Interview with Paul Bryant From CROGenie

Making sometimes just minor changes to your website can massively impact revenue. Paul helps to identify those changes small or big, that can mean the difference to your bottom line.

Hey Paul,

Thank you for joining me in this interview. We have been friends for many years ever since we met in Nottingham at an affiliate gathering.

I was a newbie affiliate and you were incredibly helpful, even after a few drinks I said you looked bigger in your profile than in real life! Hardly a compliment when wanting help, eh?

You recently helped us out with improving conversions for my supplement store. So I am keen to share your story of how you got into conversion rate optimization and highlight the common mistakes business owners make and easy wins.

So, Paul, let’s jump straight into this with my first question.

It would be great to get a little background information from where you were born to where you live today. What’s your backstory?

I was born in Hull, England, and had a fairly typical childhood in the area. We weren’t wealthy but my parents worked hard to ensure we had a modest but comfortable upbringing.

I got really good GCSE results but then slacked off during my A-Levels and left college with under-par results. I remember deciding that further education wasn’t for me and I began looking for apprenticeships as college life was coming to an end.

I never did find anything I liked the look of (or that paid more than £60 a week!) and so I kind of fell into University by default.

That’s where I think I made my first good career move. Initially applying to do Geography, I went through clearing so I could switch to a Marketing course as I figured it would open more career options and I’d enjoyed the marketing module during my Business Studies A level course.

As it turned out, I really enjoyed my time at Uni and came out with a decent 2:1 and a job working in the marketing team of a supplier of supermarket’s own-label chicken!

While it was a great experience, I always craved to work in online marketing. In fact, I’d been kind of obsessed with the internet since around 1998 (I’d dabbled with building sites and even edited a Hull City fan website in the early 2000s).

My opportunity came in 2006 when I joined a company that sold… ahem… male enhancement products online (coincidentally, a job that led to me meeting you, Adam, but we’ll say no more about that!).

[Always great to see a personal interest crosses over to your job eh? – Adam]

While the product may not have been my first choice to work with (though I should point out, it was a clinically proven device!), I really did get a crash course in online marketing. The owner of the company was extremely knowledgeable and I have no doubt my career wouldn’t have been anywhere near as successful without that experience.

It was during that role I first got involved in conversion rate optimisation (more on that later).

Since then I’ve spent time working for myself as an affiliate, I’ve launched my own products, I’ve consulted for what is probably the best CRO agency in the world, and I’ve spent 6 years heading up the CRO for a SaaS platform in the PPC niche.

I now primarily run my own websites again but, as my passion is in CRO, I also offer CRO video audits via my CRO Genie website.

How did you first get into conversion rate optimization (CRO)?

As I touched on in the previous question, I first got into CRO while working at a company that sold male enhancement products.

I had two main responsibilities. Looking after the website for the product (writing copy, producing wireframes, etc), and helping the affiliates who promoted it to generate more sales.

Looking back, this was a ‘money can’t buy’ kind of experience.

I was managing a website that was getting thousands of daily visitors so I could test different copy, images, design, and get results back very quickly. I also was speaking to lots of different affiliates, learning from them and working with them to improve their copy, their marketing, and how they generated traffic.

I had to quickly learn all the so-called ‘best practices’ but I also got to see so many different approaches and the results of each approach that it was easy to quickly upskill my knowledge.

But it wasn’t just about knowledge. I really really enjoyed it and soon became passionate about helping people generate more sales from the traffic they were already getting.

That led to me working at a leading CRO agency as a lead consultant and then on to being the Head of CRO at a SaaS in the PPC niche. I left that role last year in order to focus on my own websites but still offer CRO audits as a side hustle!

What’s your process for working out what to split test?

Firstly, put best practices to the back of your mind.

Then, forget about what you’ve seen your competitors do.

All that is important initially is finding out what is stopping your visitors from converting.

By far, the biggest wins you’ll ever get are when you systematically overcome the specific objections being raised by your visitors.

To do this, it’s all about research. I use a combination of analytics, heat maps, visitor recordings, surveys, customer support records, user testing, and more to try and uncover exactly where the issues lie.

It can take several weeks to collect all of this information but it’s worth it. Once the results are in, they’ll usually point pretty clearly to a handful of issues that need resolving.

Sometimes it’s not necessarily that something needs ‘fixing’. It may already be ‘fixed’ but it’s just not clear to visitors.

Either way, it’s simply a case of understanding the results, then devising tests that give you the best chance of removing ‘blockers’ and getting people to your end conversion point. This is where experience can really help.

It’s important to rank the ideas based on their likelihood to produce a business-changing result. There’s no point in optimizing a page that doesn’t get much traffic, for instance. I’ll also consider things like how easy the test is to implement and maintain if it wins as everyone wants a streamlined business.

It’s worth keeping in mind that best practices can be useful, but will rarely produce busing-changing results. Equally, what your competitors are doing can be a useful guide, but your aim is to beat them, not just get on par with them so why would you try and copy them?

That’s why this research-led approach is the key to success. It’s the only thing that can truly elevate you above your competitors.

I have used VWO in the past but now use Google Optimize, what software do you recommend using for performing split testing?

To be honest, split-testing software has come a long way in the last few years and there isn’t one that is far and away better than the others.

Some, like VWO, offer more of an all-in-one suite with some of the research products I mentioned included. Others like Google Optimize are much more basic offerings but still perfectly usable.

What’s more important is that you find a tool that works for you and just get testing!

As long as your chosen platform is giving accurate results, your approach to testing is what really matters. But any kind of testing is better than none!

I know I am not alone when it comes to being tempted to stop a test prematurely on pure “gut” instinct.

What’s the biggest mistake that most business owners make when looking to improve conversion rates?

Ha! Yes, I do always try to dissuade people from ending tests early. It doesn’t matter if it’s winning or losing, ending a test early isn’t usually a good idea.

Always aim to have at least a full 7 days of data, at least 25 conversions per variation and a statistical significance of at least 95%.

That said, there are occasions when you need to end a test early. For instance, if you’ve made a mistake, the results are taking too long (to prevent this, use VWO’s test duration calculator before starting work on a test to check its viability), or there’s a technical issue.

If you do stop a test early, always take stock of where you’re at. You can call a test a winner or loser early as long as you’re prepared to accept the results may or may not be accurate. If you make a habit of it, you’re not really split-testing at all as you’ll never have confidence in the results.

So, I’d say not ending tests early is important but I don't think it’s the biggest mistake.

For that, I’d say it’s people blindly copying what other people have done.

Whether it’s copying competitors or just following best practices, if that’s all you’re doing, you’ll always be playing catch-up.

What works for one site isn’t guaranteed to work for everyone. Every website has its own unique blend of visitors. Not every visitor will have the same objections to every brand they look at.

Take the time to properly understand your visitors and what makes them tick. Then, make sure you’re delivering exactly what they are looking for when they’re on your site.

What are the easiest wins to boost conversion rates?

The easiest wins are the ones that overcome a specific objection. Though I’ve probably banged on enough about that by now! 🙂

Headlines and subheadings are some of the quickest ways to get wins. They probably won’t produce huge wins (for that, big bold changes are usually needed) but they are very easy to implement and can have surprisingly good results.

That’s because most people scan-read pages. The heading and subheadings are what makes them decide whether to read the rest of that specific page or section. If you get them right, you’ll get much better engagement on the page which will make it easier to convert people.

Call to actions are also incredibly important and is another good area to focus on if you want to run some quick tests.

Also, the closer you get to the point of the conversion, the more impact you can often have (e.g. testing on checkouts). However, to be effective, you need to be getting enough visitors to that point, so it’s a bit of a balancing act.

You set up your CRO service business, CROGenie, what’s this about and why is it a no-brainer for anyone looking to improve their conversion rates?

CRO Genie offers one service and one service only…. CRO video audits.

I record a video going through your website, or any other marketing materials and pinpoint all the opportunities you have to improve conversions.

Essentially, you get to tap into my 15+ years of experience in CRO and get some solid, actionable suggestions for how to improve your results. Plus, I offer a full money-back guarantee if you’re unhappy with your video for ANY reason.

Now, after everything I’ve said about understanding visitors and not following best practices, this might sound like a contradiction. But…

1. If you already have research and data available about your visitors, share it with me and I’ll include it in the advice I give so you’re not just following best practices.
2. Even if you don’t have research available, my advice will help you pinpoint potential areas you can improve. You can then use research to delve into these specific areas in more detail and uncover exactly what changes you should make.

The main aim is to give you clarity on where you should focus your time for the biggest impact.

Plus, as it’s all on the video you can see exactly what I’m commenting on and can rewatch or share with team members in the future.

There’s one caveat though. Other than the CRO video audits, I no longer offer any other consultation services.

This is actually an advantage as it means the advice I give is purely designed to help you grow your business. It’s not biased towards me wanting to win a contract for regular work. I have my own projects and don’t really need to take on consulting work.

What have been your biggest wins with customers?

If we’re talking biggest individual split-test wins then one that always springs to mind is a 364% uplift I achieved for one affiliate by split-testing a new funnel on his website. I rewrote the copy and tweaked the design and the results were mindblowing. It gave him an almost instant boost in his earnings from that flow.

However, there’s something really important I need to say here. It’s not about conversion rate growth.

Well, OK, it is, but people fixate on that way too much. What’s much more important is the value of the wins.

For instance, let’s say I triple the number of people who opt-in to your mailing list. Sounds good, right?

Well, it might be. But what if the emails you send to people don’t actually convert very well? In that case, all I’ll have really achieved is increasing your email service bills! I’ve probably just cost you money!

What really needs looking at is how much extra income has been generated by your wins? Whether that is from direct sales, reduced churn, higher average order values, or whatever your goal is.

I’ve worked with several clients who have added 6 figures of income to their bottom line from a single winning split-test. Unfortunately, I’m not allowed to name the brands but we are talking household names. The kind of brands most people have in their home.

Of course, it’s all relative. A small business may only need to add £10,000 in revenue from a winning test to transform their business. But the point is, don’t focus on % increases in conversions, focus on increasing the value to the business.

If you’re doing that, you’re on the right path.