Shopify Conversion Rate Optimization

Shopify Conversion Rate Optimization

Conversions are a big deal. You want people to discover, learn more about, and then finally buy one of your products. And the more customers you have in your store, the more you earn.

With over 3 million stores currently on Shopify, attracting visitors and encouraging them to make purchases requires some effort. But what if, despite your best efforts, it seems like very few people are actually visiting your store?

This is a clear sign that it’s time to assess your store’s performance and identify areas for improvement. Slow-loading websites, confusing checkout pages, generic stock photos, or poorly optimized mobile pages can all negatively impact customer trust and ultimately reduce sales.

While you can’t expect overnight skyrocketing sales, there are several actions you can take to enhance your Shopify store’s performance, maximize your existing traffic, and ultimately increase your sales. In this comprehensive Shopify guide to conversion rate optimization, we’ll help you identify the specific areas where your store may be falling short and provide actionable strategies to improve them significantly.

What is conversion rate and conversion rate optimization?

A website visitor converts when they take the action you want them to take on your website. And those can come in many shapes and sizes. For example, when running a Shopify (or any other, for that matter) store, your main goal (or macro-conversion) is for the visitor to make a purchase. But there are several smaller actions that you might want website visitors to take – like signing up to receive a newsletter or for the loyalty program. Those are called micro-conversions. Your conversion rate is the percentage of visitors who completed those actions.

A high conversion rate means that your website is well-designed, performing well, and there’s nothing blocking your website visitors from making a purchase or signing for a newsletter. On the other hand, a low conversion rate in your store indicates that you should take a closer look at it, as there are probably a few things turning your visitors away – like slow loading speed, complicated checkout, or maybe outdated design. 

How can you find out your online store conversion rate? 

Shopify calculates your store’s conversion rate automatically, so to know what is yours, you can simply check your current conversion rate in the analytics dashboard. If you want, you can also look at how your Shopify conversion rate has changed over time by looking at the “Online Store Conversion Over Time” report – if there’s a sudden drop in conversions, then there’s also something you should have a closer look at.

What is conversion rate optimization, then? Basically, it’s about finding the issues preventing your customers from converting, testing your Shopify store for performance, and then updating your store. Your goal here is to make your store more appealing to the visitors so more people would be encouraged to shop there – or do any other action you want them to take. 

What is a good conversion rate?

Now though, how can you know whether you have a “high” or “low conversion rate? Littledata has the answer to the question – in July 2022, they surveyed 3777 stores to learn more about how well Shopify stores are doing this year. And so they found that:

• An average Shopify conversion rate is 1.4%
• The top 10% of the most successful stores on Shopify had a conversion rate above 4.7%, while the top 20% could boast of having a conversion rate higher than 3.3% 
• The bottom tier of the Shopify platforms has a conversion rate of 0.3% or lower.

If your Shopify conversion rate is in the higher tier, then great work – everything on your website works as it should (though there’s surely room for improvement). However, when it’s in the average or lower range, it’s high time to evaluate what parts of your store might not be working as well as others and look for ways to optimize those pages.