Dig deeper: What is a conversion optimization platform?

Once you’ve determined a COP makes sense for your business, spend time researching vendors and their capabilities by doing the following.

Identify and contact appropriate vendors 

If you’re considering a COP adoption, you’re bound to have challenges you’re trying to overcome. Create use cases describing them. Then develop the questions you’ll need to answer when researching solutions and talking to vendors.

Also, document the capabilities of your current conversion optimization software, the new capabilities you would like to have, and those you can’t live without. This last category is critical, and will help you avoid making a costly mistake. 

Begin your research by reading the vendor profiles in this report, then visit the vendor sites for the blogs, e-books and interactive tools that they offer. 

Narrow your list of prospective vendors by evaluating their platforms based on your use cases. Submit a list of the requirements you’ve identified to each potential partner and set a timeframe for them to reply. 

Finally, decide whether or not you need to engage in a formal RFI/RFP process. This is an individual preference. However, be sure to give the same list of capabilities/use cases to each vendor to facilitate comparison.

Questions for stakeholders as you set up demos

Set up COP demos within a relatively short time frame of each other to help make relevant comparisons. Make sure all the stakeholders in your organization are on the demo call and pay attention to the following: 

• How easy is the platform to use for the day-to-day tasks handled by each department that will be using it? 
• Does the vendor seem to understand our business and marketing needs? 
• Are they showing us our “must-have” features based on the use cases we shared?

Questions for vendors 

Questions to ask each vendor include: 

• What kind of conversion rate improvements do you typically see with your clients? 
• What kind of workflow do you recommend and why have you decided on that approach? 
• Does the COP work natively with our current CMS or will we need to perform an integration? 
• What is involved in the set-up? Do I just need to add a line or two of code to my site or is it more complex? 
• How does the platform integrate with other martech platforms (i.e., CDPs, marketing automation platforms, CRMs, DSPs, DAMs)? 
• What reporting do you provide that demonstrates the ROI from our efforts? 
• What kind of customer support is included? Can we pick up the phone to report problems? 
• Will we have a dedicated account manager and technical support, especially with the initial migration? 
• Do you have other clients in our vertical? 
• What kind of professional services are available? And how much do they cost? 
• How does the company handle requests for product modifications? 
• What new features are the vendor considering? 
• What’s the long-term product roadmap and launch dates?

Questions for other companies using the technology

Before deciding on a vendor, take the time to speak with several customer references, preferably individuals in a business similar to yours. The vendor should be able to supply you with several references if you can’t identify them yourself. 

Use this opportunity to ask any additional questions and verify what you were told during the demo. Make sure that the person you’ve been referred to is a primary user of the platform. Consider also asking these questions: 

• Why did you move to a COP? 
• Why did you select this platform over others? 
• Has this platform lived up to your expectations? 
• How long did the software take to implement? 
• Who was involved in the implementation? 
• Were existing staff retrained to use the COP, or did you have to hire new team members? 
• Were there any surprises that you wish you’d known about beforehand? 
• Where have you seen the most success? The biggest challenges? 
• How are you measuring your own success? 
• Has the overall implementation provided positive ROI, including all costs (i.e., license, manhours, etc.)? 
• What is the most useful, actionable (favorite) report the platform generates? 
• How easy was the set-up process and how long? Did the vendor help? 
• How responsive is customer service? 
• Has there been any downtime? 
• What do you wish they did differently? 
• Why would you recommend this platform?

Questions for vendor about pricing 

Although not all vendors require an annual contract, many do. Once you’ve selected a vendor, be sure to get in writing a list of what technology and support are covered in the contract. 

Ask about what kinds of additional fees might come up: 

• Are there charges for custom integrations or additional API calls? If so, how much? 
• What is the hourly charge for engineering services, and is there a minimum? 
• What partner organizations are available to install and integrate the platform? 
• If we later need to put a new-hire through the training we will receive at onboarding, what will that cost? 
• What performance levels do you guarantee (response time, availability, problem resolution, accuracy, etc.) and what happens if you don’t meet them? 
• What is the “out” clause? 
• Will you agree to limits on annual license fee increases? 

Obtaining the answers to these types of questions upfront — and having them in writing — will ensure fewer surprises or additional costs down the road.

Our new report, “Enterprise Conversion Optimization Platforms: A Marketer’s Guide,” is now available for free download.

The post Questions to ask about conversion optimization platforms appeared first on MarTech.

Dig deeper: What is a conversion optimization platform?

Deciding whether your company needs one calls for a comprehensive self-assessment of your organization’s needs, staff capabilities, management support and financial resources.

Business needs and consequences

Failing to meet expectations can have significant business consequences. Seventy-one percent of consumers expect companies to personalize their interactions, and 76% get frustrated when they don’t, McKinsey research finds. 

In addition, analysts noted that it’s easier than ever for frustrated customers to go elsewhere. Three-quarters of consumers adopted new stores, products or buying methods during the pandemic. Businesses recognize the importance of customer experience to their overall organizational health. The digital experience is ranked as “critical” by nearly half (47%) of companies, while only a third (33%) said maximizing conversion on their websites was critical, a Decibel/Econsultancy survey found. 

COPs, which can be deployed as part of a digital experience platform (DXP) or independently, may utilize differing approaches but ultimately have the same goal of delivering experiences that meet users’ needs and maximize conversions.

Making an informed adoption decision 

Understanding your current testing processes and identifying where you are looking for improvements are critical pieces of the COP adoption decision making process. The following questions will help your organization begin the process in assessing if a COP is the right fit for your business goals.

Do we have needs that aren’t being met by our current testing program? If you’re using a COP, are there gaps in what it can accomplish? If you’re not using one, what are the use cases to which you’d like to apply the technology? 

Do we have the staff that can manage the agile marketing workflows involved in conversion optimization? Conversion optimization isn’t a “one and done” project; it requires marketers to continually look for ways to improve their customer experience and perform tests to see if their instincts are correct. 

Does the martech we’re currently using to manage our website and mobile apps work with a COP? Conversion optimization platforms are typically very open and integrate with a wide variety of systems, but it may be more difficult to use them with a homegrown or infrequently used CMS. 

Do we have support from web development leadership? If you’re planning to implement larger tests involving the infrastructure of your site or app, you’ll need to work with developers. Getting them to back the adoption of this technology will be integral to its success. 

Does our C-suite support this type of initiative? Executive buy-in is essential to the success of any martech adoption. 

The likelihood of a successful adoption is increased if your management: 

•  Is convinced that achieving better conversion rates and improving customer experience are essential to the success of the business. 
• Agrees that conversion optimization is an never-ending pursuit, and not a one-time event. 
• Is willing to fund the investment in software and staff necessary to implement a conversion optimization initiative.

Our new report, “Enterprise Conversion Optimization Platforms: A Marketer’s Guide,” is now available for free download.

The post Does your company need a conversion optimization platform? appeared first on MarTech.

COPs are also sometimes called conversion rate optimization (CRO) tools, personalization engines, or experience optimization platforms (EOPs). Conversion optimization platform functionality typically includes:

• A/B and multivariate testing.
• Tools to manage testing programs and “roll out” successful experiments. 
• Personalization, often enhanced with AI and machine learning. 
• Server-side experimentation.

The need for conversion optimization platforms

Implementing a COP makes sense at a time when 79% of consumers and 85% of business buyers say their experience with a business is as important as the products or services it provides, according to the most recent “State of the Connected Customer” report. 

What constitutes a great customer experience is set by industry leaders. Businesses fall short of customers’ expectations when they fail to deliver an Amazon-like checkout experience or an Instacart-like delivery experience — even in B2B. 

Benefits of conversion optimization platforms

Many conversion events drive revenue. And since COPs optimize conversion events, it’s fairly easy to determine whether such a platform is paying for itself or not. But the benefits of conversions aren’t limited to driving revenue. 

COPs also help businesses maximize ROI from investments in driving traffic to websites or mobile apps. Few companies believe they are proficient practitioners of conversion optimization. Only one in ten said their approach was fully automated, powered by machine learning, and delivering personalized experiences that tie back to measurable commercial benefits, according to a 2020 Decibel and Econsultancy report. 

Agile marketing meets agile development 

Conversion optimization tools fit with agile approaches many marketers are adopting. Rather than a “project” or “campaign” mindset, where initiatives are discrete sets of tasks that start and are completed, agile marketing adopts the “sprints” and “backlogs” mentality popularized by developers. COPs mesh with this because they are designed for a continuous workflow. That workflow consists of iterative experimentation, followed by reflection on those experiments, and actions taken as a result of the insights gained. 

Since developers are often part of the experimentation and roll-out, working alongside marketers, this approach also encourages teams to adopt similar work methodologies.

Conversion optimization platform capabilities

The functionality of conversion optimization platforms differs depending on the vendor’s philosophy around optimization and its use of artificial intelligence. 

Typical capabilities facilitate: 

Platforms vary in terms of their ability to suggest experiments most likely to have a significant impact. Testing capabilities typically include the ability to adjust and manage traffic volume to experiment variations. Some platforms feature tools that deliver insights about user actions on websites, such as heatmaps and the ability to recruit users for more formal testing sessions. 

Our new report, “Enterprise Conversion Optimization Platforms: A Marketer’s Guide,” is now available for free download.

The post What is a conversion optimization platform? appeared first on MarTech.