The importance of conversion rate optimization for your dental website
There are certainly a lot of marketing acronyms floating around out there. In a sea of CTAs, ROIs, PPCs, CPCs, and dozens of others, there is one that your dental practice should pay particular attention to if you want to achieve peak performance for your dental website marketing. Conversion rate optimization (CRO) can be described as any strategies intended to improve the percentage of visitors who perform a desired action on your website. That action might be completing a form, scheduling an online appointment, or simply picking up the phone and calling your office.
The reason CRO is so important is pretty simple. Any amount of money you’ve invested in generating traffic to your website through search engine optimization or digital advertising is essentially wasted if those visitors don’t eventually become new patients. Your marketing strategy needs to be focused just as much (if not more) on lead conversion as it is on lead generation.
So, how good (or bad) is your current conversion rate?
Before you dig into conversion rate optimization for your dental practice website, you need to make an honest assessment of where you currently stand. First, take a look at all of the CTA’s (calls to action) on your dental website and what pages they reside on. Next, you need to gather some data from your website’s analytics. Look to see how many visitors those pages received over a specified period of time, and also how many of those visitors completed the desired action. Then, just plug those into this simple formula:
Number of completed conversions/number of visitors x 100 = conversion rate %
What would be a good conversion rate? It depends on several factors like the type of practice, level of competition, and dental marketing goals. But if your rate is lower than you expected and you think you can do better, then there are some common causes that may be holding you back.
Five things that might be hurting your dental website conversion rates
Weak copywriting
Your website copywriting needs to convince your visitors of the value that you offer. Review the content of your website and identify any weak, non-persuasive wording that would simply fail to motivate or engage you if you were in the patient’s shoes.
Poor design
Bad design is another big enemy of conversion rates. Layouts that make it difficult to follow the intended flow of a page can detour viewers from reaching your intended action. Compare the visual appeal of your dental website to some of your competitors to get a feel if you’re on the right track.
Bad U/X
U/X (user experience) includes any factors that make it easier for your visitors to use your site, such as navigation, page speed, and accessibility. Poor U/X can annoy visitors and drive them away from your website before you even have an opportunity to convert them.
Unclear CTAs
Don’t assume that what you are asking visitors to do is obvious. All of your calls to action (CTAs) should be highly noticeable and specific in terms of what the person should do and why they should do it.
Frustrating forms
Even if your readers do reach a form to take a specific conversion action, it’s no guarantee that they will complete the process. Forms that are overly complicated or poorly constructed can lead to frustrated attempts and abandoned entries.
Ready to improve your dental website’s conversion rate optimization?
If you feel your dental website could be performing better, our dental website designers are experts at conversion rate optimization. Contact us today to discuss how we can improve your conversions and generate more new patients for your practice!