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Q. Which approaches do you use to decide which part of a site needs most 

urgent attention?

Ben Jesson, Conversion Rate Expert:

 Fortune magazine called what we do ‘a com-

bination of multivariate statistical analysis and good  old-  fashioned detective work’ and 

that pretty well describes our approach.

It’s often very useful to map out your entire sales/conversion funnel and make sure 

it’s being comprehensively measured in whatever web analytics package you prefer.

Then you should look for the biggest  drop-  offs from one step to the next. We like 

to say that we look for the ‘blocked arteries’ (that is, pages – or page elements – that 

get loads of visitors but are underperforming). How do you know if something is under-

performing? Clues come from a range of feedback mechanisms: the analytics data, 

usability tests, surveys, customer support feedback . . .  and, of course, gut feel. Of 

course, we have the advantage of having been engaged by companies on several con-

tinents and in many industries, so we have a good knowledgebase of what’s good and 

what’s bad. See our list of effective tactics and strategies.