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BEST PRACTICE REPORT
Web Conversion
Optimization
Measurement
January 1, 2018
Summary
Measuring the effectiveness of a Web conversion optimization (WCO) strategy requires
the selection of the right metrics and understanding how they relate to one another. WCO
measurement begins the moment a visitor lands on the Web site and encompasses the
site’s ability to attract, engage and qualify visitors. Fully evaluating the impact of WCO
requires the analysis of Demand Waterfall® metrics for inquiries that originate on the Web
site.
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Editor’s note: For a tool that provides a structured approach to operationalizing the
Web Conversion Optimization Framework, use “The Web Conversion Optimization
Assessment Tool,” which enables organizations to create environments that attract,
engage and qualify targeted Web site visitors.
In his 1975 book The Tao of Physics: An Exploration of the Parallels Between Modern
Physics and Eastern Mysticism, the physicist Fritjof Capra described the importance of
context in scientific measurement: “A careful analysis of the process of observation in
atomic physics has shown that the subatomic particles have no meaning as isolated
entities, but can only be understood as interconnections between the preparation of an
experiment and the subsequent measurement.”
B2B marketers seeking to assess the effectiveness of their Web conversion
optimization (WCO) strategies also must consider context. Simply measuring activities
and immediate outcomes is not sufficient to ascertain whether the results align with
goals or the desired impact has been achieved. Instead, context-specific metrics must
be selected to reflect a Web site’s ability to attract, engage and quality targeted visitors
(see “The Web Conversion Optimization Framework”). In this report, we outline the
measurement criteria and assessment process required to optimize a non-transactional
Web conversion strategy as a component of an organization’s demand creation
strategy.
WCO Measurement: Attract Phase
WCO strategy is designed to facilitate the sharing of messaging, content and offerings
in the form of Web site experiences that attract, engage and qualify Web visitors. In the
Attract phase, WCO focuses on the Web site’s level of preparedness to receive traffic
from multi-channel inbound and outbound tactics. For each visitor, the process of
determining whether the site will adequately address the initial reason for the visit is
almost instantaneous. Measurement in this phase includes the following metrics:
• Traffic volume. Determine if the site is capturing the necessary number
of visitors needed to meet the Web site’s portion of lead generation
required to meet marketing qualified lead (MQL) goals. Measure the
total number of new and repeat visitors to the site. These metrics should
be presented as year-over-year and month-over-month growth figures
and should include any changes in inbound activities to highlight
correlations between these activities and the subsequent increase or
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decrease in site activity.
• Unique and repeat visitors. These metrics compare the number of
unique or new visitors (usually defined by user-agent and IP) to the
number of repeat visitors to the site, indicating whether enough new
visitors are being driven to support new-logo acquisition goals and/or
enough repeat visitors to nurture leads to support the progression of
the buyer from one buying phase to the next (e.g., education to
solution). Marketers can examine unique visitors as a percentage of the
total or compare the ratio of unique to repeat visitors to determine if the
correct balance is in place to meet company goals. The optimal ratio
may vary; for example, companies focused on growth via new buyers
with short sales cycles should emphasize new visitors, whereas
companies with longer sales cycles or that grow via new offerings
should emphasize repeat visitors.
• Abandon rate. Measure the volume and percentage of visitors who do
not engage with the Web site, compared to the volume and percentage
of visitors who click at least once. A high abandon rate indicates that
either a portion of the visitors to the site are not the right profile fit, or
that the site is not properly prepared to meet visitors’ information needs.
Using reverse IP lookup tools can help determine whether target buyers
are reaching the site, based on company, geographic and/or industry
criteria. If they are not, conduct relative targeting and persona exercises
to identify and attract the right buyers to the site.
• Attract-to-engage metrics. The attract-to-engage ratio is used to
determine if the site is converting a sufficient percentage of visitors
before they abandon the site (i.e., bounce). Here, initial engagement is
defined as the total number of visitors who clicked on at least one offer,
link or navigation element before leaving the site. Calculate this metric
by comparing the number of visitors who abandon (bounce) the site to
the total number of visitors who clicked at least one offer, and the total
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number of visitors. The metric is expressed as the total number of
visitors who engage (volume) and the ratio (percentage) of total initial
visitors who decide to engage after they land on the site. With this
information, digital marketers can determine if more inbound activity is
required or if the site needs to better align to the visitor’s needs — or
both.
WCO Measurement: Engage Phase
During the Engage phase, Web experiences are used to build the credibility and trust
necessary to satisfy visitors’ information inflection points and facilitate the Qualify
phase. Engagement success is measured by the site’s ability to progress buyers
through their information-gathering process to the point where they are willing to
provide their own information in exchange for content they perceive as high value.
• Progression. This metric determines if the buyer is progressing in his or
her search for content designed to support the education, solution and
selection phases of the buying cycle. Buyer progression is assessed
based on the level of engagement (i.e., frequency, length of visit) and
type of content viewed or downloaded. Measurement requires tagging
each content asset in its metadata for the buying stage — education,
solution or selection — that it is designed to support. For instance, if a
visitor accesses an asset designed for education and then an asset
tagged as appropriate for the solution phase, he or she is considered to
be progressing. Best-in-class Web sites offer predefined paths — based
on industry, persona, company size or other segmentation factors —
that provide content offers aligned to the buyer’s journey, improving the
visitor experience and enabling measurement of progression.
• Frequency. By using the frequency of visits to the Web site as a proxy
for the buyer’s level of urgency, especially when frequent visits take
place in a short period of time, digital marketers can infer that these
visitors have a higher propensity than others to convert from unknown
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to known and eventually engage with sales.
WCO Measurement: Qualify Phase
The primary goal of qualification is to get the visitor to identify himself or herself. Once
a unique identifier — usually the visitor’s email address — is obtained, anonymous
visitor data and company data for existing accounts can be added to the contact record
to build a buyer profile. After the visitor converts from unknown to known, the
qualification process continues as the organization matches the contact to the ideal
buyer profile to determine if the contact’s response can be considered an inquiry.
• Form submission rate. This metric compares the total number of forms
submitted in a given timeframe to the number of visitors. It is used to
determine if enough visitors are converting from unknown to known to
enable bi-directional communication to support further engagement on
and off the site (e.g., email nurture, social engagement, sales
engagement). In addition to using regular Web forms, digital marketers
should also track email subscriptions, site subscriptions (if required),
RSS feeds, forums, communities, newsletters or social networks. Due to
the limited contact data typically provided, consider dynamic profiling to
gather additional contact data to more fully enable bi-directional
communication.
• Form abandon rate. This metric counts the number of visitors who are
presented with a form but abandon it (or a page with an embedded
form) without submitting it. This metric gauges the quality of the content
gating strategy (see “Gating Web Content, the Sirius Way”) — including
the timing of the offer, the content’s perceived quality, and its alignment
with the buyer’s need(s).
• Other qualification mechanisms. Additional mechanisms to collect
visitor data include the number of new contacts created via online chat
(gated chat sessions, or ungated chat sessions with visitor data
collected during or after the chat), the number of inbound calls to the
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Web site’s main phone number (with caller data collected), and the
number of site visitors who submit a “contact me” form or Web inquiry.
Like the form submission rate, these metrics help digital marketers
understand the site’s effectiveness in converting visitors from unknown
to known.
• Profile fit. Profile fit rate, as determined by the volume and ratio of
responses that qualify as inquiries, is critical for determining if the
correct visitors are being targeted and supported by the site. For each
response generated, compare the contact to the ideal buyer profile (i.e.,
Lead Level 2 — see the brief “The Lead Spectrum, Expanded”) to
determine if it counts as an inquiry.
Key Takeaways
Organizations should think of their Web sites as digital marketing labs where
experiments are conducted to optimize experiences and outcomes throughout the
entire revenue cycle. Just as subatomic particles encountered in a science lab have no
meaning as isolated entities, WCO measurement is meaningless without consideration
of impact on the business. Fully evaluating WCO requires an analysis of the types of
leads created and their subsequent progress beyond qualification — including the
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creation of marketing qualified leads, sales opportunities and revenue via the Demand
Waterfall. In addition, by measuring WCO in the context of inbound demand creation as
well as sales outcomes, digital marketers can improve inbound targeting and tactic
optimization as well as Web experience.
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