One of the queries we get a lot is “why aren’t my Google Ads converting?“. The hard truth is that there can be many reasons that your Google Ads aren’t performing as expected and every step in that process needs to be on point. In this article I’m going to concentrate on what you can do to gain some insight into the user’s on page experience.
So your ads are getting lots of impressions, a good click through rate and you’re satisfied with the cost per click (CPC). That’s fantastic and congratulations. But that traffic isn’t converting into enquiries or sales on your website.
Providing your Google Ads are setting the right expectations with your customers when they click on your ad, then the problem really has to be with the website itself. Let’s consider those factors.
You have competition and it’s highly likely that your customers are clicking on your competitors Google Ads as well. There’s a few simple things to ask yourself about the market you’re competing in.
How does your Google Ads offer compare to your major competitors?
This is the simplest form of market analysis. If you’re prepared to spend on paid search traffic using Google Ads, it’s mandatory to analyse the competing offers in your market. You’ll need to match or beat your competitors in some way that convinces the potential customer that your product or service is what they need.
This doesn’t necessarily mean competing on price because lets face it some of your competitors are probably basing the offer purely on price and that’s not always the customer you want. In my personal experience, competing on price alone generally brings customers who don’t have the budget required to do the job properly and they really aren’t focused on quality. That being said, depending on your market it may be necessary and it always depends on the individual product or service itself.
Does your website raise any questions about quality or authenticity?
If your advertising budget is driving traffic but the customer lands on your website and the web design doesn’t convince them of the quality and value in your service, it’s going to be hard to convert them into an enquiry or a sale.
Simple things like whether the website is mobile responsive because in most industries that majority of the website browsing is being done on mobile devices and more specifically mobile phones.
Can they find your contact details and business information easily. Anyone making a purchase online will want to know who they’re dealing with and how to get in contact with them if there’s an issue with their order.
Spy on your website visitors to see what their on-site behaviour is like.
Providing your offer is attractive, your website is answering the customer’s questions and doesn’t raise concerns about quality, the issue has to be somewhere else. How can you see what that issue is?
The answer is to spy on your user’s browsing activity while they are on your website. This will give you a lot of insight into the user behaviour because you can see exactly what they’re doing when they land on your page and how they interact.
It may even reveal technical issues that you weren’t aware of that’s preventing the user from taking the conversion actions you need. We typically use a service called Hotjar which will record your website visitor actions for playback at a later time.
This information incredibly helpful and will often lead to adjustments that can increase your conversion rate significantly. Hotjar has a free plan which allows you to record 100 visitor sessions for free. You can gain a lot of insight from 100 visits and if you need more you can just start recording again for another set of 100 recordings.
Get Your Google Ads Converting
So lets sum up the details we’ve gone through today.
- Ensure your Google Ads are relevant to the search query and the landing page you’re sending the customer to
- Analyse the market and set up your offer with some points of difference so that it gives your customers a reason to purchase from or contact your business
- Ensure your website answers the customers questions and raises no concerns about authenticity or quality
- Guide the customer through your sales or lead funnel on the website easily.
- Analyse exactly what your prospective customer is doing on your website by recording their sessions and watching their activity to discover any sticking points that are preventing conversions.
