Why am I getting traffic but no sales: find it

Traffic that does not buy usually arrived for a different job. A guide answers a question, a free calculator returns a number, and a glossary entry defines a term. The visitor gets what they came for and leaves, and the analytics shows a healthy visit with a short stay. Nothing on the page is broken, which is why the problem is hard to see from inside. The only question that matters is whether the page gives a stranger a way from the answer to the product, and on some sites that way is a footer link, or no link at all.

• Top landing pages by visits: are they articles, tools or glossary entries rather than product pages?
• For each of them, the share of visits that reach the pricing page at all.
• The first link to the product in each article: labeled with the product name, or with Learn more?
• Free tools: does the result end with a next step to the product, or with nothing?

Start with the pages that bring the most visits, not the whole site. Sort landing pages by sessions for the last month, and note whether each one is an article, a tool, a glossary entry or a product page. Then ask how many visits to each page reached the pricing page in the same session. Those two numbers separate two problems that look identical from the homepage. An article with many visits and almost no pricing visits is doing its job of answering, and the problem sits on the path from the article to the product. A product page with many visits and no pricing visits is a different problem: the visitor did not get the offer they came for.

A tool or calculator often gives the visitor exactly what they searched for. They enter a number, get a result and have no reason to keep reading. The page does not fail, and the analytics shows a finished visit. The gap is the bridge. A useful bridge names the job the result feeds, such as tracking the quotes the calculator produces, and offers one next step with the product name on it. Without that line, the visitor treats the tool as the whole product. Check the result screen as a stranger would: after the answer, is there any sentence that mentions your product, and a button that leads to it?

A route is the number of clicks between the article and the pricing page, plus the words on each click. If the only way to the price is a header link labeled Solutions, many visitors will not follow it, because nothing says it leads to a price. Count the clicks from the top article to the pricing page, and keep the route short. Read each label aloud and ask whether a visitor knows what happens after they click it. Mimiq's simulated visitor reads the article with a reason to keep going, then shows how many steps it took to reach the price and where the route broke.

Pricing page testing

Each new article, tool or glossary entry can bring a new group of visitors with the same gap between the answer and the product. After you publish one, rerun a simulated visitor from its top search and check whether they reach the pricing page within a few clicks. Test a free tool as its own run, since its visitors arrive with a different reason than an article's. Compare pricing visits with article visits after each change, not only the total.