If you go to any of the biggest online retailers today, you will find that they have tools to track the behavior of a customer. These tools help them see what is broken, what is working, and what is not. But you must know that things that visitors usually do on a site heavily depend on their purpose. If a customer has pressing wants and needs, he/she will go ahead and make a purchase, given your website appeals to them.
To know the 5 initial things that visitors end up doing on your site, read the blog below.
- First Step – they arrive
An analytics tool is one of the most invaluable tools that help you gauge your visitors’ mindset. But, you must know that most of the visitors that land are coming through a query on the search engine. A checklist of search titles will let you know what they seek and when they arrive.
For instance, a shoe seller sees that people are looking for leather shoes and not rubber slippers. You may, thus, discover a part of your website that is targeted for the needs of the visitor while the other isn’t.
Analytics will give you a checklist of websites that send traffic to you. These websites are called the “referring URLs” that let you understand the goal of customers. You can, thus, infer that visitors coming from a free coupon donating site are more interested in saving. However, those coming from a retail link are interested in the product’s features.
That means a simple step of uniting your site’s conversions with referring URLs will help you recognize the valuable traffic sources. You can also find those sites that direct high-converting traffic.
- Second Step – they seek
Sales are very important. But a checkout page on your site tells you whether you have missed a chance or succeeded. Consider an example where during the end of season sale people kept looking for a kegerator that dispenses chilled beer. At first, only the Christmas season would stock it. But search keyword results revealed that even when the Christmas season was long over, people did keep looking for it. Do you see how analytics helped in letting us know what buyers were seeking and not only what they found.
An important principal data point is the rate of cart abandonment. This activity goes beyond conversions. You will see how a certain percentage of customers added items in the cart but abandoned the site right before checking out.
This crucial metric indicates the ability of your site to end deals. Within no time, you will find out all that is amiss with the checkout process on your website.
- Third Step – they land on multiple homepages
One of the prevailing myths that make web designers waste hours in the wrong place is that user experience starts at the homepage. However, you may not know that customers can enter your site through several homepages and not just one entry point.
That is because all search engines dig a lot deeper into any e-commerce site. That means if a visitor types “Bluetooth speakers”, they will be brought to not just an electronic item but everything from GPS devices to MP3 players and televisions.
- Fourth Step – they start viewing the top pages
Once they have stopped seeking, your customers start viewing the top pages on your website. Though you own a business of selling items, there could be some items that specifically resonate with your customers.
Thus, most of the hits could come from people reading the reviews left by customers. Or say you are selling 20 products but there are 5 of them that indicate high traffic as they are bestsellers. Knowing these interests of your customers will help you design your website better to meet their expectations.
- Fifth Step – they buy or bounce
After having viewed all the pages, people may eventually add items to the cart, resulting in conversions. Or conversely, they can leave when the landing page fails to meet expectations. Analytics will show you those landing pages that have the highest bounce rates. This measurement lets you know those pages that are letting your customers down.
Thus, if you see a high bounce rate, redesign your website with a clear CTC to accomplish good sales.
Conclusion
An online retailer like you is curious about performance. This performance is the sales volume generated by your website(s). We hope our blog helps you understand a visitor’s behavior and things they do. If there’s anything we missed, do share with us in the comments below.
