Much is made these days about website conversions.

Conversions are, loosely put: “desirable actions by humans that are easily measured by machines.”

Your website might make a person smile, spur word of mouth recommendations, or even save someone’s life—but because these actions can’t be measured by web analytics software, they don’t count as conversions.

Common website conversion goals include pageviews, file downloads, email list signups, membership registrations, and so on. In eCommerce, the most important conversion is (not surprisingly) a website-based sale. Optimizing conversions on an eCommerce site, then, means generating more sales of larger dollar amounts. For the eCommerce website owner, what could be better?

A little background…

Conversion optimization is, loosely put, the process of making incremental changes to your website that increase the volume/pace/value of desirable actions by your users (as measured by your web analytics software).

Most web analytics software includes some way to measure conversions, and Google Analytics in particular has a nice eCommerce module that tracks conversions by money spent, product lines, and more.

Google also offers “Conversion University”, which is intended to train people in how to optimize conversions on their website (which, in turn, will lead these well-trained masses to spend more money with Google’s AdWords Pay-Per-Click program).
http://www.google.com/support/conversionuniversity

There are also a number of books, consultants, and other resources on conversion optimization, which are just a few short Google searches away from any website owner.

But can conversion optimization go too far? Is there ever a case where optimizing conversions at the expense of all else could be harmful?

The dark side of conversion optimization?

For the most part, conversion optimization is a breath of fresh air that attempts to introduce the hard-won lessons of web usability to marketing departments (which, on occasion, have been known to get caught up in the glitz and glamour of print-style graphic design).

Conversion optimization can, however, cause website owners to over-focus on the short term… sales per day, revenue by week, monthly profits, etc.

This short-term focus on revenue and profits can open your business up to long-term brand damage.

What about those smiles? (which are, in the experience of most web shoppers, vastly outweighed by frowns).

How about that customer who feels compelled to sing your website’s praises at a cocktail party?

What about coverage by the press, and write-ups in popular blogs?

What about Oprah, for God’s sake?!

Today’s conversion measurement methods either measure these things poorly, or cannot measure them at all. Conversion optimization, therefore, tends to ignore these things as well.

Does this mean I shouldn’t bother with conversion optimization?

Absolutely not. It does mean that you should take conversion optimization for what it is: one tool among many for building a lasting business.

Questions to consider:

What might cause a journalist to pass over your website for a competitor in a feature story?

Why might a customer decide not to send an email to their father in law recommending your website and products?

What makes a good story that people like re-telling?

Possible answers:

Trust. Emotion. Design. Beauty. Tone. The subtleties. Things that can’t be measured—or even explained.

So how do you balance the hard-edged science of conversion optimization with squishy concepts like emotion and beauty?

Trust your gut. Talk to your customers. Check in on your competitors. Bounce ideas off friends and family. Keep evolving… and yes, keep measuring!

Just don’t let all that measurement get in the way of motivational factors like beauty, emotion, and impulse—the savvy marketer’s secret weapons against left-brain sensibilities.

Derek Olson - Vice President — For the past 10 years, Derek has been providing strategic advice to clients large and small—across a wide spectrum of industries and non-profit sectors. Derek is most passionate about the symbiotic relationship he observes between web usability, semantic markup, and marketing. He can often be cajoled into speaking at length on these matters.