Margaret Fortner on Building Glamnetic's Playbook

Glamnetic’s Margaret Fortner on Optimizing your Website

Any eCommerce brand trying to optimize the shopper’s journey to conversion should start by evaluating their website. Understanding where potential conversions drop off (i.e. the point at which your customer loses their interest) can mean the difference between numbers in the black vs. in the red. 

To learn more in this arena, the Nostra team sat down with Margaret Fortner, VP of Marketing at Glamnetic. As a marketing expert with years of experience blending data and creative to strategize beautiful, customer-friendly experiences, Margaret knows just how valuable it is to streamline the shopper journey at every touchpoint — as well as the tips and tricks any brand can implement to do it right.

Below, Margaret provides her insights into: 

1. Why a lightning-fast storefront is a must-have to stay competitive
2. The three questions you should ask to speed up your site
3. Glamnetic’s tactics for optimizing storefronts for conversions

Let’s dive in. 

“As a brand working with them, I can say Nostra is incredibly helpful. There are zero issues, and it drives fast side speeds on both mobile and desktop. That’s incredibly valuable for us at Glamnetic.”

Modern eCom consumers will not settle for laggy storefronts

Rapid site speeds aren’t the exception these days, explains Margaret. They’re the rule for eCom stores. So, keep two rules in mind when building out and customizing your brand’s website: 

1. Online shoppers have higher standards than ever for the websites they purchase from. 
2. As a result, a laggy site simply will not cut it. In fact, a slow-loading storefront will only irritate your visitors.

Fortunately, you can troubleshoot for the most common potential causes. Margaret advises asking questions like: 

• Does your website have high-quality hero images with large file sizes? 
• Are any of the images on your website low-resolution JPGs? 
• Is your website optimized for rapid mobile browsing? 

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Margaret especially recommends the last question, as more and more browsing and shopping happens on mobile phones while consumers are on the go. In her words, it’s about ensuring your site looks just as attractive on someone’s giant desktop screen as it does on someone’s mini iPhone. 

Thanks to Nostra, Glamnetic can have it all: high-res media and rapid site speed

Uploading lower-resolution images and cutting down on large colorful files will undoubtedly accelerate your brand’s site speed. At the same time, Margaret reminds us that nixing those components of your store experience can lower the overall quality of your brand’s visuals — meaning a less engaging and exciting shopper experience. 

It’s a difficult tradeoff, Margaret admits. Fortunately, “that’s when Nostra comes in.” 

Instead of choosing between clear, crisp images and rapid site speed, Margaret and her team at Glamnetic leveraged Nostra to accelerate their store’s loading times — regardless of the quantity or quality of their media. As a result, Nostra helps Glamnetic reduce friction on their site and make it easier than ever for shoppers to quickly progress from browsing and scrolling to checkout. 

“When we build custom collection pages with heavier-load content, we know it can work because we’ve seen it work on our other Nostra sites. This opens up more opportunities for Glamnetic to be creative as a web team.” 

‍Here are 2 ways the Glamnetic team optimizes their site for conversions

Looking for ways to optimize your website for conversions — beyond site speed? Margaret recommends the following two tactics that every brand can employ for a streamlined, customer-friendly eCom store: 

Tip #1: Remember more and more online shoppers are mobile-first

Even if you don’t invest in ads on Meta or TikTok, everyone and everything is becoming increasingly focused on mobile experiences. If your website doesn’t follow their lead, you’ll likely wind up alienating a large portion of your potential customer base. 

Along those lines, one easy way to keep your website equally mobile- and desktop-friendly is to keep your site content simple. Don’t cover your storefront in overly branded language and tons of popups. Instead, make it easy to browse whether your visitors are on the train, in the checkout line, or on a walk. 

Tip #2: Learn from the leaders in your niche

As Margaret tells it, there’s no need to reinvent the wheel when it comes to web design. Instead, feel free to borrow inspiration from the top websites your customers are visiting — and don’t feel limited to taking cues solely from brands in your vertical. 

Let’s say you’re a supplement brand primarily targeting active millennial women. You can still learn from lululemon’s site layout and design since your brands share overlapping ICPs. 

This is effective for two reasons: 

1. These brands are the most popular to your audience for a reason. Their website must be doing something right to convert! 
2. Even if you’re a newer, lesser-known brand, a familiar website design language can almost make your visitors feel like they’ve known you before. 

“If a first-time customer has to go in and feel like they’re figuring out how to work your website, it’s like going from a Mac to a PC. It’s going to be so much easier for someone to understand your brand if you operate with the same operating system as they are.”

Trying to optimize your website for conversions like Glamnetic? Book a demo with Nostra to explore our products and get a free assessment of your site's performance. 

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