customers to finalise their purchase. Amazon or Shopify are two of the best platforms to use this system. Existing customers save their payment and personal details and can buy anything they’d either by clicking on the ‘Buy Now’ button, or entering a one-time passcode sent to their mobile. This saves them from having to fill in a lot of forms at checkout.

Do you offer any of these? Why not give them a try!


Burga express checkout

### 6. Accept multiple payment options

Did you know that [24%](http://www.iqpc.com/media/1003982/39442.pdf) of consumers abandon their transactions at checkout because the retailer doesn’t offer their preferred payment choices?

Getting more traffic means your business needs to please different types of customers, with different needs and different expectations. Having multiple payment options ensures your larger audience is taken care of and that their expectations are met. 

These uncertain times are affecting everyone, especially financially.

That’s why we recommend to offer your customers other payment solutions such as Klarna, a Swedish bank which provides customers with an easy way to pay in 3 times, or pay 30 days after their purchase, without affecting their credit score. 


Multiple payment options

### 7. Leverage reviews

Lack of trust in advertising is seriously affecting the customer journey and the decision-making process. According to [Trustpilot research](https://uk.business.trustpilot.com/reviews/build-trusted-brand/4-things-every-business-owner-should-know-about-the-state-of-reviews), in 2019, we saw an 11% decline in trust globally, with only 71% of people admitting they trust consumer brands.

Today, it’s getting easier for consumers to compare businesses by price, shipping cost, quality, and customer experience, which makes it harder for eCommerce sites to stand out, and therefore convert consumers, especially in times like these. Trust is one of those differentiators that can really help a company stand out.

Word of mouth is one of the most popular methods of recommendations today, and with 80% of people trusting reviews as much as personal recommendations, it’s safe to say that reputation and third-party validation are big difference-makers. A Trustpilot study found that 89% of global consumers check online reviews as part of their online buying journey, and 49% of global consumers consider positive reviews one of their top 3 purchase influences.

Leveraging trust and transparency through online reviews is key to increase eCommerce conversions. That’s why using customer reviews at key points of the shopping journey can encourage visitors to engage with you (now or later), rather than leave your website and keep looking elsewhere.

Luca Tagliaferro, Analytics Advisor, SEO Consultant, Lecturer & Speaker at [Future Fit](https://www.futurefit.co.uk/), explains:

"Future Fit recently ran an A/B test with Trustpilot's review carousel and saw a massive increase in conversions from leveraging reviews. The page with reviews converted at 22%, whereas the page without reviews converted at 14%. After seeing such results, we decided to implement Trustpilot widgets across the whole website. With results like these, adding reviews to the journey was just a no-brainer to boost our overall conversions." 

Reviews on product pages

Don’t be afraid of being transparent, and embrace both negative and positive reviews to build credibility with your consumers. Indeed, 64% of global consumers would prefer to buy from a responsive company over one that appears perfect.

Collecting reviews from an open platform, managing your customers’ feedback and leveraging it as social proof in the consumer journeys are great ways to build trust and increase conversions, even in uncertain times.

Even though these times are difficult for every business, try to keep your customer journey as frictionless as possible, offer free shipping and discounts to your customers, and most of all, don’t be afraid to be transparent: share more information and provide your customers with testimonials. We guarantee you’ll see a difference. 

If you’d like to learn more about reviews and how they can benefit your business in difficult times, give our guide to reviews a read!


 7 Ways to boost your conversion rate right now

Creating relevant content throughout the customer journey

## Why the customer journey matters

It all starts with understanding the customer journey and delivering the right type of message to your visitors.

The customer journey describes a variety of touchpoints by which the customer moves from awareness to engagement and purchase. The journey can have up to 7 stages: awareness, evaluation, consideration, try or examination, buy, repeat and refer.

In this article, we’ll show you what goes through the customer’s mind at each step of the journey, and how consumers can be positively influenced by content marketing.

## Influencing Customers With Content

Growing competition and lack of trust in advertising have affected the customer journey and the decision-making process. Business need to adapt accordingly.

In a world where 84% of consumers do not trust advertisements anymore, and where engaging with consumers takes more time than ever before, it’s getting harder for retailers to convert visitors into customers. The growing lack of trust means consumers are no longer interested in brands that try to sell hard. Today’s shoppers are looking for brands that put their customers first and create communities of brand advocates by rewarding loyalty.

Consumers are expecting brands to be more ‘human’ - they want listeners and problem-solvers.

__They want to trust again.__

In order to trust a company and their products, shoppers go through a considerable amount of research before making a decision and buying online, making the customer journey longer and more competitive.

Last year, 76% of purchase decisions involved online research on Google or Amazon. Traditional marketing is becoming less and less effective as potential consumers look for more information (not ads) before buying online. As a result, brands have turned to content marketing to impact and influence the consumer’s decision throughout the buying journey.

*But what is content marketing exactly?*

Content marketing, according to the Content Marketing Institute, is a marketing approach focused on creating and distributing valuable, relevant, and consistent content to attract and retain an audience.

6 Benefits of Content Marketing:

- Better visibility and brand awareness
- Encourages customer relationships
- Creates loyalty
- Builds trust and credibility through the funnel
- Increases organic traffic
- Gives your business a thought leader position

## Mapping content to the 7 touchpoints of the customer journey

While we now all understand how important content marketing is when it comes to informing browsers and influencing consumers’ buying decisions, it can be hard to know what content to share at each step of the journey. In this section, we’ve broken down how you can map specific content to your audience based on where they are in their customer journey.

### 1. Awareness

In an era where in-person shopping is slowly disappearing, first impressions need to make a bigger impact. When a new visitor gets introduced to your product or service for the first time, you have to make sure their experience is positive, seamless, and consistent so if they return via a different channel, the experience is still familiar.

It’s at this point in the customer journey where your website is most important. Don’t underestimate the power of visuals and brand identity. If your website is easy to navigate through, is visually appealing, and offers a great customer experience in terms of performance and speed, chances are your new visitor will have a good first interaction with your business, priming them for purchase.

__Suggested content:__

- On-site copy
- On-site explainer videos

### 2. Evaluation

Evaluation is the second stage of the customer buying journey. As the customer hasn’t decided whether or not they’re interested in your business, it’s necessary to create top-of-the-funnel content that may answer any question they may have or give them additional information.

That’s why it’s important to target your audience with great content that will make them feel closer to your product or service. Ideal content can be anything that attracts the customer’s eye, isn’t too long, and instantly creates engagement. A good example is an explainer or product video.

Don’t forget, this piece of content is meant to remind the visitor why they should become one of your customers!

__Suggested content:__

- One-pagers
- Videos
- Short guides

### 3. Consideration

You’ve met your visitor at both the awareness and evaluation stages, but the consideration stage is the best stage to build a relationship with your new visitor and give them a reason to choose you over another company.

The strongest reason: __trust__.

But how can you earn trust? It starts with letting your visitors get to know you better. Blog content helps you engage with your audience on a continuous basis and gives your audience an understanding of who your company is.

Did you know that 92% of people engage more with companies that are known as industry thought leaders?

Writing and publishing blog posts on your website will allow you to develop trust with your visitors while giving them more information about your company and your product or service. Time to start blogging!

__Suggested content:__

- Blog posts
- Infographics
- Guides

### 4. Examination

This stage of the customer journey may not apply to you depending on what your business offers. But if you have a way of letting interested customers try your product or service before they make a purchase, consider it. It’s a real challenge to sell online, and with people trusting brands less and less, trying a product allows them to form an opinion and make a decision on their own terms. Let them see what it’s like to be a real customer.

At this stage, your potential customer is probably having a look at what your competitors can offer them. If you can’t let them try your product or service, you should provide in-depth information about your business. Give them access to a guide or white paper that will help them understand your service or product, and make them feel closer to your brand values.

At the same time, make sure you’re maintaining your brand image and identity, which can make the decision-making process easier. It’s time to make them fall in love with your brand identity, not just your product. Your brand image can make the difference and bridge the gap from trying to buying.

__Suggested content:__

- White papers
- Guides
- In-Depth Videos

### 5. Buy

Your visitor is ready to buy. You’ve convinced them that you’re the best choice, but they’re still looking for reassurance. Your job is to provide that reassurance and keep their focus.

Customer testimonials, examples of customer experiences, or any kind of third-party validation works well. It’s also crucial to keep your visitors engaged, so don’t forget social media ads and little email reminders that say something to the effect of -  “You’ve got something in your basket, finish your transaction now!”

By creating a sense of urgency or showing them that there’s only one step left before they make a purchase, you’re encouraging your visitor to complete the transaction in an easy way

__Suggested content:__

- Customer testimonials
- Customer experiences
- Third-party validation

### 6. Repeat

You’ve won a new customer! Your content strategy and efforts have paid off. But the journey isn’t over. If you’re looking to retain existing customers, you’ve got to pay attention to your customer experience.

60% of consumers have higher expectations for customer service now than they did just one year ago.

Motivating repeat business is difficult but that’s where customer advocacy comes in. Consider including your existing loyal customers into your content strategy by leveraging the ways they’ve engaged with you.

Reading success stories from other happy customers, establishing a clear social media strategy that utilses user-generated-content, and using the same tone across all channels will encourage engagement from your recently converted customers.

Finally, go the extra mile to meet and exceed your customers’ expectations! 76% of consumers say they view customer service as the true test of how much a company values them.

__Suggested content:__

- Success stories/Case Studies
- Social posts and reviews
- User-generated content

### 7. Refer and Review

If your customers have been satisfied with their experience, they’ll happily tell other browsers. Don’t be afraid to ask for referrals or for reviews- email is usually the best way to do it but you can also utilise platforms such Trustpilot, especially if you’re looking to build your reputation!

As for referrals, an incentive can help - offer them a discount on their next order, or free delivery if they bring in new business. This strategy also keeps your customer engaged, increasing the likelihood that they become repeat customers.

__Suggested content:__

- Emails
- Reviews
- Surveys

## Knowing your customer at every stage of the customer journey

As retailers approach the challenge of converting visitors into customers, content marketing is becoming the go-to marketing tool to influence the customer experience and journey.

The key to a successful customer journey is knowing how to implement trust throughout the different stages of the process. Owned content and user-generated content encourage consumers to learn more about your business, your product or service, and how your customers feel about you.

If you’re interested in the impact of content on the customer journey, download IMRG’s 2017 report and learn how online reviews can influence the customer decision-making process too.

How great sites convert visitors into customers

A 10% bump would do wonders for all your marketing efforts. A 50% increase would be transformational. Over time, you’ve heard all sorts of advice about button colors, clear calls to action, what you should have above the fold, and how to reduce friction.

The problem with this advice is not that there isn’t merit to reducing friction, but that it is a small piece of the much larger conversion optimization puzzle. At its heart, conversion rate optimization (CRO) is convincing a customer to buy your product.

A great quote summarizes the CRO’s task: “People don’t buy products; they buy better versions of themselves.” In CRO, it is our job to paint a picture of that better self, to make them believe it, then remove friction that stands between them and a purchase. 

So, let’s break this down into each step of convincing a customer to purchase.

## Better self

To create a vision of a better self, you have to create a story that makes the customer believe it. Simply saying our product will make you thinner, happier and wealthier doesn’t quite cut it. How does it do that? What gives your product the unique ability to make me a better person while other products don’t?

The good news - this isn’t a new concept. Psychologists have been [researching this](https://www0.gsb.columbia.edu/mygsb/faculty/research/pubfiles/529/HIGGINSADVANCES_1998REG_FOC_.pdf) for over 20 years. Marketers have come across [common copywriting formulas that work](https://copyhackers.com/2015/10/copywriting-formula/). Problem, agitation, solution (PAS). Qualify, understand, educate, stimulate, transition (QUEST).

These copywriting formulas essentially provide an outline for a story about how your product is going to create a better life for the customer. One of the best A/B tests you can run are multiple landing pages, each with a new copywriting formula or framework. Experiment with the way you tell this story and you’ll find the narrative that resonates most with your target consumer.

While copywriting drives the story, the accompanying visuals of [exceptional photography](https://ripen.com/photography) and video are what immerse the consumer in the narrative.

The luggage brand [Away Travel](https://www.awaytravel.com/) consistently uses lifestyle images of luxurious, chic travelers to make their buyers imagine themselves in this lifestyle.

Away Travel Product Photography

[Peloton](https://www.onepeloton.com/) also excels at creating this image of a better you. You’ll notice most of their visuals focus on the person and their home. Their photography, video, and copy all say “You can be a more fit version of yourself. You’d spin all the time if you could just do classes at home. Imagine what life would be like then.”



Peloton Product Photography

## Make them believe

Seeing isn't always believing.

Seeing the copy and images that reflect a potential customer’s better self is helpful. In online shopping, where the options are plenty and the customer does not have the ability to directly experience the product, how can we establish trust and make customers believe the story of the better self on the landing page?

This is where social proof comes in. [Social proof is a psychological phenomenon](https://business.trustpilot.com/reviews/build-trusted-brand/a-beginner-guide-to-building-brand-loyalty-with-user-generated-content) where people conform to the actions and behaviors of a group. It is incredibly influential when it comes to driving conversions. On a landing page, social proof can take the form of ratings, reviews, testimonials and trust icons. Here are a few examples:

Birchbox Social Proof

Hello Fresh Social proof

Social proof helps customers feel confident in their choice and can significantly influence their decision towards purchasing.

Beyond your reviews, the narrative itself must be believable. You have to answer these questions for the customer: “Why this company? Why can they solve this problem when other brands have failed?”

At their core, most direct-to-consumer eCommerce startup successes have the same story. They find that people are frustrated with buying products from brands and retailers they don’t trust, who charge way too much, in a retail experience that does not value customer experience.

Think about what it was like to buy a mattress, a razor, a pair of pants, vitamins, or even glasses. That’s what the founders of Away, Bonobos, Casper, Harry’s, Ritual, and Warby Parker did.

Their solution, which in turn served as their brand story:

1. We make only one thing; we're the industry experts.
2. We make it affordable and transparent; bye, bye middlemen — you can trust us.
3. We make it easy to find, buy and return; shop online — whenever and wherever you are, free delivery right to your door, easy returns.

You don’t need to follow the digitally native brand template, but you do need a compelling reason why your brand is the solution and other brands aren’t.

## Reduce Friction

Beyond the basics of building a responsive and fast-loading site, reducing friction is about designing an end-to-end brand experience with the customer in mind. There are a few main ways to do this.

### 1. Reduce friction.

__Minimize complexity.__ A landing page is built to clear the path to purchase and give visitors the final nudge to convert into customers. The following tactics can help lower distractions and make it easier for visitors to buy.

__Minimize internal and external links on the path to purchase.__ While a navigation menu makes sense on the home page and product page, on a landing page, the customer should have a single decision to make — to buy or not to buy. It often makes sense to suppress the navigation on landing pages for this reason.

__Clear calls to action.__ Never make the customer guess how to continue down the path to purchase. Make a clear call to action and point it to a place that reduces decisions and streamlines that path to purchase.

__Promote a single offer.__ Some sites will run a coupon in a pop up window, another one in the cart, another available via a sitewide stripe at the top of the page. Beyond just simply devaluing your site, you’re also creating confusion on the offer(s) available as well as motivation for the user to look elsewhere to be sure they’re getting the best possible offer.

__A sense of urgency.__ Some brands use their likelihood to sell out of inventory, limited time runs of a style, or just short duration offers. Creating some form of urgency to make the consumer act now rather than push the decision off can be a powerful conversion driver.

__Investigate and eliminate errors.__ Whenever your site has to prompt the user with an error message, that’s a hint that something is not as intuitive as it should be. Maybe it’s being forced to enter a quantity on a product detail page, maybe it’s not seeing a required field in checkout. But, frequent error messages are friction and you want to eliminate them.

### 2. Make answers easily findable.

Once a visitor has made it all the way to your website, their purchase intent is high. If a visitor is looking for something, this is an opportunity to help them find it. The closer we get the audience to what they want, the higher the chance of conversion. Making answers accessible isn’t limited to a search bar. There are multiple ways to guide customers to what they want. For instance, some DTC brands, like Allbirds, include a live chat on the site to alleviate any concerns or answer any questions.


Allbirds Live Chat

This touchpoint is a high value opportunity to quickly solve a problem and move your visitors towards a conversion.

### 3. Create friendly return policies.

While Zappos introduced the initial no-questions-asked return policy, digitally native DTC brands quickly followed suit. Traditional companies often charge for returns or don’t offer them at all. Almost every single digitally native brand today offers a hassle-free return policy, whether it’s a mattress, a razor, or even vitamins. 

Harry’s and Dollar Shave Club both have trial boxes with risk-free cancellation if the product doesn’t suit the customer’s needs. While Casper offers a 100-night trial, the DTC mattress-in-a-box competitors that have followed often offer a 365-night trial. Ritual, the monthly vitamin subscription, offers refunds — no questions asked. 

Offering easy returns and free trials minimizes risk for the customers and makes them more comfortable with the idea of buying from a new brand.

Nectar Mattress Friendly Return Policies

## Final thoughts

The most important takeaway from this article is that conversion rate optimization is not just about moving the furniture around, it's about making fundamental changes to the way you communicate the benefits of your product to your customers, proving that your claims are true, and then removing barriers to purchase. Once you change this mindset, the possibilities for significantly improving your conversion rate begin to open up.

Can't get enough of this stuff? 

To find out more about how a review strategy can help you build social proof and improve your conversion rates, get your free copy of our Complete Guide to Reviews below. 


Download the complete guide to customer reviews

Picture of a smiling woman inviting to download the guide to customer reviews

__Author Bio:__ David Rekuc is the Marketing Director at [Ripen](https://ripen.com/), a full-service Ecommerce agency in Princeton, NJ that specializes in delivering custom eCommerce solutions.



How great sites convert visitors to customers

Social Proof for High Ticket Conversions and Luxury Brands

It almost goes without saying that life online plays a crucial role in the way luxury shoppers choose brands and products. Here's why social proof builds confidence in online shoppers and reduces cart abandonment.

According to luxury retail experts McKinsey, online sales of personal luxury goods like watches, jewelry, apparel, beauty, and perfume are on track to more than triple by 2025. At that rate, it won’t be long before nearly one fifth of high ticket luxury purchases take place entirely online. 

It almost goes without saying that life online plays a crucial role in the way luxury shoppers choose brands and products — whether it’s through Instagram feeds, influencers, articles in fashion magazines, or simply seeking the tried and true wisdom of their fellow online shoppers.

Per the same [McKinsey](https://www.mckinsey.com/industries/retail/our-insights/luxury-in-the-age-of-digital-darwinism) insights, close to 80% of luxury sales are digitally influenced, presenting quite an opportunity for anyone selling high value items online to craft a trustworthy reputation across the many digital channels customers use to [research purchases](https://business.trustpilot.com/guides-reports/build-trusted-brand/6-ways-to-make-trust-your-essential-brand-differentiator). 

Wondering how to remove any lingering online barriers to high-ticket purchases? Read on for some high impact conversion optimization strategies, and a look at how our friends at [Laguna Pearl](https://www.lagunapearl.com/) used social proof to generate a 38% lift in their own high-ticket conversions.

## Here are four strategies for igniting more high value conversions

### 1. Use social proof to build confidence in your future customers — and reduce cart abandonment  

No matter how much online shopping your audience does, it’s safe to say that the more your products cost, the more trust you’ll need to instill in your site visitors before they’re ready to buy. And while we’d argue that your cross-channel marketing messaging should always instill trust, never forget that the [most trusted messaging](https://business.trustpilot.com/guides-reports/build-trusted-brand/can-online-reviews-revive-consumer-trust-in-advertising) of all comes from fellow shoppers. 

According to luxury retail experts at McKinsey, “Digital luxury is increasingly a customer-to-customer (C2C) economy. The consumer is central to the shopping journey, from advocacy to sales. Luxury consumers, highly engaged on social media, are evolving from paying observers of the show into actors on the stage. They are becoming, in effect, another marketing channel.”

We can confirm that today, more and more online shoppers rely on the experiences of other shoppers to make their buying decisions, with recent Trustpilot research uncovering that a whopping [82% of shoppers](https://business.trustpilot.com/guides-reports/build-trusted-brand/why-and-how-social-proof-influences-consumers) are more likely to purchase after reading ratings and reviews. 

[Laguna Pearl](https://www.lagunapearl.com/), an online luxury retailer selling high-end pearl jewelry, knows this firsthand. They partnered with Trustpilot back in 2013 to give customers a public forum to share their experiences with and opinions of their brand. Once they built up a critical mass of reviews, they made sure to display them across their website and on key shopping pages to help [overcome customer hesitation](https://business.trustpilot.com/reviews/build-trusted-brand/4-ways-to-overcome-customer-hesitation) in the moment of truth leading up to a high value purchase. 

Laguna Pearl Features Reviews on Website

Within just 30 days of implementing Trustpilot reviews, Laguna Pearl saw a __38% increase in click-through rates to their site and a 9.5% decrease in cart abandonment.__ They also saw positive effects from including Trustpilot ratings in their paid advertising campaigns: earning [Google Seller Ratings](https://business.trustpilot.com/reviews/why-wont-my-google-seller-ratings-show-up-and-4-other-gsr-questions) on their Google Ads increased their CTR by 8%, and including Trustpilot ratings in their Facebook ads increased their CTR by 9%. 

Perhaps most impressively, __of those that clicked-through, 5% went on to purchase at some point in the next 30 days__ — clearing the [3.3% benchmark](https://www.growcode.com/blog/ecommerce-conversion-rate/) for eCommerce sessions with completed transactions. 

Leon Rbibo, President of Laguna Pearl (and sister company [The Pearl Source](https://www.thepearlsource.com/)), also cites their [business profile pages](https://www.trustpilot.com/review/www.thepearlsource.com) on Trustpilot as a source of their success since Google searches for reviews of luxury brands and products have become so common. Thankfully, Trustpilot profile pages are likely to show up at the [top of organic search results](https://business.trustpilot.com/reviews/why-does-google-care-if-your-business-has-online-reviews-in-2019). 

According to Rbibo, “with Trustpilot, we are already proving to potential customers that we are legitimate before they even land on our website. Companies can try to fill up their websites with as much content and information as possible, but at the end of the day, there will still be customers that require a certain amount of trust before they can finally make a purchase — especially with high value purchases like jewelry.”

## 2. Optimize the online shopping experience for luxury product conversions

On top of building more trust at the very top of the luxury shopping journey, there are a number of conversion-boosting levers to pull on your website itself. Put yourself in your customers’ shoes: spending large sums of money can be exciting but stressful for even the most experienced online luxury shoppers, so it’s important to consider [UX principles](https://uxplanet.org/essential-ux-design-principles-and-strategies-for-ecommerce-aa55557931bb) that make it easy to convert. 

One way to do this is to constrain their choices. Think about it this way — once an online shopper arrives at your product page, they’ve already made a complex series of decisions. Now is the time to reduce any further complexity on the path to conversion, and you can do this by providing clear and simple choices. 


Luxury Brand Product Page Design

Consider page layouts that [showcase product details](https://uxdesign.cc/designing-better-product-pages-b377c035581) at a large scale, or that remove the need to click through a carousel to get a sense of the product from all angles. 

__You can even use customer feedback from reviews to identify what matters to your customers and ensure it’s reflected in your UX__. But how can you keep tabs on everything mentioned in your reviews? 

[Review tagging](https://business.trustpilot.com/features/review-tagging) is a great way to keep tabs on trends within customer sentiments collected through Trustpilot. For example, if you sell jewelry online, customers might mention certain occasions or holidays where your products made great gifts. You might consider tagging those reviews by occasion, and eventually create a new section or landing page in your store highlighting that use case for trending occasions like our friends at Laguna Pearl:

Laguna Pearl TrustScore on Homepage

### 3. Soften the blow of spending

[Psychologically speaking](https://sitetuners.com/blog/leveraging-psychology-to-remove-barriers-to-high-ticket-conversions/) and perhaps unsurprisingly, our brains equate the act of spending to losing valuable resources — and this can have an even more pronounced effect when online shoppers aren’t able to closely inspect their purchase in real life. 

Fortunately, you can soften the blow of spending by reframing the way you present prices. Simply removing the currency symbol or the remaining decimal pages from any prices listed on your product pages can be a huge help. You can also consider payment services that allow customers to “buy now, pay later”, or other options for customers to [incrementally pay off](https://www.digitalcommerce360.com/2017/02/06/case-study-how-payment-installments-boosts-sales-tradesy/) their luxury purchase.

As it turns out, dividing up a large expense into smaller amounts minimizes the perceived loss customers experience when they shell out everything at once. In fact, empowering them to pay little by little can pay off for luxury online retailers with an astronomical effect on average order value.

### 4. Use reviews to offer personalized content across the shopping journey and enable customer participation

Getting closer to your customers through online channels reviews can create a virtuous cycle of not only operational improvements, but delightful experiences and a sense of what McKinsey calls [“customer intimacy”](https://www.mckinsey.com/industries/retail/our-insights/luxury-in-the-age-of-digital-darwinism). 

While it might seem counterintuitive to use artificial intelligence tools like Trustpilot’s [Review Insights](https://business.trustpilot.com/features/review-insights) to develop a deeper human connection with customers, online luxury brands can strike gold by using [consumer insights technology](https://business.trustpilot.com/reviews/learn-from-customers/introducing-trustpilots-new-machine-learning-tool-review-insights) to get as close to their customers as they were in the days of strictly brick and mortar transactions.

Just as Louis Vuitton famously hand-wrote personalized product suggestions to customers in the early days of luxury retail, brands today can approximate that level of insight and closeness by monitoring their review insights and actioning the feedback through both their product offerings and their marketing materials, even using trends in their review insights for advanced customer segmentation.

As far as customer intimacy goes, front runners in online luxury retail are also looking to customers for opportunities to co-create. According to customer engagement experts at [Deloitte](https://www2.deloitte.com/us/en/pages/chief-marketing-officer/articles/future-of-marketing-global-marketing-trends-internal.html?page=5), “many brands and marketers need to evolve their approach and create a dynamic two-way engagement across all stages of the consumer journey and the product lifecycle. Those doing it best are often seeing willing customer participants become brand ambassadors, influencers, advocates, collaborators, and even innovators.”


Customer participation across the spectrum

Customer Participation

As far as we’re concerned, creating a feedback loop with your customers is the first step towards zeroing in on the type of valuable consumer insights that have the potential to evolve into co-creation. 

Simply by collecting reviews, online luxury retailers can harness customer recommendations to offer the most resonant luxury products, roll out [personalized customer experiences](https://business.trustpilot.com/reviews/why-a-personalized-consumer-experience-matters-in-the-ecommerce-world), and even unlock opportunities for customers to participate in brand-building.

### Start using social proof to sell more luxury products online


Find out how to stand out on social media, effortlessly

According to McKinsey, the answer to whether today’s luxury brands are adapting fast enough to the highly digital customer journey is mixed. While a good number of luxury retailers have increased their spend on digital activities, the majority are incrementally dabbling in these kinds of activities and struggling to keep pace with online luxury shoppers’ expectations. 

Though more and more luxury retailers are starting to meet their customers where they are — online — you can still get ahead of the curve by opening a dialogue with your customers through online reviews. 

To sum it all up, collecting reviews about your luxury brand and products can help you build more trust at the top of the shopping journey, reduce cart abandonment, improve your online shopping experience, and even improve the overall experience that customers have with your brand. Taken together, these factors can quickly move the needle for high value conversions. 

Want to learn more about the many ways luxury brands can benefit from collecting reviews? Get your free copy of The Complete Guide to Customer Reviews below.  


Download our complete guide to reviews

How luxury brands can use social proof to ignite high value conversions 

5 easy ways to increase your website's traffic

In this article, we go through 5 of the best ways to increase your website's traffic, who's doing it well, and how you can implement them starting today.

That goes without saying. If you have no traffic, no one is finding your business, let alone giving you money. That’s why it’s important to utilise multiple strategies to bring new visitors to your site while keeping old visitors engaged and more likely to return. 

As hard as this may sound for small businesses, there are ways to attract more potential customers to your website. In this article, we’ll be going through 5 of the best ways to increase your traffic, who's doing it well, and how you can implement them starting today.

## 1. Create new content and optimise old content

Content marketing is one of today’s most popular marketing tools, and we can see how big it has become since marketers rated it the most important technique for driving sales in 2017.

But what is [content marketing](https://en.oxforddictionaries.com/definition/content_marketing) exactly? According to the Oxford dictionary, “a type of marketing that involves the creation of online material and content that does not promote a brand but is intended to stimulate interest in its products.”

It’s important to note that content marketing is not the same as advertising - you’re not promoting your brand, you’re providing value to your audience.

__In 2016, [90%](https://www.smartinsights.com/content-management/content-marketing-strategy/essential-2017-content-marketing-statistics/) of companies used content marketing as part of their overall strategy.__

The most popular forms of content marketing are in the form of social media content, case studies, blogs, reviews, and newsletters. Competing with Facebook posts, blog articles, and content published every second is difficult, but as long as you're providing valuable content, your traffic is likely to increase.

Reviews are a great form of content that is consistently updated, is authentic, and provides value to potential customers by giving them insight into what they can expect from your business.

You can also increase the number of pages on your website that can rank for some of your most important keywords. Consider adding new category pages, new blog posts, new visuals, infographics, or videos that will help your website maintain its ranking and continue attracting new browsers.

Once you’re optimising your content for keyword terms and tracking them using tools such as SEMRush, you can optimise old content and help those pages rank better by updating the content regularly. Remember, Google prefers fresh content to old one.

Ranking high will always bring you more organic traffic, so keep an eye on your old content too.

__Who’s doing it right?__

download (4)

Etsy blog

Etsy’s blog is a great example of providing content that’s fit for their audience. To attract and retain people who are interested in their service, they discuss the latest trends in handcrafting, gift ideas, and news. All through great content and beautiful imagery.

__Trustpilot’s tips__

Every piece of content should have some of these traits in order to be valuable content:

- Unexpected
- Emotional
- Inspiring
- Educational
- Relevant
- Practical
- Unique
- Credible
- Trustworthy

## 2. Consider Social Advertising to drive website traffic

Social advertising on Facebook, Twitter, and other social platforms is still relatively cheap compared to Google Ads and many of the platforms allow you to segment the audience you’re targeting with specific keywords or demographics. 

But you might wonder, is advertising on social media really worth it?

The cost of a Facebook ad varies on a number of factors, but the average cost per click of Facebook ads in 2016 was 27.35 cents. Meanwhile, paid search ads offer keyword targeting as high as $25 per click for highly competitive keywords.

__Social media has a real advantage over PPC - it lets you target the exact customer you’re trying to reach.__

Social media advertising also allows you to have a larger window of time to work with. With an average amount of time of 40 minutes spent a day on Facebook, users are now more concerned with browsing, reading, clicking, liking, and connecting. And this makes it easier for you to connect and interact with your audience.

__Who’s doing it right?__

download (5)

social ad

Why is this Bustle Facebook ad so efficient?  

Well, first of all, it’s visual. Many brands will utilise a standard Amazon Prime logo, but Bustle wins with its neon lights variant.

The copy is just as good. Using “brilliant” in the title is a strong word to describe products, stimulating curiosity and making people want to click while also being consistent with its neon sign image.

Finally, it’s got a very clear CTA (call to action). The ad mentions brilliant and odd products that everyone loves, and that can be delivered to you in just two days.

What’s not to love?

__Trustpilot’s tips__

Get specific. You can target users by:

- Location
- Age
- Languages
- Relationship status
- Education level
- Field of study
- Schools attended
- Employers
- Job titles
- Income
- Purchase behavior
- Mobile device type, and much more...

### 3. Speed up your website to increase traffic

Think the speed of your website doesn’t matter?

Think again.

A 1-second page delay in page load time can lead to 11% fewer page views and a 7% loss in conversions. When considering conversions that directly affect revenue, 7% starts to look like a very big number.

A study by Akamai found that 47% of people expect a web page to load in 2 seconds or less, and 40% say they will abandon a page if it takes more than 3 seconds to load.

A faster site will not only help you convert better, but also get more organic traffic. Websites are rewarded when the search engines are able to crawl websites quicker, and find more relevant content on them.

__Speeding up your website is essential - for search visibility, better user experience, and ultimately, more revenue.__

__Who’s doing it right?__

download (6)

Apple example

Apple’s website scored 89/100 during their website speed test. Apple has optimised their image and feature-heavy website to deliver a beautiful user experience without leaving revenue on the table by having a slow-loading website. It’s a great example of how an eCommerce site can make you feel like you’re having an experience.

Assess your site using free tools like Pingdom or GTmetrix to get your website’s score.

__Trustpilot’s tips__

Speed up your website with these 10 tips:

- Minimise HTTP requests
- Reduce server response time
- Enable compression
- Use browser caching
- Minify resources
- Optimise images: check their size, format and Src attribute
- Optimise CSS delivery
- Prioritise top of the page content
- Reduce your plugins
- Reduce redirects

## 4. Optimise your website for mobile and voice search  

This year will see Google implementing their Mobile-first index. But what does this mean for your business’s website?

__If your site isn’t optimised for mobile devices, your ranking positions are likely to suffer.__

With Google saying that 61% of users are unlikely to return to a mobile site they had trouble accessing, websites no longer have the luxury to ignore their mobile users. We covered how critical it is to have fast-loading pages in the section above and Google has made it easier to both speed up your website while catering to mobile users.

To speed up load times for mobile users, Google recently released its Accelerated Mobile Pages (AMP) project. AMP is an online publishing format that is similar to HTML and was created to help speed up web page load times.

AMP provides higher performance and engagement as web pages and ads load instantly, giving users a smooth experience both on desktop and mobile and also improves SEO performance.

__Who’s doing it right?__

BuzzFeed’s AMP site still feels like a BuzzFeed site, with image-heavy pages that rely on large text and titles. However, it has a much more minimal layout and hides its categories within other pages, decreasing load time and optimising the user experience.

__Trustpilot’s tips__

To optimise your website for mobile, you have to pick a configuration. Here’s a little recap to help you choose. 

All 3 configurations are Google-friendly, but the search engine recommends responsive design first:

- Responsive web designing is the simplest and most-recommended form of optimisation, and it’s extremely easy to implement. It delivers the same HTML on the same URL and the page adapts to the size of the screen.
- Dynamic serving is another form of mobile optimisation. The URL remains the same, but serves different HTML content when accessed from a mobile device.
- Separate URLs means you have to keep 2 distinct URLs: one for mobile and one for desktop.

Once you’ve implemented one of the configurations, inform Google and other search engines in order to help them understand your page so that it can rank your site properly.

With the growing popularity of virtual assistants like Siri, Alexa, or Google Assistant, the internet is taking a new turn. Today, people looking for information online are [more likely to use voice search](https://uk.business.trustpilot.com/guides-reports/get-seen-in-search/the-new-face-of-seo-answer-engine-optimization) and plain language than they were over the last several years.

In the keynote for Google I/O 2016, Google CEO Sundar Pichai told the audience that 20% of mobile search queries are voice queries.

And this number is only expected to grow as voice recognition software becomes more advanced by the hour. Your SEO should be optimised for voice searches, and you should research potential conversational queries that are applicable to your site as well.

If you haven’t updated your search strategy to account for voice search, you are missing out on the chance to reach potential customers that could convert.

__Trustpilot’s tips__

These are some ways businesses can make their content voice search-friendly:

- __Optimise long-tail keywords and phrases__: voice searches make use of natural language. The way we talk is different than the way we type. The phrases and keywords that we use while speaking to digital assistants are different than the ones we’d use when typing in a search engine.
- __Focus on your FAQs__: your frequently asked questions pages are the perfect place to include long-tail keywords. A clear answer to a commonly asked question has a better chance of appearing in Google Answers.
- __Local SEO is your friend__: voice search is 3 times more likely to be local. Keeping your contact information, opening hours, location and content up to date is necessary. If anyone asks “Where can I find a coffee shop in London?”, being optimised for local SEO means you are more likely to appear in the first set of results.

*In our fifth and last section, we asked our friends at [HawkSEM](https://hawksem.com/), a digital marketing agency in Los Angeles, to share their best tips to ensure the traffic you're drawing to your site doesn't sacrifice quality for quantity.*

## 5. While focused on quantity, don't forget quality

Sure, a high volume of site traffic is great — but you also want to be getting the right kind of traffic. That means figuring out how to strategically attract your target audience to turn qualified leads into conversions, while continuing to grow your reach. 

Once you define what “qualified” traffic looks like at your particular company, the best way to go about getting it is often through a mix of paid and organic efforts.

emeals example

landing page example

As far as paid efforts go, the more specific you make your paid search, display, and retargeting ads, the higher your chances will be of attracting people who are interested in the products or services you offer. That means your ads and landing pages should:

- Be consistent in their language — your ads should match your landing pages, and both should match what your audience is searching
- Be specific about who exactly you’re targeting (i.e. “first-time homebuyers in San Diego” instead of just “homebuyers”)
- Use audience segmentation options when available

It’s also wise to focus on lifetime value (LTV) rather than simple cost per acquisition (CPA), cost per click (CPC), or click-through rate (CTR). LTV is about the overall impact one sale can have on your business throughout your company’s relationship with the customer. Once you determine what's driving the best long-term quality leads, you can allocate more of your budget there — from specific keywords, devices, and times to campaigns, audience segments, and more. This is easier to do when you filter all of your cross-channel ad data into your CRM, giving you full visibility into what’s working and what’s not. 

When it comes to organic traffic efforts that lead to conversion rate optimization (CRO), you’ve still got plenty of options at your disposal. One of the best ways to attract the right traffic is through [quality content creation](https://hawksem.com/blog/how-to-create-quality-content-marketing/). Work on having a bank of thorough, educational content that speaks directly to the problems and pain points of your audience, while providing them with solutions. 

This is a much more beneficial option than “keyword stuffing,” which not only comes off as inauthentic, but Google may penalize you for it as well. Sticking to natural language is also a must, thanks to Google’s recent BERT algorithm update that helps the search engine better understand context when it comes to wording and phrases.

“Before writing your ad copy or blog, you want to fully put yourself in your target audience’s shoes,” says Sam Yadegar, CEO of HawkSEM. “Ask yourself: How is what I'm writing about helping make their lives better? How will this piece of information help them achieve their goals?” Along with this, he adds that researching and doing a thorough analysis of your target personas can help inform the way you speak to them. 

Whether you’re trying to attract your first customer or you 10,000th customer, generating more traffic to your online store is a crucial part of growing your business, and these 5 proven tactics should help you drive more traffic in the long run.

If you'd like to find out what kind of impact Trustpilot can have on your advertising, download a free copy of our newest whitepaper below!

5 Easy ways to increase traffic to your site

planning email strategies to unlock black friday sales volume

With just a few weeks left until the busiest time of year, we’ve looked into why consumer behaviour is changing, and what email strategies you can employ to unlock Black Friday sales volumes throughout the year.

Once again, Black Friday wins the “biggest shopping event of the year” award, and this year will be no exception. However, in the past few years, Black Friday has become more than just a full day of big discounts. It’s become a month-long sale, pushing consumers to buy all of their holiday gifts, and more expensive items such as electronics or furniture, in November.

So with just a few weeks left until the busiest time of year, we’ve looked into why consumer behaviour is changing, and what email strategies you can employ to adapt to new spending habits.

## Why Black Friday shopping behaviour is changing

Both experience and research demonstrate that almost everyone loves getting a bargain. 

Let’s face it, if you want something and know that it will be reduced in price in November, you’re more likely to wait and buy it at a discounted price than buy it immediately, full price. Of course, this might not apply to everyone, but research shows a shift in shopping behaviour and spending habits as people now wait to buy bigger items such as furniture, toys, TVs, phones, tablets and other holiday gifts at Black Friday due to discounts being much bigger than during the rest of the year.

You’ll find toys and electronics at the top of ‘Black Friday’s most popular items’ list. [According to IMRG](https://www.imrg.org/), in the last couple of months, the electronics industry has seen back-to-back declining growth (-17.7% on average). In fact, interestingly, the last positive growth was seen in November 2018 — notably Black Friday month. 

Consumer behaviour is slowly starting to change, and experts are starting to wonder if the sector is now so disrupted by the big discount event that shoppers withhold the purchase of large ticket items to just one month of the year. 

As many industries are starting to face this issue, it seems like the problem is getting bigger every year. This could affect many retail sectors if not addressed, so to guarantee all-year-round conversions,__ we asked Hawke Media to help us compile a set of strategies, tips and tactics to help you combat slow growth after Black Friday and the holidays.__

## How to make the most out of email marketing, all year long

[Hawke Media](https://hawkemedia.com/) places a heavy emphasis on [Black Friday and Cyber Monday](https://www.forbes.com/sites/forbesagencycouncil/2019/09/26/the-time-is-now-preparing-for-holiday-e-commerce-season/#26b286f17d98) for their clients, but they also don’t want them to only thrive [one month](https://www.cnbc.com/2018/11/24/black-friday-pulled-in-a-record-6point22-billion-in-online-sales-adobe.html) and falter all of the other months of the year. That’s why Hawke Media marketing gurus implement strategies that will increase success on campaigns — and therefore profit margins as well — throughout the year, not just during the busiest time of year. Email marketing plays a huge role in year-round brand success — here’s how you can use it to climb to the top of your revenue goals, as best demonstrated by Hawke Media client ACME Electronics.

ACME Electronics is an electronics brand, best known for its high-end audio systems and speakers that are so affordably priced they’ve never had to run a sale. The company manufactures all of its own products in the U.S. and puts a particular emphasis on customer service. These are just a few of the reasons why they’ve built a robust and loyal following among consumers, despite being a lesser-known company in an industry of big-name competitors. 

There was one missing piece to the puzzle: ACME Electronics wasn’t seeing the revenue growth one might expect with such a strong customer base. With Hawke Media’s help, the brand developed and executed a plan to solve the puzzle. The email marketing strategy they built is a great email model for any company looking to grow their revenue after Black Friday’s sales growth.

The email marketing campaign’s aim was to help them develop a brand voice. Hawke Media found out what made them unique and who their [target demographic](https://blog.benchmarkemail.com/finding-target-audience/) was to improve messaging around value props to expand that demographic and acquire new customers.

First and foremost, it was essential to start by activating and growing a previously unused email list with an automated nurture and retention email series. Next, ACME Electronics created weekly email campaigns with rich, informative, and entertaining [content](https://hawkemedia.com/blog/email-best-practices). If your brand doesn’t have an email list, it’s extremely valuable to create one in order to utilise weekly email campaigns and nurture strategies. 

ACME Electronics’ email list was sizeable prior to engaging with Hawke Media, but they had never taken advantage of it. In conjunction with the email plan, they worked on their [Facebook advertising](https://www.facebook.com/business/news/email-and-facebook-ads), which increased web traffic to the email list. Having an advertising strategy can be very beneficial for growing your email list quickly, and [showcasing reviews in your advertising can help you build trust](https://business.trustpilot.com/reviews/why-87-of-consumers-find-ads-more-trustworthy-with-trustpilot) earlier in the funnel. 

In terms of advertising strategy, ACME Electronics ran Facebook advertising campaigns that incorporated [new messaging](https://www.lyfemarketing.com/blog/facebook-ads-best-practices/), in order to better demonstrate the value that customers get for such a high-quality product at their price point. In doing so, they gave some value beyond their typical customer demographic, which is one way to expand on your current demographic reach. 

In addition, Hawke Media’s Facebook advertising experts developed a unique series of 30, 60, and 90-day [retargeting](https://hawkemedia.com/blog/facebook-prospecting-vs-retargeting) campaigns, testing different value props. Three months in, ACME Electronics was earning a whopping 621 percent return on advertising spend, with cost per acquisition steadily decreasing 83 percent in two months. 

As ACME Electronics activated the list, it grew rapidly. They then ran automated nurture and retention campaigns, and developed juicy weekly emails that really engaged the audience, open rates and click-through rates shot up roughly three times the industry standard. Within three months, the email sends were consistently generating a return on investment of approximately 500 percent.
ACME Electronics’ email marketing plan ensured sales growth all-year-round, and not just during the holiday season.

### To sum up…

These are the 4 easy steps you can take to rock your email marketing plan to boost your sales in the months of declining growth post Black Friday:

1. Start by building strong email lists
2. Activate those email lists
3. Don’t forget to grow the email list via Facebook advertising, which means: 
- Creating a variety of messaging that communicates your customer value to expand your reach beyond your typical demographic
- Developing a series of varied-length retargeting campaigns that test different value props 
4. Finally, developing email content that will not only inform but also entertain your audience and showcase social proof to boost credibility and reduce consumer doubt.


If you’d like to learn more about Hawke Media, check out [their website](https://hawkemedia.com/). Alternatively, if you’d like to find out more about the power of social proof and learn how online reviews can have a positive impact on your bottom line all-year-round, download a free copy of our newest consumer research below.

trust signal report

4 Email marketing strategies to unlock Black Friday sales volume throughout the year

leaf-wall-office-space 4460x4460

Office space with leaves on the wall

### Single Keyword Ad Groups (SKAGS)

When setting up a [Google Ads](https://klientboost.com/ppc/google-ads/) account most people will wonder what’s the best way to build the foundation. Most people will want to group together a batch of common-themed keywords into multiple ad groups.

Makes sense — why wouldn’t you keep all the similar keywords under the same umbrella? 

However, what might seem like an initial good idea can actually be more detrimental to the performance of the overall account. This can cause what we call the [Iceberg Effect](https://klientboost.com/ppc/adwords-strategy/). This refers to the discrepancy you see from the surface of your Google Ad’s account when compared to under the surface. 

In simplest terms, the ratio of [controlled keywords and uncontrolled search terms](https://www.wordstream.com/blog/ws/2011/05/25/keywords-vs-search-queries) is too big. 

Single Keyword Ad Groups (SKAGs) can help you gain more control of the very aspect that we can’t control...search terms.

__The Proof__

[LemonStand](https://lemonstand.com/) was able to [increase their ads click through Rate (CTR) 259%](https://klientboost.com/case-studies/lemonstand/) with the implementation of SKAGs in their Google Ads account.



KlientBoost LemonStand

If you're wondering how the CTR increased so dramatically with SKAGs, don't fret. We'll explain.

__How it Works__

SKAGs are setup exactly how they sound: one keyword per ad group. Designating one keyword for one ad group can help make sure that the keywords you’re paying for are only triggering for relevant search terms.

Here's a basic lowdown of how SKAGs are structured.

SKAGs KlientBoost

Grouping keywords under one large ad group umbrella will bring traffic in from so many various search terms that it will be very difficult to create relevant ads, let alone identify the converting search terms that are actually generating you revenue.

The aspect of [message matching](https://www.google.com/url?q=https://unbounce.com/ppc/doing-adwords-wrong-make-it-right/&sa=D&ust=1553877045933000) is compromised when you don’t have dedicated ads. The messaging of the ad can’t be directed at one specific search intent when you can’t figure out what search term brought the conversion.

With more control of keywords and search terms, you can tailor ad copy to have a more 1:1 ratio, also helping increase [quality score](https://klientboost.com/ppc/quality-score/).

With a more relevant ad, click through rates are likely to increase as a result of ad copy that matches visitor’s search terms.

Overall, SKAGs help you gain control while adding granularity to your campaign structure and hyper-relevance to your ads.

### Google Seller Ratings

While we’re on the topic of ads, another tactic worth mentioning is the addition of Google Seller Rating extensions. These extensions showcase a business’s highest ratings in Google’s Search Network ads as well as Google Shopping ads.



You'll see the star rating under the URL of the ad. 

GSRs KlientBoost

Google gathers these ratings from reputable sources that bundle together business reviews and showcases them on an ad.

Keep in mind, however, that your business has to have at least [100 verified site reviews](https://business.trustpilot.com/reviews/why-wont-my-google-seller-ratings-show-up-and-4-other-gsr-questions) per country from the past year with a composite rating of at least a 3.5 in order to showcase this extension. So if you’re a mom-and-pop shop looking to boost online traffic with these reviews, you’ll have to wait.

__The Proof__

[Cykelpartner](https://www.cykelpartner.dk/), a Trustpilot customer, saw a [35% increase in conversion rate](https://business.trustpilot.com/reviews/how-to-calculate-google-seller-ratings-effect-on-adwords) with the implementation of the Google Seller Rating extension. They also saw a 20.51% decrease in CPA.

Although CTR decreased 4.45%, what matters is the conversion rate and the CPA.

Although CTR decreased 4.45, what matters is conversion rate and the CPA.

GSRs - KB

Don't worry, we'll explain how this contributes to an increase in revenue. 

__ How it Works__

These ratings offer social proof that, to visitors, help build trust, and show a higher level of expertise. Knowing that others are rating a reputable service or product highly can only bring about positive opinions; even before converting.

Making an impression on a viewers takes only a couple seconds, so gaining this trust immediately can be a make it or break it kind of moment.

What you’ll also find is that these converters are usually of a higher quality. Because they’ve been influenced by the ad’s seller extension, they’ve already been semi-convinced in following through to the wanted conversion action.

### The Breadcrumb Technique

This [CRO](https://business.trustpilot.com/reviews/what-is-conversion-rate-optimisation) technique involves having multi-step form pages to obtain a conversion action on a [landing page](https://business.trustpilot.com/reviews/5-landing-page-best-practices). There’s a common misconception that a one-step form is favorable amongst visitors because of the simple one-time form fill-out process.

In reality, it’s quite the opposite. One-step form pages tend to deter people away as they come off very upfront about wanting specific personal information.

Instead of taking the aggressive one-step approach, The Breadcrumb Technique allows for trust to be formed with less forward questions being asked first. These questions will nudge visitors down the decisions making process until the desired conversion is made.

__The Proof__

Here are two separate examples of increased conversion rates as a result of the added CRO test.

ZipLending ran a test where they implemented The Breadcrumb Technique with a two-step form.

Here are the first form's qualifying questions

Ziplending 

And here is the page where you'd gather all the important visitor information. 

Ziplending screenshot of their quote form page

Ziplending 2

This obtained 35 more conversions in a three-month span than they obtained in the previous three months.  

Here’s a second example.

Advanced Grassed also implemented The Breadcrumb Technique which contributed to a [214% increase in conversions](https://www.acquisio.com/blog/agency/mastering-user-psychology-breadcrumb-technique-boosts-conversions/).

Advanced Grass asked some pretty insightful qualifying questions. 

KlientBoost7

They also asked the most important questions on the second step. 

KB AG2

__How It Works__

As mentioned before, the one-step page can be seen as pretty aggressive to a first time visitor. You can even say that it comes off as straight “salesy.”

Just imagine you’re shopping to purchase a brand new car and a car salesman opens up his greeting with, “So you ready to purchase?” You’d most likely pass up on making a purchase from a such a forward question. Trust hasn’t been established.

The same thing goes for the landing page conversion process.

In order to gain that trust, we refer to something called the [yes ladder](https://www.businessinsider.com/the-scientifically-proven-method-for-getting-people-to-say-yes-2011-7) where small requests will increase your chances of getting a ‘yes’ to a bigger request later on. Qualifying questions help visitors feel as if they’re getting a customized solution to their needs. So the added questions help in obtaining that end conversion action.

[User psychology](https://www.business2community.com/content-marketing/3-landing-page-best-practices-debunked-01408936) also plays a role in The Breadcrumb Technique. Once someone makes a choice or decision to take an action, they ’ll continue down the path that validated their original choice. In other words. they’ll most likely follow through to the end.

As Johnathan Dane, founder and CEO of KlientBoost says:

*“Once we’ve made a choice, we will encounter personal and interpersonal pressures to behave consistently with that commitment.”*

### The Goldpan Technique 

When it comes to Google Shopping Ads the problem always lies in trying to funnel the most relevant search queries to match your [e-Com](https://business.trustpilot.com/reviews/how-to-increase-conversions-for-your-ecommerce-business) products. Irrelevant search queries decrease the likelihood that you’ll get a sale.  The Gold Pan Technique makes it easier for you to distinguish the best intent searches meant for your products thus increasing your ROAS.

__The Proof__

A KlientBoost client was able to [increase conversions 360%, obtaining an 80% higher ROAS](https://klientboost.com/ppc/gold-pan-technique/).

KB 9

__How It Works__

Because you’re segmenting traffic into three different categories: generic, branded, and product-specific searches.  This adds the aspect of granularity and control for shopping campaigns just as SKAGs does for search network campaigns.

With ad groups that also match the campaign group structure, you should consistently see positive results.

This allows you to create sales funnel based around good quality high intent searches that are most likely to convert.

### Conclusion

These four tactics can help boost your business’s revenue to new heights. You may want to keep in mind that each method holds up differently within each industry. Nothing a little testing can’t figure out.

What you can count on is the fact that these tactics can help build a steady foundation for you to be able to optimize on for the rest of your digital marketing efforts.

SKAGs and The Goldpan Technique help establish structure and relevance while The Breadcrumb Technique and Google seller ratings help institute trust with viewers and visitors. All of which can only benefit your overall Google Ads performance and ultimate profits.

Find out how Trustpilot could help you boost revenue too, download a free copy of our Complete Guide to Reviews below.


__About the Author__

Johnathan Dane is the Founder and CEO of [KlientBoost](https://klientboost.com/conversion-rate-optimization/), a PPC agency focusing on CRO and aggressive testing to boost ROI for its clients. If you liked what you read in this post feel free to get a proposal to learn more.

4 Paid digital marketing tactics proven to generate results and revenue 

Holiday Playbook - 5 ways to win over wary holiday shoppers

It’s safe to say that online shoppers will be on the lookout for trustworthy brands to buy from this holiday season. Here are 5 strategies to inspire customer confidence in even the most scrupulous buyers.  

To name just a few scams likely to be at the top of consumers’ minds while shopping for holiday gifts this year:

- [Forbes](https://www.forbes.com/sites/kenkam/2018/12/16/how-to-avoid-amazon-scammers-this-holiday-season/#7927e18f3faa) examined phony tracking numbers among other inventive delivery scams targeting Amazon shoppers over the winter holiday shopping rush.
- Speaking of the eCommerce giant, [9.1% of Amazon's 250 million reviews](https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/nicolenguyen/amazon-fake-review-problem) are estimated to be fake, fraudulent, or "unnatural" in a direct attempt to fool online shoppers.
- The [AARP](https://www.aarp.org/money/scams-fraud/info-2018/protection-from-holiday-scammers.html) reports fake shopping sites and apps every holiday season.
- And perhaps most interestingly, no age group is exempt from holiday shopping fraud: Despite being one of the most logged on generations, [millennials are 25% more likely](https://www.ftc.gov/news-events/blogs/data-spotlight/2019/10/not-what-you-think-millennials-fraud) to report losing money to online shopping fraud than other demographics.

From knock off electronics (including [fake Apple products](https://www.theverge.com/2018/2/2/16966216/chinese-apple-counterfeiter-pleads-guilty-selling-iphone-ipad-fakes)) and bait-and-switch [Facebook advertising](https://techcrunch.com/2018/06/12/facebook-ecommerce-scams/) to cheaply made Chinese clothing ([$4 bikini](https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2018/05/wish-china-cheap-stuff/560861/), anyone?), to fraudulent product reviews, all coming to light in the last few years — __it’s safe to say that online shoppers will be on the lookout for trustworthy brands to buy from this holiday season.__

Ready to put your most trustworthy foot forward for the eCommerce holiday goldrush? 

## Here are five strategies to inspire customer confidence in even the most scrupulous holiday shoppers.  


### 1. Have a presence on third-party review platforms 

As the first place consumers go to shout about great shopping experiences, and sometimes [cry foul](https://business.trustpilot.com/reviews/learn-from-customers/why-do-people-write-reviews-what-our-research-revealed), review platforms are a goldmine of consumer wisdom. The beauty of it is, that wisdom is readily accessible to fellow shoppers everywhere.

With more than 300,000+ reviewed companies, and 13,650,000+ organic reviews written on the Trustpilot platform, it stands to reason that reviews left on Trustpilot company profile pages are a great way for smart shoppers to suss out the integrity of a business they’re considering buying from.

And historical Trustpilot platform data shows that online shoppers try to do just that around the holidays — in past years, search volumes for reviews on Trustpilot surged around November and December, with nearly 480,000 review searches leading up to holiday purchases.

More than likely, during this period of increased review activity shoppers are on the lookout for warnings about products arriving [not as advertised](https://www.consumer.ftc.gov/blog/2017/03/some-online-deals-charge-dont-deliver), or poor delivery experiences.

But consumers won’t find too many reviews on Trustpilot that mention these common scams outright. We’re proud to say that __only 1.5% of all reviews and 3.5% of all negative reviews mention scams__, according to a recent deep dive into Trustpilot’s review data.

That’s peanuts in the grand scheme of things.

Said differently, online shoppers look to platforms like Trustpilot as a key resource for finding credible companies to do business with, especially around the high stakes shopping months of the winter holiday season. Putting your company right where customers are looking is a great way to get discovered around the holidays.

And perhaps just as importantly for retailers doing business online, your future customers are likely to come across your profile on third-party review platforms at the very [top of organic search results](https://business.trustpilot.com/reviews/why-does-google-care-if-your-business-has-online-reviews-in-2019). So if you want to be sure holiday shoppers can easily find reviews of your business, grow your reputation where it matters.

### 2. Improve your online reputation to catch more holiday shoppers at the very top of the funnel

It’s no secret that in this day and age, even unscrupulous shoppers do a ton of research online before making a purchase. But what are they looking for?

If online shoppers don’t have a go-to provider for their particular needs, they’re almost always looking for trustworthy brands with an authentic online presence. This helps them figure out pretty quickly whether they’re willing to buy from an unfamiliar retailer.

In fact, [recent consumer research](https://marketing.trustpilot.com/the-value-of-a-trustworthy-brand-rep-demandgen-us) confirms that online reputation is the number one way to improve trust with customers, with 90% of online shoppers ready to walk away from a brand that has a poor online reputation.

And we’d hazard an educated guess that shoppers are even less likely to take a chance on unreputable brands around the holidays than they would be ordinarily.

From The Value of a Trustworthy Brand Reputation (Trustpilot 2019)

Top Factors That Decrease Brand Trust

On top of that, __[93% of online shoppers](https://business.trustpilot.com/guides-reports/build-trusted-brand/6-ways-to-make-trust-your-essential-brand-differentiator) say they read reviews before buying online__, and as mentioned above, this behavior only increases around prime shopping dates. With so many options to choose from, it’s unlikely that online shoppers will opt to support a brand with a questionable reputation, or with no customer reviews to validate the product or service.

Top Factors that Increase Brand Trust


So, what are some easy ways you can make sure your online reputation is bulletproof?

- __Proactively collect customer reviews.__ Per our research, 94% of customers are more likely to trust companies with positive reviews, and 80% will still trust companies with a high volume of reviews.
- __Never delete unfavorable reviews.__ 95% of online shoppers say they lose trust in companies that obviously curate their online reviews.
- __Keep the information and style of your website up to date.__ 77% of shoppers lose trust in brands and retailers with websites with an outdated look and feel.
- __Make sure your website has a secure web connection.__ 88% of shoppers are unlikely to convert on unsecured websites.

Do these things, and it’s unlikely that your future customers will suspect your business of any scammy practices.

### 3. Put trust signals front and center throughout the online shopping journey

Today’s online shoppers already have an unprecedented amount of choice. Despite marketers’ best efforts, the steady stream of holiday offers on every channel from September to December only [adds to the noise](https://business.trustpilot.com/guides-reports/build-trusted-brand/can-online-reviews-revive-consumer-trust-in-advertising).

As a result, your future customers need more third-party validation (and [social proof](https://business.trustpilot.com/reviews/build-trusted-brand/what-is-social-proof-and-why-is-it-important-for-marketing)) than ever when looking for the perfect holiday gifts online.

For the uninitiated, social proof — like reviews, social likes, online mentions, and testimonials for products, services, or brands — has a powerful psychological effect on shoppers. Because this kind of public support comes from other shoppers rather than from the business itself, the positive messaging surrounding the product or service comes off as more authentic and trustworthy.

Trust signals are a logical extension of this concept — think: visual representations of social proof like badges, ratings and scores, and even logos endorsing a product or service. And they should be front and center across the online shopping journey because they also elicit a strong influence on shopping behavior.

Per another [recent consumer research report](https://business.trustpilot.com/guides-reports/build-trusted-brand/why-and-how-social-proof-influences-consumers), almost all consumers (98%) could identify at least one type of trust signal that increased their likelihood to make a purchase.

We also uncovered that 82% of shoppers feel more comfortable making a purchase when they come across positive star ratings about the product or service in their shopping journey, and this percentage only goes up when they encounter ratings displayed on key pages like the homepage or product pages.

From The Psychology Behind Trust Signals (Trustpilot 2019)

Trust signal placement

Here are some things you should definitely keep in mind if you plan to use trust signals to cash in on even [more holiday shopping conversions](https://business.trustpilot.com/reviews/how-great-sites-convert-visitors-to-customers).

- __Trust signals work differently at each stage of the purchasing funnel.__ 
- Per our consumer research, when online shoppers are in the preliminary research phase of a purchase, they want to see that your product or service has been mentioned on blogs or in the media.
- If they’re comparing several retailers, online reviews and customer testimonials are the first place shoppers look for support making their decision.
- And finally, if they’re ready to check out, trust signals that communicate authenticity (think: Authorized Seller Badges) are what it takes to prevent an abandoned cart.

So, if you want to turn skeptical browsers into buyers this holiday season, make sure you’re placing trust signals thoughtfully throughout your online shopping journey.

### 4. Stay up to date on known red flags — and avoid them.

Today’s customers have seen it all, and they have access to plenty of information about [trending scams](https://www.aarp.org/money/scams-fraud/info-2019/holiday.html) and how to avoid them. For so many reasons, it’s wise to make sure you steer clear of any black hat marketing or site experience maneuvers that could inadvertently communicate to today’s educated consumers that your business is in any way dishonest.

Here’s a shortlist of holiday vibes you definitely [don’t want to give off](https://www.cnbc.com/2017/06/16/online-shopping-scams-how-to-identify-fake-sites.html) with your marketing offers or onsite experience this year:

- __Don’t send customers on a wild goose chase to redeem your offer.__ Customers today are hyper aware of scam tropes. Emails asking the recipient to click a link or download an app to access an offer are a known red flag, so keep marketing offers simple this holiday season.
- __Avoid offering suspiciously deep discounts.__ This is especially important if you’re selling trending gift items, which tend to make shoppers suspect that your offer is too good to be true.
- __Double, triple, quadruple check your spelling and grammar.__ In the eyes of savvy shoppers, poor spelling and grammar on your website, marketing materials, and emails are can indicate a careless or dishonest retailer.
- __Make your contact info and business details readily available.__ Whether you’re an eCommerce store, a service provider, or a travel business, websites that don’t provide their street number or address might stop online shoppers in their tracks.
- __Customers care about your return and refund policy.__ In fact, they care about all of your policies. Make sure that your terms of service, shipping and returns policy, and of course your privacy policy, are all discoverable onsite.

At the end of the day, we’re all consumers. So before you push out that marketing offer or website update, put yourself in your future customers’ shoes to make sure it doesn’t carry any tenets of a holiday scam.

### 5. Level up your customer experience ahead of the holidays to show shoppers they’re more than just revenue

We’ve covered what customers do not want to see in their online shopping journey. But the other side of that coin is what you can do to make sure you move shoppers to the final stage of your eCommerce funnel.

[Customer experience](https://business.trustpilot.com/reviews/learn-from-customers/5-reasons-why-customer-experience-is-the-pulse-of-every-business) is a hot topic year round because it drives loyalty and retention, helping you sustainably grow your bottom line. In fact, businesses at the frontlines of customer centricity deliver compound annual revenue growth rates of 17%, compared to just 3% for businesses falling behind in this critical area.

To make sure your customer experience is the best it can be this holiday season, consider taking some of the steps outlined below:

- __Start collecting customer reviews before the holidays.__ If you don’t have a review strategy in place already, look into popular third-party review sites. It’s important to proactively find out what your customers want and need to increase overall customer satisfaction.
- __Showcase your reviews and testimonials throughout the customer journey.__ The online shopping journey bombards shoppers with choice, and empowers them to research their options every step of the way. Counteract purchasing hesitation by placing trust signals at key moments of the customer journey.
- __Optimize your website for mobile searches.__ Today, more than half of all internet traffic comes from mobile phones, and 82% of internet users have used their mobile devices to shop online. If your site isn’t optimized for a mobile shopping experience, you could lose customers to mobile-friendly competitors.
- __Site speed is mission critical to the online shopping experience__, so check that your website is fast enough. [40% of online shoppers](https://www.entrepreneur.com/article/281986) will abandon a page if it takes more than 3 seconds to load, so make sure your images are compressed and web-friendly before the holiday rush kicks off.
- __Delivering personalized content works wonders.__ Taking the time to personalize your brand’s customer experience with relevant pieces of information helps create brand affinity and loyalty,
- __Ensure your checkout process is seamless and secure.__ Don’t lose shoppers who have made it this far! Make sure you’re up to date on best practices, like offering guest checkout options or the ability to log in through social media profiles. Make the number of steps in the checkout process abundantly apparent, and consider offering chat and phone support — at least during the holidays.

### Winning the holiday shopping rush with a trustworthy brand reputation

Sure, we’d argue that trustworthiness and good business ethics are essential all year round — but they certainly come into even sharper focus when customers are on high scam alert for the holiday shopping rush.

According to [retail experts](https://www.inc.com/anna-meyer/retail-holiday-sales-season-growth-2019-christmas.html) at Deloitte, “We’ve seen retailers continue to improve customer experience, and invest in the fundamentals… Convenience is the new retail currency; retailers who offer seamless experiences, have products available, and can deliver items more quickly than ever are most likely to win the holiday season.”

And while we couldn’t agree more about the importance of customer experience around the holidays, we do have one thing to add: 

The companies that will come out on top this holiday season are the ones actively working to lead with their online reputation and build trust with shoppers through thoughtful uses of social proof to show — not tell — online shoppers that they can buy with confidence.

Ready to take the plunge and create your own review strategy in time for the holidays? Get your free copy of The Complete Guide to Reviews below. 



Holiday Playbook: 5 Ways to win over wary holiday shoppers

Bird landing on a hand in the mountains

## The latest landing page best practices

__1. Split test landing pages __

Only 56% of businesses who are leveraging landing pages actually test and optimize them. But why invest the time and resources to create landing pages and send paid traffic if the pages aren’t performing optimally? Without knowing what’s working to convert traffic, you’re leaving money on the table.

__2. Message match__

This is probably the most crucial way to reduce bounce rate and increase landing page conversions. Make sure the offer in your ad is precisely the same as the page it leads traffic to, otherwise there’s slim chance anyone will stay on your site, much less convert.

ClassPass' Ad and landing page, both sporting a solid message match: "5 Classes for $19" Limited Trial. Sources: Google.com, ClassPass.com 

download (7)

__3. Create urgency__

When someone arrives on your landing page, you don’t have their attention for very long. It's important that your page is compelling, relevant, and urges the visitor to take action. How can you do this?

Imply scarcity, using phrases like: “limited supply” or “time is running out”. You can also go the extra mile by including live countdown until the offer expires, or by adding a pop up with the deadline, like Rush49 does below:

Rush49 PPC landing page. Source: rush49.com 

download (8)

__4. Use your customer's language__
 
Your offer isn’t compelling if your customer doesn’t understand it. Connect with your target market by using their language in your copy. One effective way of identifying your customer language is by mining customer comments and reviews to see the way your customers describe your company and product. Then adopt their language.

Dashlane landing page, customer review of Dashlane. Sources: Dashlane.com, Trustpilot.com 

download (9)

__5. Convey trust with testimonials or reviews__

The more someone trusts you, the more likely they are to convert. Customers will trust the testimonials of their peers over the claims of the business, every time. So why not test how incorporating reviews on your landing page? You could see a 33% increase in conversion rates, like CitizenShipper did below:

CitizenShipper landing page. Source: Trustpilot blog

download (10)

How are your landing pages performing? Leave a comment and let us know any tips we've missed, or best practices for your landing pages.

P.S. Some stats and suggestions came from these blog posts from Impact and eConsultancy.

Also check out our [Dashlane case study] to learn how one of partners improved landing page performance with tips 4 and 5.

Turn Browsers Into Buyers