While most marketers are beginning to understand the critical importance of maximizing conversion rates, few are tracking or working to maximize another critical measurement of website effectiveness.

Visitor value

Visitor value is simply a representation of how much money you make per visitor to your website.

You can calculate visitor value by multiplying your number of sales over a given time by your average price per sale and then dividing by the number of unique visitors you received over the same time period.

(# of sales x price) / (# of unique visitors) = visitor value

For example, if your website made 1,000 sales last month at an average order size of $100 and received 50,000 unique visitors, your visitor value is $2.

(1,000 sales x $100) / (50,000) = $2.00

When split testing modifications to your website, it is important to understand the effect these changes have on visitor value, not just conversion rates.

This is particularly important when testing different price points or working to improve your average order size.

By focusing only on conversion rates when testing different prices, you run the risk of selecting a price point that may convert best, yet produce a lower overall visitor value and profit.

For example, in a recent split testing campaign I conducted for one of my coaching clients we tested three different price points, $17, $27 and $47.

The $17 price generated a conversion rate of 3.4%, the $27 price actually converted the highest with 3.65% and the $47 price point converted at only 3.18%.

Without looking at the visitor value, many marketers would select the $27 price point. However, after calculating the visitor values for each price point, we discovered that the $27 price produced a visitor value of $0.98. But the $47 price produced a visitor value of $1.49.

Even though the $47 price had the lowest conversion rate, because of the higher visitor value it was over 50% more profitable than the highest converting price point.

Once I explain the power and importance of improving visitor value to my clients I am often asked

How can I improve my visitor value?

There are only three basic ways to increase your visitor value.

First, you can improve your sales conversion rates. As long as your boost in conversion rates doesnt come at the expense of price or average order size, improving conversion will also improve your visitor value.

Second, as I have already demonstrated, by testing different price points for your products, you can often find the sweet spot where your visitor value is maximized.

The third way to maximize visitor value is by working to increase your average order size. Using tactics such as up-selling, cross-selling and bundling you can quickly boost the average amount your visitors spend per sale.

While my clients and readers all know how passionate I am about maximizing conversion rates, when it comes to changes or split tests on your website that involve pricing or average order size, visitor value is the metric that you want to maximize.

By consistently measuring the impact your conversion rate optimization efforts have on visitor value, you can ensure that your site is living up to its most profitable potential.