When you search for information on improving your ROAS (Return on Ad Spend), you’ll typically find plenty of advice on topics such as: 

• Creating smarter audience segments 
• Refreshing your creatives 
• Experimenting with CTAs

And this is all good advice. But like much of the advice that’s shared within marketing, it focuses mainly on traffic – whether through growing your ad impressions and interactions, or improving the click-through rate. 

So what can we do once the customer has landed on your site, or even added items to their cart? 

Why to optimise your site’s conversion rate first

The average cart abandonment rate is 70.19%. We’ve all heard a version of this statistic, and it’s easy to become complacent about what it actually means.

But when 3% is considered a ‘good’ overall conversion rate, we believe most e-commerce brands would see the biggest impact by working on their overall site conversion rate. And specifically, improving their checkout conversion rate, and reducing their cart abandonment rate. 

Starting at the very bottom of the funnel

While it’s hard to find a breakdown of the average cart abandonment rate by channel, we do know that it’s higher on mobile than desktop (some sites have average mobile abandonment as high as 85.64%). 

And consider your own shopping habits in this area, too. 

How many times has an ad caught your attention while you’re aimlessly scrolling, only for you to be distracted by the arrival of a notification (or your train stop) before you have a chance to complete your purchase? 

A fast checkout experience can make all the difference here, so we’d recommend focusing your attention on making this experience as smooth as possible, and making your checkout page as quick and clear as possible. 

But even the best checkout experience won’t convert everyone the first time around, which is why you also shouldn’t let your abandoned cart emails languish unloved. 

The challenge of finding clear ‘wins’ 

Once you get past the most glaringly obvious quick wins and smooth out any clunky user experience issues, conversion rate optimisation is tricky. Which is why it so often goes unowned at smaller brands. 

Essentially, it becomes harder to see what’s working overall. Any blanket change you roll out will benefit some users and may disadvantage others, meaning you need to wait a while to prove which side wins out. For brands with less traffic, this is a long wait, with the likelihood of a positive uplift slim; 88% of conversion rate tests don’t win.

👋 FERO uses over 430 data points to build up a clear picture of each person who lands on your website, and show them their preferred checkout experience – from payment method to messaging. We’ll also sort them into one of four unique segments, so if they do abandon their cart, we know just the messaging to bring them back. Try it free for 30 days.