Case Study: weconvertvans.co.uk – how we generated 756 leads costing just £0.66p per lead

We Convert Vans are a van conversion company in Birmingham who specialise in window fitting, seat fitting and carpet lining of some of the leading van manufacturers.

In March 2016 I was hired to provide my search engine optimisation skills. weconvertvans.co.uk had an existing website that had not been optimised for search and the only traffic was coming via Google Adwords. This was expensive and not a long term cost effective viable option.

Although I rebuilt the website using my preferred software, the original website design itself was carried out by another company. I therefore do not wish to take the credit for the design, or mislead readers. I do however take full credit for the search optimisation techniques and some textual changes that I implemented on the website.

This article describes the progress I have made so far.

The starting point for this case study begins with ZERO organic website visitors. All website traffic was coming via Google Adwords and therefore at an ongoing cost to the company. They approached me, as a local search professional who could improve their online search visibility.

Since I began tracking visitor data via Google Analytics, the website has generated over 48,000 page views and received 756 online leads. I cannot speak for the number of phone calls as a result of website visitors, because this is not a metric we track. It is inevitable that the website has generated calls and leads, however I only track online leads, so the sum below relates only to online leads via completed forms. If we were to track and factor in calls and direct emails, the cost per lead would be even lower.

The cost of David Vidgen Ltd services was just £500 investment, so for the business it has currently cost them £0.66 per lead, reducing on a daily basis. The main contributing factors to the success of the site is down to having optimised content and intelligent internal linking. This has resulted in excellent organic rankings and traffic coming from three main service areas the business operates within. You can learn more about on-page optimisation in our article SEO for beginners and novices.

The design of the site will have inevitably played it’s part in conversions. It’s a very simple design with clear navigation. Enquiry forms are on each page and this helps avoid the visitor having to click and navigate around the website. There is a lot to be said about simple design and navigation.

In our experience those websites that have simple design and navigation, perform significantly better than aesthetically pleasing websites. Contrary to what we all may think about design and first impressions, providing your website is not unpleasing on the eye or looking amateurish, it will lead to higher conversions. That means on a spectrum of amateur and beautiful, you just need to be inline with the fixed expectations of visitors in your particular industry. In this instance, the beauty is in its functionality, not in the design.

It’s about having a good understanding of the business and knowing: what is normal? what are the customer expectations in that industry? Don’t break away from the normal. People have fixed ideas when it comes to websites and industries. If you go for innovative or unconventional design, people are less likely to like them. The design of your site will be predetermined by what visitors portray as normal for the industry. Their are 100’s of ways to differentiate between you and your competitors, designing a visually pleasing website in an industry where this is not required, is not the way to differentiate, but it’s certainly a way to confuse and not meet customer expectations. This will result in fewer conversions.

Visitors need to know exactly what they are getting

The text talks about the booking process and the while you wait service. This is a really useful strategy when it comes to conversions, because all too often websites fail to explain the actual process of the service ‘what customers actually get or should expect’. This leaves visitors unsatisfied, and when this happens they go elsewhere.

The brand logos help visitors quickly decide if the website offers services that are specific to their requirements. This enables visitors to make that snap decision, plus the logo inclusions help borrow trust from some of the most respected vehicle manufacturers in the world.

5 Simple conversion strategy tips to take away from this case study:

1. Keep design simple with easy to follow navigation. Avoid the pitfalls of thinking you must have a beautiful website. This is not the case in most industries.
2. Make it easy for the visitor to enquire by having forms on all important pages.
3. Make sure you talk about the next steps, this engages customers and helps them fully understand the services you offer.
4. Make use of recognisable brands and logo’s so you can borrow their credibility.
5. Include details of guarantees on all key pages.