Effects of verbatim repetition of the headline message on the proceed button on click-through rates in online retail

TL;DR

Repeating the headline message exactly on a proceed button increases online shopping conversion rates by over 10%.

Contribution

Demonstrates that verbatim repetition of messages improves conversion rates through processing fluency.

Findings

Verbatim repetition of header messages on buttons increased conversion rates by over 10 percentage points.

Gist repetitions and new messages performed worse than verbatim repetitions.

Processing fluency principles can be effectively applied to consumer behavior in online retail.

Abstract

For online retailers, increasing click-through rates and reducing dropout rates are critical to success. In this study, we examine the effect of verbatim repetition of the website's headline message on the proceed button, based on research on processing fluency. In our field study involving 956 online platform visitors, we found that verbatim repetitions of the header message on the proceed button resulted in an increase in the conversion rate by more than 10 percentage points compared to gist repetitions and new messages. Our findings highlight the importance of simple verbatim features and demonstrate the successful application of processing fluency research to impact consumer behavior.

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