<p>Your website isa crucial tool for the growth of your credit union. It’s your biggest branch and it affects every aspect of your business. Your site influencesthe number of account and loan applications you get, how your members interact with you on a daily basis, and the type of talent that seeks you out as an employer. If your website isn’t effective, your credit union as a whole will be less successful. Case in point: 88% of the banked US population will head to the Internet before opening a new checking account, according to Google Financial Trends.</p><p>How effective is your website? Most organizations don’t know. If you ask fordata that proves how well your site is performing, you’ll most likely receive information like bounce rates, number of unique visits, returning versus new visitors, and average time on site. These consumption metrics are useful indicators of your site’s success or shortcomings, but they’re limited in terms of evaluating ROI. A million website hits in one month means nothing if your bottom line isn’t affected.</p><p>If you really want to know whether your website is generating business for your credit union, focus on conversion metrics. Tracking conversion allows you to quantify online behaviors that are directly associated with member loyalty and product utilization. How many people signed up for a newsletter? How many clicked on Apply now?How many visitors completed a mortgage application?</p><p>To successfully incorporate conversion tracking into your business strategy, keep these two things in mind.</p><h2>1. Treat it as part of a holistic marketing strategy.</h2><p>For conversion tracking to be effective, you have to drive traffic to your website. Keep in mind that your current site visitors are probably your members and a few straggling non-members coming in from organic search. They’re limited in the amount of additional business they can provide. To broaden your prospect base, you need an outreach plan that drives a variety of organic, paid, and earned traffic to the site. Today’s marketing tools are powerful enough that any brand can find users online who are interested in buying a product they’re selling, but those tools come with a price point and it takes a high level of strategy to make them efficient.If you want to be able to assign ROI to your website, you need a comprehensive plan to make that ROI possible.</p><h2>2. Use it to drive process improvement.</h2><p>Just because you start tracking conversions doesn’t mean more usersare going to convert. When you implement conversion tracking, you’re likely to learn some hard truths about your website, operational processes, or products. You may find that your site isn’t optimized for conversion or that your offer isn’t compelling enough to convince a user to take the next step on-site. Those hard truths allow you to identify areas for improvement and monitor how prospects respond as you make changes. Your marketing department may be managing your website, but other departments will have to participate in making your site more effective.</p><p>Conversion tracking isn’t for the faint of heart, but the gain is worth the pain in terms of ability to generate and measure ROI. By investing in conversion tracking tools and a sound outreach strategy, you’ll exponentially increase your access to actionable prospects. The insights you gain from conversion tracking will enable you to make more-informed decisions about what your credit union should improve in order to convert those prospects into members.</p><p>Most credit unions benefit from partnering with a marketing expert like Third Degree to develop their outreach strategy, optimize their website for conversion, and implement conversion tracking tools. Third Degree’s approach helps credit unions develop <a href=”http://www.thirddegreeadv.com/websites/?utm=callahan_conversion”>websites</a><a href=”http://www.thirddegreeadv.com/websites/?utm=callahan_conversion” target=”_blank”> </a>and <a href=”http://www.thirddegreeadv.com/digital-marketing-for-banks-and-credit-unions/?utm=callahan_conversion” target=”_blank”>digital strategies</a> that drive measurable results.</p><h3>About Author</h3><p>Jared Miller<br/>Digital Strategist<br/><a href=”http://www.thirddegreeadv.com/?utm=callahan_conversion”>Third Degree Advertising</a><br/>jared@thirddegreeadv.com</p><p>Jared’s expertise is helping credit unions translate the brand experience to digital and social platforms in ways that support their business goals.</p><h3>Company Bio</h3><p>Third Degree works with progressive credit unions to help them successfully navigate the realities of a competitive marketplace. With more than a decade of experience in the credit union industry, Third Degree provides strategic counsel, brand development, and results-generating marketing and engagement programs.</p>
