CRO Fundamentals That Build Trust With Website Visitors
In our 13+ years as a digital marketing agency, we’ve seen how customer purchases rarely happen in a single moment. They involve several steps where visitors make micro-decisions: stay or leave, browse more or give up, add to cart or hesitate. Conversion Rate Optimisation (CRO) helps us pinpoint exactly where these critical moments occur.
The gap between traffic and conversions often comes down to specific elements on your website that either guide visitors toward completion or subtly deter them.
The Homepage
Your homepage creates the all-important first impression for new visitors. Often, most of your traffic will come through the homepage, and even when it doesn’t, the homepage is frequently a contributor to the user journey. Pay particular attention to the area above the fold because this determines whether a visitor stays or leaves. Here’s what we consider essential:
- A clear value proposition that communicates your business’s main benefit
- Strategic placement of call-to-action (CTA) buttons that guide users toward conversion
- An engaging headline that captures attention and explains your offering
- Clean, uncluttered design that loads quickly on all devices
- A mobile-responsive layout that works on all devices.
When you scroll past the fold of a homepage, you’ll find other key elements that matter too. Great photos of real people help users to emotionally connect with a brand, and incorporating stats and data can help to build credibility. Unique value propositions and clear navigation paths to service pages are also crucial. The idea is to make it easy for people to take the next step, no matter where they are on the homepage.
Product Category Pages
If you’ve got an eCommerce store with a lot of products, category pages are where customers browse your range and decide what to look at in more detail. Minor tweaks here can make all the difference in how many visitors progress to product pages or add items to their baskets. These pages should include:
- Add to cart buttons directly on product listings to reduce the number of clicks to purchase
- Pop-ups that allow users to continue shopping after adding items to their cart
- Quick view options for viewing product details without navigating away from the current page
- Intuitive filtering and sorting options that help customers find exactly what they need
- Clear product images and prominent price information
- Stock availability indicators.
The idea is to keep the shopping momentum going and reduce the chances of users exiting the site.
Product Pages
Product pages are where potential customers decide whether to buy or not. We’ve looked at hundreds of these pages and found that the best ones make buying decisions effortless:
- Essential information visible above the fold to minimise scrolling
- Clear, sticky add-to-cart buttons that remain visible while scrolling
- Multiple, high-quality product images
- Clear pricing information with any discounts highlighted
- Detailed product specifications and features
- Related or recommended products to create additional purchase opportunities through cross-selling
- Clear delivery information and returns policy
- Product availability status.
In addition to this, customer reviews and ratings provide social proof that builds trust. Your website should make it easy for customers to leave their own reviews after purchase to help create a cycle of validation for future shoppers.
Service Pages
For businesses focused on generating leads rather than direct sales, your service pages need to convince visitors to get in touch. The best service pages:
- Clearly explain what you offer, how it benefits the customer, and include examples of where it’s worked before (i.e. use cases)
- Include supporting images relevant to the service being offered
- Provide multiple contact methods catering to different communication preferences
- Include client reviews, testimonials, and case studies ( helping build brand credibility)
- Have on-page contact forms with minimal form fields to reduce friction
- Include compelling CTA text on submission buttons.
Thank you pages after form submission should confirm successful receipt, explain next steps and timeframes, and offer additional resources to maintain engagement.
Cart and Checkout
When shoppers hit your checkout, they’re just steps away from becoming customers, yet this is where 7 out of 10 people drop off. First-time buyers are particularly cautious – they haven’t built a relationship with you yet and need extra reassurance. Simple touches like keeping forms short can dramatically increase how many prospects convert to paying customers. The checkout process should remove all possible friction with:
- Guest checkout options (no forced account creation, unless it’s specifically part of your strategy)
- A clear summary of the items being purchased
- Progress indicators showing customers where they are in the checkout process
- Clear communication of free shipping thresholds (creates additional purchase incentives)
- Prominent trust signals reinforcing security at the payment stage
- User-friendly forms that reduce the required effort and information
- Transparent display of all costs (no hidden fees)
- A simple process to modify quantities or remove items
- Contact options allowing customers to get assistance without abandoning their purchase
- Multiple payment options (convenience for different customer preferences).
Navigation Elements
Most site visitors won’t land directly on the exact page they need. They might view 4-5 pages before making a decision. Your navigation is the guide that helps people find their way around, and making it more intuitive is often a quick win in the CRO toolkit.
Headers should include:
- Fully visible navigation menu for desktop users
- Logical menu organisation that visitors can easily follow
- Sticky navigation that remains visible when scrolling
- Prominent display of your most important category pages
- Visible search functionality
- Easily accessible contact methods.
Footers should include:
- Newsletter signup opportunities
- Payment method indicators (e.g. logos)
- Links to important informational pages, such as About and FAQs
- Complete contact details
- Trust badges and certifications
- Social media links for further engagement.
The Last Word
When we started this conversation about conversion rate optimisation, we explored how websites often lose potential customers at critical moments in their journey. Each of the elements we’ve outlined represents a specific opportunity to guide visitors naturally toward taking action rather than abandoning the purchase process entirely.
Great design is purposeful but should feel effortless for a user, and because of this, the best-designed products often go unnoticed. CRO affects the subconscious decision-making visitors experience as much as any conscious thought. For example, did you know that the average person makes around 35,000 decisions every day? Most of the time, you won’t even be aware that you’re making a decision.
Our approach to CRO centres on data and evidence. We observe how visitors behave on-site and work with you to implement targeted improvements that guide them toward conversion. It’s not so much a push to purchase as smoothing the path to purchase, removing all of the barriers that might have tripped users up. If you’re attracting plenty of traffic but not seeing the conversion rates you’d expect, our team can work with you to help identify opportunities for improvement. Get in touch to discuss a CRO audit.