Deadliest Online Warrior: Marketing Tactics Battle for Budget
September 21, 2011
For the past couple of weeks, I’ve been pulling together data and screen shots for a presentation to CMA Ottawa (the Canadian Marketing Association – Ottawa Chapter) on Tuesday, September 27th, 2011 at the Hampton Inn and Conference Centre.
I’m presenting “Deadliest Online Warrior: “Marketing Tactics in a Battle for Budget” to fellow marketers in the national capital region. My plan is to present online marketing campaign results in a case study format so that the audience can get a feel for how different tactics performed. Until then:
“Instead of a TV show that pits historic and modern warriors to battle to the death, how about a conversation that pits historic and modern online marketing tactics in a battle for budget?
As customers spend more time in social networks and less in their email boxes and traditional websites, how should organizations adjust their online acquisition strategies? Join Kelly Kubrick of Online Authority for insight into the effects of combining paid search and social advertising with the power of social media marketing. Kelly will take you through a head-to-head result comparison between tactical legends of the online battlefield:
• Paid Keyword Search vs. Social Network Advertising’s Demographic / Psychographic Targeting?
• Banners: Behavioural Targeting vs. Search Term Targeting?
• Email Buy vs. Social Media Content Marketing?”
I’m very pleased to report that CMA Ottawa now has online registration available. Event details are:
When: Tuesday, September 27th, 2011 from 11:45 a.m. to 2:15 p.m.
Where: Hampton Inn and Conference Centre, 100 Coventry Road, Ottawa, K1K 4S3
Cost: $ 40.00 for CMA members, $ 55.00 for non-members
As always, there’s plenty of free parking and the cost includes lunch, coffee, dessert, and a great opportunity to network with many other local marketing professionals.
For those of you who may not be familiar with CMA Ottawa, they “host monthly networking and educational luncheons and seminars throughout the year. CMA Ottawa is a place of dynamic exchange among direct, interactive and customer contact marketing users, creators, managers and suppliers.”
I hope to see you there!
Landing Page Lessons from Optimization Summit 2011
June 20, 2011
Earlier this month, I attended MECLABS‘ inaugural Optimization Summit in Atlanta, Georgia. As MECLABS is the parent of MarketingSherpa and MarketingExperiments, I was curious as I’ve been a fan of the former for years. I have only recently come across the latter but have already found their “Best of” monthly emails very useful. I expected case studies to be at the core of the conference material and was not disappointed. As a side bonus, I was introduced to an unexpected and entertaining cast of characters including Dr Flint McGlaughlin and “the Pool Guy”, aka Marcus Sheridan, the Sales Lion.
Landing Pages Should Reflect the Rituals of Good Conversation
Dr McGlaughlin kicked off the pre-Summit Landing Page Optimization Workshop by suggesting that landing page optimization is akin to a successful conversation, whereby certain rituals and patterns need to respected before value can be exchanged. The geography of the landing page provides you with the opportunity to anticipate and manage the chronology and sequence of a conversation with your prospects. The entertainment value arose from the irresistible temptation to act out how a flawed landing page contains the same landmines encountered in a flawed pick up attempt at a bar…
My favourite comment related to marketers’ mistaken need to slam product or lifestyle ‘hero shots’ and aggressive calls to action front and centre on their landing pages (guess who’s making that mistake on the home page right now?). According to Dr McGlaughlin, those hero shots are like meeting someone at a bar and immediately asking them to move in with you. Who wouldn’t turn tail and bolt? At best, it’s overly enthusiastic and misguided, and at worst, predatory. Instead, as marketers, we need to take a step back to map the sequence of a successful conversation, and plan our landing pages accordingly.
Consider the Source: Understand Channel Relevance
Start by thinking through the traffic source or channel your prospect arrives by, whether it be via organic or paid search, advertising on social networking sites, or via your own email newsletter, etc. Depending on the source, your visitor may be completely new to your product or service or have already been sold on it, and may simply want you to get out of their way. If the former, assume more copy might be needed and if the latter, less is most definitely more.
Put yourself in your prospect’s frame of mind and remind yourself of the value proposition you implied in that source channel. MarketingExperiments defines your value proposition as “the primary reason why your ideal prospect should buy from you rather than your competitors” (expressed in 10 words or less).
Your Headline Should Keep the Promise You Implied
Ensure that you keep that promise by opening your landing page with a headline that initiates the conversation between the two of you. Your only task here is to intrigue the prospect enough to keep him or her from immediately clicking on the back button. You can do that by ensuring your headline provides the connection between the source channel and the landing page itself. Be sure the visitor is able to orient him / herself by providing clarity about where they are and what to do next. To illustrate, Dr McGlaughlin provided the following examples of original vs. alternate treatment headlines:
Original: Why Try BRAND Online?
Treatment: Get Unlimited Access to all 32 Volumes of BRAND during your FREE TRIAL..
Original: Searching for the Most Accurate Mailing Lists? Your Hunt is Over!
Treatment: We Make 26 Million Phone Calls a Year to Ensure You Get The Most Accurate Mailing Lists Available!
Next, draw your visitors’ eye further into the page by offering a few brief sentences that expand on your headline. Do that well, and you can entice the visitor to scan a sub-heading that leads into a handful of bullet points that reinforce the value proposition promise. The reinforcement comes from the provision of key quantitative data (in your bullets) that validates any claims you’ve made to date.
At this stage, the conversation should be rolling along well enough that you are now in a position to suggest a call to action. As you make the ask, you also need to provide an incentive to convince the visitor to actually take the action. Further, that incentive needs to be directly related to your value proposition, and you should include a visual to illustrate the incentive. As an example, include an image of the charts or tables from the report you’re asking the visitor to register to receive.
Avoid Landmines: Don’t Require Your Visitors To Submit
Be careful of the classic landmine, also known as the “submit” button. I wish I could play a recording so that you might hear Dr McGlaughlin’s booming southern preacher voice as he lacerated this bad habit of ours: “I SUBMIT TO THE GODS OF MARKETING!” Instead, the wording of your call to action needs to describe what is expected of the prospect. Some examples (besides “click here”!) include:
- Help Me Choose
- Become a Member
- Get Instant Access
- Download a Free Trial
Anticipate Anxiety and You Will Reduce Friction
MarketingExperiments‘ research identifies the call to action as a point of “friction”, or “the psychological resistance to a given element in the sales process”. Knowing that your ‘ask’ inevitably causes anxiety, anticipate that anxiety and counter the friction through reassurance. How?
Perhaps you might limit the length (number of) or difficulty of fields you require the prospect to complete. Or, you might use “seals” that illustrate policies such as “100% Satisfaction Guaranteed” or “No Hassle Returns”. You can also create a “backstop” by offering a single, powerful testimonial from a respected third party. Ensure these assurances are in close proximity to the source of anxiety.
Anticipating your prospect’s anxiety gives you an opportunity to “intensify the positives” in order to reduce friction. Do that well, and you’ve got yourself a conversion which results in a value exchange between you and your prospect.
The Value You Offer Must Outweigh the Cost to the Visitor
That value exchange might include critical credit card information or simply a valid email address. Regardless – you will have convinced your prospect that the your offer is worth the exchange of their valuable information. Nicely done!
In summary, we end up with a landing page layout that follows the conversation flow illustrated in the chart below:
Optimized Landing Page Flow – or “The Ritual Of Conversation”
As a web analyst, I was most intrigued with the idea that these conversational elements and related landing page layout recommendations are represented by MarketingExperiments Conversion Heuristic”*, which states C = 4m+ 3v + 2(i-f) – 2a© where:
c = conversion
m= (Your prospect’s) motivation
v = the clarity of your value proposition
i = incentive
f = friction and
a = anxiety
*Source: MECLABS Landing Page Optimization Summit Study Guide, Landing Page Certification Workshop
Using MarketingExperiments’ Conversion Heuristic, you immediately notice that the most important elements of your landing page are reflected in the relative value of the coefficients. Thus, at 4, the highest coefficient, your prospect’s motivation (4m) has the highest impact on the success of the conversion. MarketingExperiments defines motivation as the “magnitude and nature of of the customer’s demand for” your products / services.
By targeting motivated prospects by source, you have control over a key lever leading to your conversions. Translation – don’t bring prospects with low motivation to your landing page as you are setting yourself up for failure. This is, of course a core tenet of marketing — target your primary audience / market segments or suffer the wrath which results from a blown budget.
Next in importance is the clarity of your value proposition (+3v). The clarity comes from an articulation of the “appeal, exclusivity and credibility” of your offer. If well articulated, you can overcome, or subtract, possible friction your prospect might be feeling by “adding” an incentive appropriate to your value proposition [+2(i-f)].
Only then can you address the final issue that could deter the prospect from completing the conversion: anxiety (-2a). Notice that anxiety is a negative coefficient and that it is equal to the value garnered from your “incentive minus friction step”. To overcome your prospect’s anxiety, you must intensify the positives and reassure.
Avoid Symmetry
Dr McGlaughlin also made a point of reiterating that their research shows that easing the “eye path” in relation to landing page layout is also critical. Of utmost importance, don’t make the mistake of seeking balance by equalizing page components in your design. Avoid equally weighted columns which are another source of friction as they encourage indecision.
Instead, use a 2/3rd left hand column to contain all of the elements described above – headline, copy, subhead, bullets and calls to action. However, use the right hand column to support the content on the left. Examples of support content could include additional testimonials.
Be Clear About The Objective of Your Landing Page
If you’d like to try assessing your existing landing pages, use the framework offered by MarketingExperiments’ Conversion Heuristic, and then see how well your page performs in relation to the critical elements. Before you do so, however, ensure you have consensus on the goal of that page so you can be sure that you maintain your focus throughout the assessment. This offers the added benefit of helping you identify any conflicting objectives you may have inadvertently allowed on the page.
Just to make sure the audience was taking everything in, MECLABS hit us with an exam at the end of the day. Due to the amount of caffeine consumed, I am pleased to say that yours truly did make the grade:
Evidence of my Membership in MarketingExperiments Certified Professional Members Directory
What do you think of MarketingExperiments proposed framework? Would you consider amending your landing pages to reflect the proposed approach?
Thank you CMA Ottawa
October 28, 2008
A big thank you to everyone who attended today’s CMA Ottawa‘s luncheon, “Secrets to Effective Internet Marketing“. I enjoyed everyone’s questions and appreciate the time you took out of your day.
For those who may not be familiar with CMA Ottawa, it’s the local chapter of the Canadian Marketing Association, “the largest marketing association in Canada representing the integration and convergence of all marketing disciplines, channels and technologies.”
CMA Ottawa welcomes marketers from all sectors, public and private, from both sides of the river to its monthly luncheons (September to May). For information about upcoming sessions, please visit http://www.CMAOttawa.com.
Thanks!
Internet Marketing Secrets Revealed
February 3, 2008
Good news for Ottawa’s business owners and entrepreneurs – details about the City of Ottawa‘s Small Business Forum 2008 are now available. The Forum is set for February 22nd, 2008 from 7:30am to 2:00pm at the Ottawa Congress Centre and the cost is $90.00 CDN (plus GST).
This year’s keynote is Cora Tsouflidou, Founder, President and CEO of Cora’s Breakfast and Lunch. As a result of one of my standing committee meetings, I’ve become a regular at the Ottawa-Kanata location so I’m looking forward to hearing the scoop on how Ms Tsouflidou grew her restaurant chain from a single location in Montreal in 1987 to more than 90 Canadian franchise locations today.
Speaking of scoop, I invite you to “Internet Marketing Secrets Revealed”, a presentation I’m giving at the same event from 9:00 – 10:00 AM. For those who might be interested, my plan is to explain
- How to identify rich sources of website traffic
- Why you should play nicely with robots
- How perception vs. reality can work in your favour
- Why assumptions can hurt (but testing can help)
- How to take immediate advantage of the dawning “other” Internet
I’m going to assume that you have a website for your business already, but if not, please pop by anyway – if nothing else, I hope you’ll leave with a few plans in mind for when the moment does come.
Register for the Forum online or contact Kim Kelly Associates at (613) 521-3910 or kim@kimkellyassociates.com.
Looking forward to seeing you there!
Kelly Kubrick
Online Authority
Is your web marketing MIA?
February 3, 2008
Calling all Ottawa home builders, renovators, designers, trade contractors and suppliers! Have your Internet marketing efforts gone missing in action?
If so, GOHBA (The Greater Ottawa Home Builders’ Association) invites you to get your Internet marketing on track. Learn how to use the Internet to your advantage through improved customer service that remains accountable to the bottom line.
Join Kelly Kubrick of Online Authority for a web marketing breakfast workshop on Tuesday February 12th, 2008 from 8:30 to 11:30 AM at the Cleo Banquet & Convention Centre located at 156 Cleopatra Drive, Ottawa, Ontario.
To register, please contact Stephanie Norbury, Event Planner / Office Manager at GOHBA at events@ochba.com or call (613) 723-2926.
Help! My website is a dud!
January 10, 2008
Is your business part of the residential construction industry in Ontario? Will you be attending “Ontario Forum 2008″, presented by the Ontario Home Builder’s Association (OHBA)?
If so, please join Kelly Kubrick of Online Authority for a two-hour seminar about how to diagnose if your website is a dud:
“Ever wondered why your website traffic is so low? Have you wanted to ask for an evaluation, but were afraid of what people might say? Most websites share common mistakes that are easily fixed. Come to this session to find out what you might be doing right…or wrong.”
Event details:
Ontario Forum 2008
Weston Prince Hotel
900 York Mills Road, Toronto, Ontario M3B 3H2
“Help! My website is a dud!”
January 17th, 2008 – 8:00 AM to 10:00 AM
Thank you WBN
December 5, 2007
Many thanks to the Women’s Business Network (WBN) of Ottawa for the invitation to speak at their November 2007 luncheon. It was a pleasure to meet so many WBN members, learn about their companies and to have the opportunity to discuss today’s Internet marketing trends.
Thank you WBN members, for your interest in Kelly Kubrick’s and Online Authority’s particular passion – demystifying the Internet and teaching business owners how best to take advantage of the opportunities it offers.
Further, my thanks to Sue Smarkala of Adlerian Counselling and Consulting Group Inc for the great summary of the presentation.
Internet Marketing Today
November 2, 2007
On November 20th, 2007, Kelly Kubrick will be speaking to the Women’s Business Network (WBN) of Ottawa. The WBN is “an organization of like-minded women, interested in making relationships to create more business…and has celebrated over 20 years of involvement in the business community.”
She’ll be discussing “Internet Marketing Today” and in particular,
- How this IS your mother’s Internet (Or the geeks have left the building);
- Proof that the web is different than print;
- What you & the Internet can learn from the Yellow Pages;
- Why sharing your sandbox with robots is a good thing;
- The truth behind the emperor and his clothes
Why The Internet IS Your Business (Whether You Like It or Not)
September 14, 2007
On October 11th, 2007, Kelly Kubrick will be presenting Why The Internet IS Your Business (Whether You Like It or Not) at the London Home Builder’s Association dinner event. The following day, she’ll run a clinic for attendees entitled
A Blueprint for Success on the Internet.
Build A Profitable Web Presence
August 31, 2007
Now published – Online Authority’s first “Internet Business” column in Home Builder Magazine – Build A Profitable Web Presence, available in the July 2007 issue.
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