10 ECommerce CRO Success Case Studies

‍Conversions or CRO is everything and everywhere when it comes to eCommerce. A low conversion rate indicates that you are preventing potential customers from purchasing anything from you. This fact is a very petrifying proposition for a retailer or business in this digital world. Without a doubt, we know that you do not want alarming people and never meet them again for your business.

Fortunately, amidst these concerns, numerous case studies can help your conversion rate optimization. These eCommerce CRO experiences will serve as excellent guides for you to comprehend what success means in this industry. However, before delving into these case studies, let us know the term Conversion Rate Optimization first. 

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What is Conversion Rate Optimization?

Conversion rate optimization (CRO) is a process that helps increase the rate at which visitors to your website or stores complete an action you want them to do. These actions could be anything from signing up for a free email course to making a purchase. It involves attaching your business to your customers’ standards and preferences, improving their whole purchasing experience. 

With conversion rates in the e-commerce space hovering around 3-5% globally, CRO can be a distinction maker, especially at scale. However, although most problems arise in actual conversion rate optimization strategies, many marketers fail to understand what CRO is, how to implement it correctly, and forget to adequately reap the rewards of high conversion rates. Hence, to help, here are some defining factors of CRO: 

 It quantifies the performance of your ads, landing pages, and others and compares your results to know what to enhance and boost based on specific objectives and KPIs. 

1. It requires repeated processes until you reach your planned conversion rate or successfully hit the spot of diminishing returns. 
2. It maximizes your traffic value. 
3. It follows a structured and data-driven approach. 
4. It utilizes analytics and user feedback methodologies to make robust and suitable actions. 

What are the Benefits of Conversion Rate Optimization for ECommerce

Now, here are some of the benefits of Conversion Rate Optimization that you can enjoy for your business. Keep an eye on each of them, and try to imagine your website or other platforms getting the attention, engagements, and revenues you deserve. 

1. You can get to know your customers on a deeper level. 

Before going into the conversion rate optimization journey, it is essential to have in-depth knowledge about your customers. It will help if you familiarize your business with who they are, what they are doing, how they experience your website, and what hinders them from converting. On the other hand, accurate data is a good CRO process as it provides you a space to produce conversion-friendly segmentations based on the actions, way of living, and purchases of your existing and probable customers. 

2. CRO is an efficient eCommerce approach. 

Through customer rate optimization, you can support your customers in a snap on what they are looking for and eventually buy from you. Since you have a tailored experience for them, it becomes more efficient for you and your consumers to act, decide, and purchase. 

3. Boost customer lifetime relationship 

CRO helps you to keep a firm hold on fresh visitors to your website and loyal customers. Through this methodology, you can always create different ways to connect with them and keep them under your belt. First, you need to categorize and separate new and solid customers. After segmenting them, you can come up with a variety of plans on how to treat them and shower some affection. For example, for your long-lasting buyers or visitors, you can do some “Welcome back” popups or customized product recommendations based on their most searched or purchased product classification. This simple gesture can make them feel special and highly appreciated. 

4. Increase Website Traffic and Revenue 

Everyone loves to earn, right? Money is always part of the game in this industry, and COR can give that to you. So, try some ads, and pay for them because you can always get more revenue afterward. Personalize the advertisements based on your research on the first point. You can keep them returning for more by using metrics to analyze their experience. Small steps like this will undoubtedly make your buyers spend more money for you. You might also want to explore growth hacking techniques in leveraging your traffic. Having a good number of website visitors will bring you to the goal of converting them. Here, you can use some tools like Crazy Egg and Hello Bar to expect what they will do when they arrive on your site.  

5. Get more business leads 

CRO proves its prowess in helping people in the industry to elevate lead-generation results. Since you have exceptional knowledge about your visitors, converting them and marketing what you have is easier than ever. Complete and correct data helps you plan what’s next for you and your consumers. With this, you can also calculate and manage all the possible risks throughout their journey. So, it is a win-win situation. 

10 Successful Ecommerce Conversion Rate Optimization Case Studies

Since you know what CRO can do for you, here is a thorough walkthrough of 10 successful eCommerce conversion rate optimization case studies that will inspire and help you soon. 

1. McDonald’s

It is impossible that you have not tried any McDonald’s meals. But have you heard about McDonald’s merchandise? 

Over the years, this well-known fast food restaurant has evolved and already endeavored in various industries, such as digital merchandising. One of their initiatives involves Golden Arches Unlimited. It is an online shop of McDonald’s where people can buy tons of items like Christmas Jumpers, umbrellas, notepads, and other apparel and accessories. 

Since the 1980s, McDonald’s has partnered with diverse fashion brands and retailers to accomplish this goal. In 2017, they successfully launched their unique items through McDelivery Collection. Having an online platform through GoldenArchesUnlimited.com, McDonald’s enables its company to preserve a long-lasting relationship with its loyal buyers by igniting a modernized way of meeting its brand’s fanatics and products in one place. This power comes from the eCommerce website, allowing them to show off what they can offer beyond the meals that people have already loved.

This one is a great conversion rate optimization case study because the brand had strong ties with their consumers by establishing a solid online presence, converting their meal lovers into McDonald’s fashion lovers. Now, if you are planning to start or revitalize your brand, you may also want to read more about how McDonald’s did it like it was just as easy as 1-2-3. 

2. Walmart.ca 

In 1994, Walmart.ca already started flourishing in the business. Now, it has one of the largest employers and numerous subsidiaries and distribution centers. They continuously grow in the industry as they unfolded contactless pay, home delivery services, online shopping, and others. But one fantastic thing that happened to Walmart.ca was their responsive redesign boost conversions that spiked up to 20%. It took them almost a year to make a responsive site and improve revenue through mobile devices. 

Based on their research, the general look of their site on mobile was dreadful and required a lot of time to load. From here, they started working on speeding up the overall experience and making it responsive to the screen size or device it was being used on. 

Walmart performed hands-on usability tests on its old, and new designs ran A/B tests on different website features and made general speed improvements. Finally, Walmart saw a 20% increase in conversions across all devices as an outcome of their new design. On mobile, orders rose by 98%, which is a good number. The test results’ most notable finding rests on the information about product availability presentation. After eradicating the “View Details” option from products that cannot be purchased online, they noticed an increase in conversions.

How fun is it to know that even a simple action can take you to greater heights, right? So, better start exploiting your website, do some research, and stay curious about what can transpire for your business! 

3. Isadora Agency

Through the years, Isadora Agency has already built a name as one of the top companies for eCommerce Digital marketing Agency.

They collaborate with American personal transporter manufacturer Razor as part of their craft. They discovered that there weren’t many reasons for users to visit the website because it lacked all the features required by an eCommerce website to facilitate direct sales.

Isadora accordingly made all the alterations after conducting in-depth research and analysis of the circumstance. The new product page ultimately served as the center of attention for Razor’s revamped eCommerce website. Visitors can now easily find any information on the website thanks to these solutions. Isadora has improved the user experience since the website’s inception through analytics reviews, A/B testing, and website upgrades.

This brief case study only tells you to try working with other companies and acknowledging that getting help is not bad. Besides, thorough research, maintaining strong ties, and conducting different methodologies for your consumers are just as important as your goals. So, balance them and ace the eCommerce game. 

4. BliVakker.no

Even though this case study is a little dated, it is generally accepted that streamlining the checkout process can improve conversion rates and advance income.

Given that everyone has a Facebook account and that Facebook is frequently linked to it, why not use Facebook Login to make the checkout process simpler?

BliVakker.no, one of Norway’s most prominent online cosmetics retailers, has been receiving 20,000 daily visitors. They sought to enhance their checkout process by making changes based on the findings of usability testing, well-known best practices, several A/B tests, and analytics data.

In one of these tests, they applied Facebook Login to checkout pages. Here, 8000 visitors were used to test the website using Visual Website Optimized. As a result, a 3% boost in conversions on the checkout page without Facebook equated to an additional $10,000 in weekly income.

We can learn from here that even though BliVakker adhered to accepted practices and conventional thinking, they erred by assuming that Facebook Login would increase conversions. Best practices by themselves fall short. Similarly, never, ever, ever allow the outcomes of a third party’s analysis to dictate how you should adjust your page. Always do your testing. 

5. Heineken 

Heineken N.V., a Dutch brewing company, launched Heineken Lager Beer, famously known as Heineken. It is a product with 5% alcohol by volume pale lager beer that comes in a green bottle with a red star. The brand has aspired to attract more customers and create different campaign materials over the years. 

With this in mind, Heineken thought of the UEFA Champions League as a marketing tool to draw in new internet visitors and consumers. They also ventured into engaging customers who only use digital devices after finding that most of their clients are UEFA Champions League viewers.

To reach this online audience, they carried out a Drinkies direct-to-consumer operation in Amsterdam. Within 60 minutes of placing an order, clients may receive cold beer and snacks at their doors. Huge thanks to the development of an eCommerce channel. The number of Drinkies remarkably rose on match days during the 2019 spring UEFA Champions League knockout phase. Correspondingly, they increased sales, and data showed a growth in the number of new Drinkies customers.

This Heineken eCommerce case study proves how their sponsorship of the UEFA Champions League allowed them to align with new customers and foster overall penetration. As a brand or startup business, you might want to combine direct-to-consumer operations with transparent marketing for your eCommerce campaigns to be successful. There are different ways to do this, but always remember to arrange everything in line with your brand. 

6. Taloon.com

 

The Finland-based online hardware retailer, Taloon.com, provides supplies for plumbing, electrical, gardening, and other building projects. They use the VWO platform to handle its website optimization requirements. Eventually, they opted for testing because they wanted to boost sales on their product pages.

 Contrary to popular belief, Taloon.com examined two product pages—one with social buttons and the other without—to see any discernible difference. Surprisingly, the competitor, often known as the page without sharing buttons, saw an 11.9% conversion boost. 

The key takeaway from this conversion rate optimization case study is that do not be afraid to take risks and discover new things, even if you go against the standard approaches. Including social sharing icons on your website typically increases traffic and conversion rates. But this study tells a different story. So, go and explore; perhaps you are the next one to uncover out-of-the-ordinary strategies. 

7. Domino’s 

In the 1960s, Russell Weiner founded and led Domino’s Pizza, Inc., known as Domino’s. It became a  worldwide American chain of pizza restaurants, serving many pizza lovers daily. However, the business also wants to hop into the digital world and be the world’s largest pizza conglomerate. And here is their transformation narrative. 

With a substantial online user experience, Domino’s has developed into a competitive eCommerce force that rivals several well-known eCommerce businesses. They introduced new ingredients and a refreshed appearance to market their outstanding pizzas. The latest products and marketing strategy’s effectiveness resulted in a 32.2% rise in sales. Domino’s hired programmers and digital marketers to present lunch delivery to the IT world to sustain and develop this. Since then, they have advanced into an eCommerce company that sells pizza all over the globe. 

As part of their continued success, they advertise their business and heighten their presence on digital platforms like SMS, email, and email. Domino’s also harnessed Google Ads campaigns and eventually surpassed Pizza Hut in paid advertising for its term.

In this CRO case study, you can get the idea of dreaming big and heightening the power of technology. No matter what business you run or how long you are in the industry. Here’s what you can do: study your market, create something new for your customers, and let your vision become a reality with proper preparations, firm plans, and investment in technologies. 

8. Coca-Cola

For business development in 2020, everything revolves around COVID-19, including brand advertisements and how they behave in these darkest times. Lockdowns have sparked a digital shopping boom as consumers started looking for safety measures without interacting with products or people. As a result, eCommerce has become increasingly significant. 

At this moment, Coca-Cola is also prioritizing packaging choices that are appropriate for online sales, boosting in-app exposure with e-delivery, and testing out fulfillment methods that are supported by technology. In response, Coca-cola launched the MyCoke System, a more convenient way of ordering and shopping for consumers. As a result of this choice, Coca-Cola is growing its online businesses, such as Coca-Cola En Tu Hogar, which enables customers to order beverages and groceries for home delivery.

Consequently, customers may shop, buy, and track orders for Coke Catalog products easily. Thanks to MyCoke’s efficiency, it brings tons of advantages for Coke loyalists. Here, Coca-cola attests to the power of innovation and the purpose of technology during these trying times. It is harder for people to go outside due to the threats of the virus. That’s why they initiated a modern way of connecting with them without sacrificing their well-established brand.

You can always learn something from Coca-cola or other more prominent companies that have been standing here in the industry for decades. You can get ideas from reading their creative briefs, watching their ads, and understanding their case studies like this. 

9. SmartWool

 

Peter and Patty Duke, ski instructors from New England, founded the American brand Smartwool in 1994. From there, the brand constantly makes a mark in the industry and gathers more consumers behind them. 

Now, SmartWool is online and wants to increase its eCommerce revenues. Hence, they contacted Blue Acorn for assistance in increasing conversions. And here is their problem: Experienced conversion optimizers can improve a poor site’s performance substantially, but what if your customer already has a well-designed site that adheres to all best practices?

Luckily, the SmartWool team was open to testing various page layouts and the like to see which ones worked the best. One of the initial pages to be assessed was the category page. Its high traffic volume accelerated the process of receiving test results. 

With this, the Blue Acorn team created a brand-new, attractive design that was original and distinct. They tested their novel design against a tried-and-true alternative that uses repeating images arranged in rows of equal-sized images to enhance eye tracking when browsing merchandise. Eventually, they used Optimizely to build up the test and get the results. The findings show that: with a statistical confidence of 95% and 25,000 visitors tested, the variation—the more conventional category page—won by rising revenue per user by 17.1% compared to the baseline.

In this conversion rate optimization case study, you can infer that product images with bigger sizes can garner more clicks but do not give assurance for more purchases. Therefore, you should always run tests and use different analytical tools because it is paramount for your eCommerce objectives. 

10. Adidas

Most people know that Adidas, or Adidas AG, is a German manufacturer of special sports footwear and sporting goods. Despite thriving in the industry for years, the global health crisis affected Adidas’ business plans. 

In 2020, Adidas expected its online sales to reach $4.3 billion, a 55% eCommerce sales increase. And given the risks of the pandemic, Adidas efficiently invests in the digital realm. They have been attempting to digitally engage its clients in North America as its strategically targeted market. As a product, they distanced themselves while emphasizing physical fitness and connectivity by creating their #HomeTeam campaign, which became a win for them and delivered their anticipated results. 

This case study serves as an excellent way for you to reimagine your business and bring it closer to your customers. People want a company where they can relate despite the ever-changing world. Big brands like Adidas did not escape the consequences of an unanticipated crisis like COVID-19. Thus, let your brand rise to the occasion and launch possible campaigns online that can help you cut through the noise. You can follow Adidas’ successful CRO case studies and hopefully achieve their success or experience even more.

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Conclusion

You have read some of the best conversion rate optimization case studies that can help you stand against competitors. However, to genuinely benefit from all of these case studies, you need to select the ones from the list or do your own research that is relevant to your business. 

Another thing, consider testing and analyzing as a prolonged initiative that you will repeatedly perform over a lengthy period. Remember, the industry is fast-paced and changing every day. Although this is not a race, the clock is still ticking. So, plan your next move and ensure that eCommerce conversion rate optimization is successful. 

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Author’s Bio
	Vy, Removal.AIVy is a content writer for Removal.AI– an AI tool used to remove bg from images for social media, eCommerce, web, app development, and marketing automation. She loves to share her insights about tech, AI, and marketing.