How ModelCars.com more than doubled sales on traffic that barely moved
ModelCars.com sells scale model kits, diecast collectibles, paints and tools. Twenty-five thousand products, sixty-plus brands, and a shopper who often can't name what they're looking for. Our SEO team had already grown the traffic. All that did was prove, at higher volume, that the store wasn't turning visitors into buyers.
I completed two projects with GoldenWeb in the past 90 days. I had a great experience with the teams, and the results have been fantastic so far.
The Brand
Twenty-five thousand products, and no way through them
ModelCars.com has sold scale models and diecast collectibles since 2012. Sixty-plus brands, seven scales, five skill levels, and everything from a $2 pot of paint to a collector piece in the hundreds. They don't manufacture any of it, which matters more than it sounds.
Traffic was never the problem. Our SEO team had grown it and it kept climbing, and all that did was put more people in front of a store that could not sell to them. A catalog that size is only an advantage if a shopper can get through it, and a reseller only wins the order if the buyer has a reason to buy that exact box here rather than from the twelve other sites listing it.
The Approach
A catalog this big is a findability problem before it's a design problem
Most CRO advice is written for a store with twenty products and one thing to say. None of it survives contact with twenty-five thousand SKUs across sixty brands. We started from what a collector who knows exactly what they want, and a beginner who knows nothing, each have to do to reach the right box.
- 01
Cut the menu down to the routes that carry revenue
The old header carried more than 150 links across nine mega menus, which is an index rather than a route. The categories people actually buy from now lead, and the long tail sits behind a single More, so the first decision is between six things instead of a wall.
- 02
Made search a primary route instead of a fallback
On a catalog this size, search is how every shopper who already knows what they want moves. It now sits full width in the middle of the header with predictive results, so a half-typed "Tamiya 1/24" resolves before the query is finished.
- 03
Built a path for the visitor who can't name the product
A beginner doesn't know whether they want a kit or a diecast, or what a scale number means. Pick For Me asks a few questions and hands back a shortlist, and the homepage now opens with three entry points by where someone is in the hobby: never built a kit, coming back after years away, already deep in a collection.
- 04
Turned every collection into a junction rather than a dead end
Sibling collections slide across the top of each collection page, so someone browsing 1/24 diecast can move to 1/64, or across to the kits, without going back to the menu. Browsing a catalog is a lateral motion and the old structure only went down.
- 05
Answered the question a reseller has to answer: why buy it here
They stock other people's products, so we built the case for the shop itself. Stock and dispatch state next to the button, shipping and returns written out where the doubt shows up, named reviews, and a direct line on authenticity: authorized distributors, no counterfeits, no gray-market imports.
- 06
Put the expertise on the page instead of the blog
Kit or diecast, which scale fits the shelf, which paint belongs on which kit, what the skill levels mean. Every product page answers those now. A shopper who has to open a competitor's tab to work it out tends to buy in that tab.
The Results
Traffic up 12%. Sales up 123%
Sessions grew 12% over the window, which is the SEO work still compounding. Everything after that came from the store. Conversion rate rose 65.9% and average order value 20%, and because those two multiply rather than add, revenue per session landed 99% higher and total sales more than doubled. The distance between the traffic bar and the sales bar is the part the rebuild is answerable for.
Sessions are shown for contrast rather than as a result. The rebuild wasn't aimed at traffic; conversion rate and average order value are what it moved, and revenue per session and total sales are what those two produce together.
The Foundation
Five templates rebuilt, because the shopper gets stuck in all of them
Fixing one product page on a catalog this size moves almost nothing. The shopper still lands on a homepage merchandising the wrong end of the range, browses a collection page with no way sideways, and reaches a product page that gives them no reason to buy here. We rebuilt the whole path.
| Template | What changed |
|---|---|
| Homepage | Categories, the shipping promise and three entry points by experience level lead. The old page opened its bestseller row with $2 paints and glue |
| Collection | Sibling collections slide across the top, so browsing moves sideways instead of stopping |
| Product page | Stock and dispatch state at the button, shipping and returns in place, named reviews, and a straight answer on authenticity |
| Cart | A progress bar against the $99 free-shipping threshold, at the moment one more kit is worth adding |
| Navigation | 150+ links reduced to the categories that carry revenue, with search and Pick For Me as the routes in |
Every change traces back to one of two questions: how a shopper finds one product among twenty-five thousand, and why they should buy it from a reseller rather than the site next door.
For Hobby & Collectibles Retailers
If your catalog is the advantage, the store has to get people through it
We work with a small number of Shopify brands at a time so every account gets this level of attention. If you're sitting on a big catalog and the traffic isn't turning into orders, let's talk.
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