We might be a little biased, but we say you need a top-notch CRO agency on your team.

Why? Well, only 22% of businesses are satisfied with their conversion rates, so chances are yours could also do with a pick-me-up.

You need a mix of technical know-how, industry experience and a little pizzazz to pull off an effective Conversion Rate Optimisation (CRO) strategy. That’s why you need a good agency to support you – the big decision is choosing which one to go with.

To make sure your CRO agency is the right fit, we’ve come up with a quick intro to CRO which should give you a better idea of what to look for. Let’s jump right in:

What does a CRO agency actually do?

Let’s get straight to the point …

A CRO agency improves user experience to boost your conversion rates.

Quick recap: conversions are the actions visitors take on your site. It doesn’t matter if it's an email signup, white paper download or a product purchase - your CRO agency should be focused on boosting the numbers for these!

Through effective CRO, more of your website traffic will take the action you desire. This means your company will reach its goals and gain more customers – now doesn’t that sound good?

Your CRO agency will achieve this using three core methods:

1. Analysis of user behaviour
2. Testing hypotheses
3. Creating new and targeted content

It’s important to remember that no two websites or brands are the same, so your CRO agency should take a unique approach to your content. The strategy it creates should align with your brand’s long-term goals and meet the needs of your target customers.

Most CRO agencies will go through a similar process to achieve this, so we’ve outlined it here to help you understand how your CRO agency is likely to work.

Create a thorough brief

To improve your conversion rates, your CRO agency will need to know you, your brand and your objectives inside-out.

This means it will need to take a comprehensive brief, before even looking at your website. A face-to-face meeting or a chat over the phone will really help your agency understand your product/service and target audience, and put it in a great position to start work.

This briefing stage is a great opportunity for you, too. You’ll be able to ask questions about your CRO agency's processes, working methods and any other burning topics. We’d suggest you ask about:

• the level of involvement the agency requires from you
• the data it needs access to
• estimated time periods (for initial optimisation and maintenance)
• reporting on progress

Have a list of questions ready before the briefing takes place, that way you won’t forget anything important.

Initial audit

Your CRO agency will look through your site and make notes based on its extensive background in analysing online user experiences.

It will collect a large amount of data – both quantitative and qualitative – that encompasses the entire customer journey.

It’ll do this by using analytics tools, like Mixpanel, Kissmetrics, Amplitude and Google Analytics. These tools provide information about important KPIs, including:

• conversion rate
• bounce rate
• exit rate
• average time on site
• average page views
• audience demographics

It will also create a comprehensive conversion funnel to highlight any key drop-off points and may use heatmaps, to identify areas of interest.

By talking directly to customers (through meetings, surveys etc.), your CRO agency will gain an in-depth understanding of customer motives, which will allow it to implement changes accordingly.

Once it has completed this audit, your CRO agency will come up with a systematic plan for improvement and pitch it to you. If you like what you hear, it will move forward.

Testing

Based on this plan, your CRO agency will test different areas of your site.

It’ll probably use A/B testing to do so – 56% of marketers use this method. This type of testing provides a direct comparison between two or more variations to determine the most effective.

Here are just a few of the page elements your CRO agency can test:

• CTA
• images
• headlines
• subheadings
• buttons
• body text
• forms
• colour

Establishing which variations are the most successful can be a lengthy process, but is key to effective CRO for every page.

Throughout this process, your CRO agency will report its findings back to you and alert you to any changes it wishes to make.

Make changes and create content

The successful elements from the testing phase will be implemented in your site by your CRO agency, to create a truly enhanced user experience.

Your agency will then explore other ways in which to boost conversion rates. This often includes creating new content based on the insights gathered in the audit phase. CRO can actually fuel your content strategy, if you let it, so take your CRO agency's advice on board, or let it do this work for you.

Refinement

CRO is an ongoing process. After the initial optimisation, your CRO agency won’t just disappear.

It will stick around, monitoring and maintaining your site. It’ll continue conducting tests, will often tweak elements according to visitor response and will make changes to your goals or business plan.

The FABRIC8 touch

So, that’s your standard process for your average CRO agency. However, at FABRIC8 we aim to go a little further.

We strive to understand how and why users interact with digital products. Basically, think of us as digital detectives, exploring all aspects of your site looking for clues on how to improve your conversion rate.

We focus on the ‘test and learn’ process, and commit to providing a top-notch, ongoing service for all our customers. Our method can help guide strategy, improve efficiency and provide valuable business intelligence for brands or publishers – can you refuse that?

Here’s a little about how we work; we get the info we need through a combo of analytics analysis and behavioural psychology. This informs all that we do and provides unique and detailed insight into each customer action.

We’re pretty good at what we do, that’s because we have an awesome team supporting us. We have decades of experience in the CRO industry, and everyone in the office has the Google Analytics Individual Qualification – so we know our stuff!

Rather than assigning one person to your brand, we split our work into sub-teams (based on areas of expertise) that work together to create a strong and effective CRO strategy. Those sub-teams are:

• Analytics and insight – This team continually monitors progress, using high-tech tools and software. It aims to find out exactly how users interact with your brand.
• Strategy, user experience and innovation – This comprises a team of creatives, coders and copywriters. These guys create a plan of action, based on insights gained and think up snazzy new ways to give your site some oomph.
• Web designers and developers – These guys make the magic happen! This team creates amazing digital experiences that enhance the customer journey and improve your conversion rates.

So, the big question: Do I really need all of that?

YES, YOU DO! And you need experts to help you achieve it, otherwise things could turn a little rocky.

CRO is tough to manage in-house. In fact, it’s pretty tough in general; roughly 75% of businesses have problems finding suitable expertise for optimising their conversion rates.

This is because it requires an extremely specialist set of skills, including:

• copywriting
• data analysis
• technical knowledge
• testing knowledge
• people skills

Individuals within a company simply don’t have the time or expertise to commit to a full CRO strategy. That’s why a CRO agency is a great option, as it brings a team of experts together to do the hard work for you!

A good CRO agency will be honest, transparent and effective (as well as super-smart). You need it to make the most of every visitor to your site and to allow your business to successfully compete with others. What could help you more?