Split test your landing pages the easy way
by Steven Carl Kelly on February 27, 2011
I was recently asked by one of my mentoring students about split testing landing pages. Obviously, split testing should be standard practice for most internet marketers to use in order to gain the greatest insight into which combination of elements work best and create the most effective conversions. But when it comes to split testing, should a marketer remake an entire page and test one page versus another, or should we make small, incremental changes in a landing page and see what sort of results they produce?
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E-Mail marketing is DEAD! Or not…
by Steven Carl Kelly on January 14, 2011
I just happened to read a really interesting post and case study in the “Conversion Science” column at Search Engine Land, and I thought I’d share it with you…
Extreme Email Experiment: How Much Is Too Much?
The experiment concludes with these thoughts:
“Today, email is a more effective channel in a B2B sale than is social media. It is also a great way to get more out of your search engine and advertising traffic. When you get an email address, you get a second chance at the sale. And a third, fourth and fifth chance.”
Case Study: $40 Million in Free Publicity
by Steven Carl Kelly on October 15, 2010
As marketers, and especially if we’re players in the internet marketing game, we need to keep an eye out for massive free (or nearly free) advertising opportunities. I have little doubt that there are easy marketing “shots” that we can take which would return to us far more in positive exposure than we could ever afford to purchase, even if we had a virtually unlimited marketing budget.
Sunglasses maker Oakley has found itself the happy recipient of what could be more than $40 million in nearly free, positive marketing (see: Oakley Gets Projected $41 Million In Exposure From Chilean Miners). After 69 days trapped in a Chilean mine, dozens of miners were brought to the surface while millions of people the world over watched. Each of these miners emerged from their underground burial wearing a pair of $180 Oakley shades. After being approached by a Chilean journalist who knew that Read the rest of this entry »
The ONE mistake that could DESTROY your online business
by Steven Carl Kelly on October 8, 2010
Today I received a frantic telephone call from Ted, one of my former mentoring students. Ted was falling apart, because he had just had his business “rug” pulled out from under him.
“I’m dead,” Ted told me. “Completely dead.”
After he had left my formal mentoring program and struck out on his own, Ted decided to focus his online marketing strategy almost solely around advertising on the Facebook platform. As you already probably know, I like Facebook as an marketing channel (see: “How Facebook Kicks Google’s Ass“) thanks to the ability to leverage Facebook’s demographic data.
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I’m sick of all the damn LIES!
by Steven Carl Kelly on September 28, 2010
As some of you may know, I work closely with and consult for some of the bigger, very well-known internet marketing names. Traditionally, these have been high-level working relationships that I’ve valued and nurtured as there is something to be said for the old adage that it’s more “who you know” than “what you know”. In fact, many of my individual mentoring students have come to me directly through these valuable relationships with some of the top online marketing bigshots.
But frankly, I’m starting to get sick and tired of a trend that has developed over recent times, a trend that is like a virus which is infecting previously honest and well-respected internet marketers. I’m talking about…
Lies.
This past weekend I was working with one of my long-time IM acquaintances who is in the early stages of preparing himself for a new product launch. As has been his custom, he asked me to review some of his pre-sales and sales materials, in particular his main product sales page. I spent some time reviewing the page, and then called him up to ask him about one particular claim he planned to make in his sales copy. I personally knew the claim was false, but I wanted to honor our years of collaboration and use a soft approach.
“I don’t think this is accurate,” I told him. “This claim doesn’t seem truthful. Is this what you intended to convey here?”
I was shocked by his answer.
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How Facebook Kicks Google’s Ass
by Steven Carl Kelly on September 16, 2010
Frankly, Facebook kicks Google’s ass. I say that from a marketing perspective, of course. Google is the undisputed king of search, but when it comes to providing marketers a superior space for advertising, Facebook is clearly the leader.
Why?
Demographics, pure and simple. Facebook collects a good amount of demographic data from its users, which means that advertisers on the Facebook platform can take advantage of that data and use it to target exactly the groups that are likely to be the most responsive to their ads.
Let’s take pay-per-click (PPC) as an example. Google offers the highly successful Adwords PPC platform. Using Adwords, advertisers can do some targeting based on keywords, day/time, geographic region, language, device, etc. All well and good, but that’s really about as far as Google can take you. With Facebook, an advertiser can Read the rest of this entry »
WSO Prices Double at the Warrior Forum
by Steven Carl Kelly on September 14, 2010
For those of you who aren’t familiar with the Warrior Forum, let me introduce you to one of the best online resources for online marketing information ever. The forum is chock full of great marketing talk, and no doubt anyone spending a little time there will come away with something useful that can help them improve their online business.
There is a private discussion area of the Warrior Forum called “The War Room” where, for less than $40, you can subscribe and have 20 years of unlimited access. Some of the best stuff in the world related to online marketing can be found, for free, inside the War Room. In fact, many Warriors in the War Room offer their products to War Room members at no charge, even as they actively sell the same products elsewhere on the Web.
Whenever I’m approached by someone who wants to make money online, and when they ask me about where they should start, I tell them to start with a paid subscription to the War Room. I’m convinced that it is the best money they’ll ever spend.
There are a few other sections of the Warrior Forum where members can post their Read the rest of this entry »
