Conversion is the moment a website visitor performs a desired action — such as making a purchase or subscribing to a newsletter. In this article, you’ll learn what conversion means, the difference between micro and macro conversions, how to calculate the conversion rate, and how to optimize conversions on your website.
What Is a Conversion?
Conversion is the moment a visitor performs a desired action, such as making a purchase, filling out a form, or downloading a brochure. It’s the transformation of a situation — for example, a website visit — into an action that supports your business goals. Conversions can happen both online and offline, and they show how often your audience takes meaningful action. A conversion occurs when someone moves forward in the customer journey and actively contributes to the success of your marketing or sales objective.
Examples of conversions:
- A visitor purchases a product from your webshop
- Someone subscribes to your newsletter
- A user completes a survey or contact form
- A lead downloads a whitepaper or quote
Micro and macro conversions
A distinction is made between micro and macro conversions. Both are important and often work together as part of the same funnel.
Macro Conversion
Macro conversion has a direct impact on a company’s revenue. Examples include:
- Purchases in a webshop
- Completed quote request forms
- Paid subscriptions
Micro Conversion
Micro conversion has an indirect impact on revenue but is essential for long-term growth. Examples include:
- Adding a product to the shopping cart (without purchase)
- Signing up for a newsletter
- Gaining new social media followers
What Is the Conversion Rate?
The conversion rate indicates, as a percentage, how often visitors perform a desired action — such as making a purchase or signing up for a newsletter. It helps measure the effectiveness of your website or marketing campaign. The formula to calculate the conversion rate is:
number of conversions ÷ number of visitors × 100%
For example: if a webshop receives 1,000 visitors and 250 of them make a purchase, the macro conversion rate is 250 ÷ 1,000 × 100 = 25%. If the same webshop gets 1,500 visitors and 250 subscribe to the newsletter, the micro conversion rate is 250 ÷ 1,500 × 100 = 16.7%.
How can you optimize conversion?
You can optimize conversion by improving your website, developing a persona, mapping out the customer journey, and analyzing performance.
- Optimize your website with SEO: Improve your search engine visibility by optimizing your website for SEO. The higher you rank in Google, the more visitors you attract — and the greater the chance of conversion.
- Create a persona: Build a persona to better understand what your target audience needs. Adapt your content, navigation, and calls to action accordingly.
- Map the customer journey: Analyze the path your customer takes from first contact to purchase. This reveals where drop-offs occur and where improvements are most needed.
- Analyze and test: Use A/B testing, heatmaps, or usability testing to find out where visitors lose interest. Small changes can have a big impact on your conversion rate.
Measuring Conversion
Measure your conversion rate by following these four steps:
- Set your goals in Google Analytics: Decide what you want to measure, such as purchases, newsletter sign-ups, or completed forms.
- Track visitor behavior over your desired time period: Monitor how many people visit your website during the selected timeframe.
- Measure how often the goal was achieved: Use Google Analytics to see how frequently the defined goal was completed.
- Calculate the conversion rate using this formula: number of conversions ÷ number of visitors × 100%
What Is Conversion Marketing?
Conversion marketing is the set of strategies and techniques aimed at turning as many visitors as possible into customers.
It combines data analysis, content optimization, psychology, and technology. More and more businesses are focusing on conversion marketing because it directly impacts revenue growth and customer value.
