Conversion rate is, for obvious reasons, one of the key metrics that everyone looks at. This is true whether you are a brand measuring ad performance, a web shop measuring shopping, or a publisher measuring how you perform online.
But just looking at a conversion rate doesn't really tell you anything. A true conversion rate is not the result of a single metric. Instead, it's a representation across multiple factors that indicate how well you are able to convert action into revenue for a person.
So, in this 30-page report, let's take a closer look at what a real conversion is.
What's wrong with the conversion metric?
A conversion rate seems like a simple metric, but one of the first problems we have with it is that nobody seems able to define what it is.
Let me give a simple example.
When I recently wrote about ecommerce for publishers, I also talked about conversion rates. I wrote that a good conversion rate for publishers reviewing products would be similar to what we often see with web shops, whereas a bad conversion rate would be more similar to a display ad.
In other words, you can determine how successful you are by looking at whether you are creating actual interest and directly impacting people's choices of what to buy, or whether you are just creating random views.
But this sounds a bit vague, because what is a good conversion rate? What number should you aim for? Well, finding that out is pretty much impossible.