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In their own words:8. Conversion Sciences Blog Conversion Sciences is another A/B testing conversion optimization agency that has stood the test of time (it was founded in 2007). In this blog you can find some remarkable and noteworthy ideas about A/B testing and conversion optimization. What to read: AB Testing JavaScript: Great Power, Great ProblemsHow to Avoid Mobile-Friendly Redesign DisastersAB Testing Inspiration: Using Emotional TriggersHow Google Reviews Drive Conversions for Local Businesses

When calculating your conversion rate, the bottom half of the fraction is visits. The lower this number is, the high your conversion rate. That's right. You can increase your conversion rate by lowering your traffic. Likewise, you can destroy your conversion rate by driving lots of unqualified traffic to your site. AdWords and SEM are designed to get only qualified traffic to your site, traffic that is likely to increase your conversion rate.

So, I'm pleased that my column on the Backward Landing Page was included in this roundup of AdWords and SEM guides. After all, the top half of your conversion rate fraction is the number of conversions. Landing pages have everything to do with that.

Regular expressions rear their ugly head in more and more places. Google Analytics is just one.

For me the regular expression showed up in the excellent Yoast SEO plugin for Wordpress. I needed to redirect a URL that had parameters, like this:

http://conversionsciences.com/conversion-upside-report/?t=10000&v=344&x=250

To do this, I could not use a regular redirect, as everything after the ? would be stripped away. I needed to use a Regular Expression Redirect. However, this sort of thing -- using query parameters -- wasn't covered in any of the Yoast documentation.

This article gave me the hint I needed, and the technique that ended up working. To summarize, I used the following regular expression to match my URL with the parameters:

^\/conversion-upside-report($|\/.*$)

The parentheses save the matching contents into a variable, which I can access using $1 in the new URL, like this:

resources/conversion-rate-optimization-calculator/upside-report/$1

It worked great. Give it a try: http://conversionsciences.com/conversion-upside-report/?t=10000&v=344&x=250

Thanks to Himanshu.

 @neilpatel While it may sound self-serving to share with you an article on why you should spend money with a company like ours, a conversion optimization company, I think you'll find the points made by Neil Patel are a great guide to choosing your conversion optimization strategy.

Yes, you need a conversion optimization strategy, even if you don't hire consultants.

Given Neil's background of creating companies in the online marketing optimization space (KISSmetrics and CrazyEgg), I hope we'll see some more from him in the form of tools.

The question to ask on a landing page is, "Will WOW increase my conversions?" Some of these "WOW" features have proven to reduce conversion rates.  Rotating banners of any sort attract the eye away, and can pull readers out of the "meat" of the page where they are more likely to convert. Accordian menus and tabbed content may prevent scanners from quickly consuming the page. It's a bit of a Catch 22: they may not have the patience to click on each item until they've scanned the content... which is hidden. Social widgets can deliver social proof and increase conversion rates. However, social media chicklets that let the visitor go off to Facebook or Twitter work against the purpose of a landing page: to keep visitors on the page until they make a decision. Why send traffic that you've paid for off to Mark Zuckerberg? Lightbox popovers are universally derided if you ask people. However, they almost always increase conversion rates. 

Every audience is different, so test these WOW features with your own crowd.

The echo chamber is alive and well in the Conversion Optimization world. @richpage has noticed how few of us are searching for CRO and "conversion rate optimization" on Google. What gives?

To quote Bryan Eisenberg, "Most websites don't have a traffic problem. Every site has a conversion problem."

If you're waiting to put conversion optimization to work on your site, the least you can do is help us spread the word. Click through for some very interesting statistics.

I'm part of the Conversations on Conversion Podcast series. Tune in.

Whenever someone writes an article about Conversion Consultants (like us), we are always nervous that we might cross some of these lines.

We know that we have made these mistakes in the past.

The issue is exacerbated when the author is someone like Amy Africa, who has the experience and likes to tell things like they are. Her middle name could be "Frank".

I'm happy to report that we have evolved beyond these "lies" and firmly embrace the matching truths.

If you are looking for someone to guide your optimization efforts, have a conversion with a Conversion Scientist.

It is a great sign that @SEOMoz included Conversion in their grand plan for Content Marketing. This infograph considers conversion a key component of content marketing, but in my upcoming book on conversion I make content a key part of conversion marketing. Different approaches, same result.

Enjoy the Infograph.

@fusionmex via @TheGrok I"ve been working with a number of e-commerce clients over the past few months. Conversion optimization has the potential to increase their conversion rates, increase their average order value and put more money in their pockets. However, Conversion Strategy is the tide that floats all pages. If you are selling online, consider some of these features requested by consumers.

Wonder what your conversion rate should be? @PhillyMktgLabs takes a stab at some categories. NOTE: These conversion rates are unacceptible!

 @conversion_team It's easy to cut prices.It's hard to build up the value of what you offer in words and images. If you can occupy the high-price category in your niche, life gets much easier.

So, I was pleased to find this article which makes a bold statement: "Avoid Best Practice Conversion Rate Optimization"

What?

While your competitors are testing button color, you can be comparing yourself to the competition, being open about your profits, and doing the math for your visitors.

Best practices only get you so far. Here are some alternatives for online success.

While good UX (User eXperience) does not always translate into higher conversion rates or revenue per visit (RPV), these trends point to excellent hypotheses for what MIGHT increase the performance of your site.

Single Page Sites: Simplicity is often a great way to increase conversion rates Infinite scrolling: Consider this for category pages. I haven't tested this yet. Persistent top nav: I am very curious to see if this increases CR and RPV. Let me know if you've tested it. Web 2.0 Aesthetics: I hope this includes the rotating banners at the top of so many sites. Typography Returns: Your message is the most important part of your conversion optimization plan. Typography can help... or hurt

Bryan Eisenberg is a great teacher and is one of the fathers of conversion science. In this post, he asks his audience to make recommendations on pricing tables, those pages that ostensibly help us to choose the right product for us.

Here are my suggestions.

The main purpose of a page like this is "Help me choose." Choice, as it turns out, is a conversion killer, so these pages can be very helpful. This page needs to tell me which is "The best value." A badge would be helpful, probably on the most expensive item.

The little "signal bars" are unique and may be helpful, but don't really tell me at a glance what I want to know.

The copy is unhelpful. Instead of "Essential productivity..." how about "Great system for a tight budget." Instead of "Yield better results..." how about "Good value ready for your network." Instead of "2nd Generation Processor..." how about "This system has the power to do heavy number crunching, video editing and graphics."

There are too many prices here -- four to be exact. I say, pick two: Savings and total price. Crossing out "Starting price" is a proven way to communicate value.

Finally, put the coupon code near the "Customize & Buy" buttons to give those transactional shoppers an extra push.

What do you find frustrating about this page?

Peep Laja @peeplaja has put together a great list of ways to increase conversion rate. The remarkable thing about this list is that he provides a case study for each of his recommendations, proof that these ideas have works somewhere. This lets you understand the circumstances that drove the improvements in conversion and help you choose the tactics you will use on your site. Thanks, Peep.

@fusionmex via @TheGrok I"ve been working with a number of e-commerce clients over the past few months. Conversion optimization has the potential to increase their conversion rates, increase their average order value and put more money in their pockets. However, Conversion Strategy is the tide that floats all pages. If you are selling online, consider some of these features requested by consumers.

 @conversionIQ has a list of ecommerce sites that seem to be doing things right. These are sites that follow best practices, and thus we would assume they are enjoying high conversion rates and strong revenue per visit.

Of course, if we were to make a list of 50 ways your site could improve its conversion rate and RPV, we'd be right on about 25 of them. That's why we always back our recommendations up with a series of A/B or split tests.

Nonetheless, it's always good to look at those online athletes that are at the top of their game.

Would you like a free strategy session with a Conversion Scientist?

If you run a blog, you'll really enjoy this critique of Jay Baer's Convince and Convert blog by Derek Halpern of SocialTriggers.com. Great ideas include: Simplify your landing pages, make your most imporant conversions most prominent, add a call to action after the comments (I call this a "dripping pan"), and more.

Conversion math is sometimes hard to understand. How can really small increases in website conversion rates LOWER the cost of all f my marketing? Well, that is a discussion for another time. Now you don't have to think so hard about it.

Google has laid it out very clearly: If your landing pages are good, they will send you more traffic for less money. You don't have to be a math genius to figure out the importance of conversion optimization anymore.

I'm always wary of any list that claims to be "complete." This list comes pretty close, and includes one of my favorite selections from The Conversion Scientist Blog.

The list is novel in that you can select the categories of interest to you and the post will modify itself to serve you best.

I'll be intersted to find out if this novel feature increases conversion rates on the page.

What do you think?