How - In Just 72 Hours - I Used PPC To Stop My Client From Going Broke

[Colin Parker]

Here is an example of the power of Google Adwords - used correctly.

I have just started a JV with a new client/potential business partner - he offers a great service in a very competitive market.

His problem is he needs more leads - and fast - because his competitors are increasingly using SEO and PPC to gain market share and his sales volume is dropping to near crisis point.

Leads for his service are sold on the internet for £45-£65 per lead. At this cost he cannot afford to buy the volume leads he needs to make the numbers crunch in his business.

My agreement with him was this: he pays for the cost of Google Adwords - he gets leads at my cost price plus a relatively small monthly management fee - and he pays me a commission on resulting sales.

He agreed and I started split testing the Google PPC advertising campaign on Tuesday of this week.

Before we 'floor the pedal' on Google Adwords advertising spend I wanted to test all aspects of the campaign: cost per click - ad content - ad position - website conversion. By doing this I can quickly establish a cost per lead and we can then make a decision on how many leads we want each week/month and how much that will cost.

In just three days - from Wednesday to close Friday - I was able to do a collective total of 73 different tests on the campaign. Google's Website Optimiser, Conversion Statistics and Analytics Tool allows me to constantly measure the results of these tests - and incrementally step by step increase the campaign conversion and reduce the lead cost.

The results of these split tests - in just 3 days - were as follows:

My 'click thru rate' (the % of potential clients who click on my ad as opposed to my competitors) increased 7 fold.

My 'cost per click' (the price I pay when someone clicks on my ad) dropped by 36%

My 'average ad position' (there are 11 ads on the page - the higher the position generally the more clicks) increased from 6.6 to 1.8. 1.8 puts me in the coveted top 3 positions directly above the SEO ads on the left of the page - and by so doing one of our biggest competitors has been displaced.

My 'website conversion' (the number of people who submitted their contact details on the site) increased from 11.8% to 56.4%. A near five fold increase.

My 'cost per lead' (click cost divided by number of contact submissions) dropped from £23.55 to £5.72. A near 75% drop.

All of this in just 3 days.

At £5.72 per lead my client/partner is now getting between 8 and 12 leads for the price he would have paid for 1 from lead sellers.

I also believe that by the end of next week further split testing will reduce the cost per lead to below £4.

We have now decided to generate 200 leads a week - advertising spend c£1,000 compared to c£9,000-£13,000 if purchased from leads sellers.

I expect to earn a six figure annual commission from my part of the deal - and my client/partners business will be transformed. To a degree it already has been. He is certainly sleeping easier now that's for sure.

That is the power of Google Adwords - fast, measurable and capable of taking you from 'zero to hero' in just 72 hours.

Colin Parker

 

[Tej]

Wow.. fantastic.. Zero to Hero in 72 hours.

I am totally naive about websites, SEO, adwords, etc....

But am interested to know ... does leads =actual business? ( income)

The spend might have been reduced to £1000... but its still spend.

Has the income increased dramatically for your client and yourself ( expected income 6 figures etc) to sleep easily... in 72 hours!! ( you get a management fee anyway.. so guess you sleep slightly better)

Really powerful stuff... seems adwords could be the saving of all businesses that are in sh1t creek... and those that are doing well, to be doing miles better.

Why don't all business owners follow this simple solution?

just a thought..

 

[Webtistic]

A consistent 56.4% conversion rate for a highly competitive sector (I am guessing finance/insurance) is somewhat amazing.

How about letting us know what the landing page is so we can see what a perfect conversion set-up looks like? Maybe your client will even get a few more leads!

 

[Jeff FV]

Some really great stats and I have no doubt that you have done a great job.

To get the complete picture it'd be good to know how many of those 200 leads per week end up buying, and how much they spend - i.e. how much cash does his £1000 a week spend generate.

 

[seedstotal]

near five fold increase in conversion dots and spots, so i guess they cant complain, he is not gonna tell you how much he earns, come on.
Great seminar Coli, i guess , i wish i could go, really could do with a five fold increase

 

[Colin Parker]

A consistent 56.4% conversion rate for a highly competitive sector (I am guessing finance/insurance) is somewhat amazing.

How about letting us know what the landing page is so we can see what a perfect conversion set-up looks like? Maybe your client will even get a few more leads!

Dave - the last thing I am going to tell ANYONE is what the landing page is!

That is like giving a burglar the key to your safe.

One of the biggest disadvantages of IM is that if a competitor knows your website is a high converter it can be replicated.

I would NEVER therefore give away specific figures for a specific campaign.

It is akin to marketing suicide.

Colin Parker
http://www.killeredge.co.uk

 

[Jeff FV]

near five fold increase in conversion dots and spots, so i guess they cant complain, he is not gonna tell you how much he earns, come on.

Fair enough - but he was happy enough to tell us how much he spends.

I know its hard to discern motives in the written media of a forum, but I was just genuinely intersted in this as a story - spending £50k a year on advertising is, I'm afraid, way out of our league!

Like Tej, I too am

I am totally naive about websites, SEO, adwords, etc...

and was just curious to see what an advertising spend of £1000 a week generates - we could all go out and spend that it whatever form we wanted to, the question is whether I could use it to generate a profit!

As the OP says, the aim is to get people to submit their contact details and Colin, the OP has clearly done a great job here and got the cost per contact down to about £5 from about £50, so he has met his brief and done a great job.

But the business he is working for still has to convert those leads into sales. Drilling down into the figures a little more, lets say he pays £1000 a week for 200 leads. If those leads then convert to buyers at a rate of 5%, then that's 10 buyers have cost him £1000, so each buyer needs to spend £100 just to cover the cost of the PPC campaign.

Now it may well be that the actual figures are much better than those quoted above, I don't know (I hope they are) it would have just added a little more flesh to a great story to have that detail, but, as I said above, well done Colin - I think you have shown what a good (professionally run) adwords campaign can do.

(Just another quick thought before I press send - if the business that commissioned the OP can't turn the leads into a profit, he could always sell those leads on to his competitors:

We have now decided to generate 200 leads a week - advertising spend c£1,000 compared to c£9,000-£13,000 if purchased from leads sellers.

and turn that £1000 a week into £9000!)

 

[Tej]

IMO

Anyone can spout figures... means nothing... could be a load of BS.

I do read a lot of posts.. and the person who I consider to be very good.... Steve Gibson... always backs up what he says.

Provides source etc...

The rest of this stuff is mickey mouse IMO

 

[Colin Parker]

IMO

Anyone can spout figures... means nothing... could be a load of BS.

I do read a lot of posts.. and the person who I consider to be very good.... Steve Gibson... always backs up what he says.

Provides source etc...

The rest of this stuff is mickey mouse IMO

Sorry ... but you are dead wrong about Steve Gibson.

Steve is a total professional and exceptionally good at what he does.

I know because I have had a number of conversations with him and we both know enough about IM - and Google Adwords and website conversion especially - to know that neither of us talks BS.

So ... why are you dead wrong about Steve?

Because - like me - he would NEVER reveal the name or website of a particular client when he gives conversion data etc., in his posts.

That would be a) a breach of client confidentiality and b) marketing suicide as I have said previously.

With respect - I couldn't care less what you believe about the figures I have put up.

I am trying to motivate forum members to learn more about PPC and how it can spectacularly increase their business. And Steve Gibson would be a great guy to go to for help.

The figures are 100% factual. If you don't believe them - that is your choice. Because I aint ever going to reveal the client and website.

Colin Parker
http://www.killeredge.co.uk

 

[Tej]

I have not asked about revealing your site.. means nothing to me

My business sense tells me

If you have "decided to generate 200 leads".. and this costs £1000.
You can then sell these leads at £50 a pop=£10k
nett profit £9000.

If I were the client..what other biusiness would I need... I would happily pay you £5000, and plus even add your "small management fee" of £1000 per week

I would be more than happy to have £3000 every week in my pocket

Sleep well... happyy days!!

Does that scenario work? ( rough figures obviously)

 

[directmarketingadvice]

really could do with a five fold increase

You don't need a five fold increase to make this worthwhile. Even aiming for 10% here and there and you'll see what a difference it makes.

I made a post a few days ago where I showed how improving 5 things about adwords by just 10% will increase your adwords income by 233%.

As Colin has shown from his results, 10% isn't a big deal. 30% or 100%+ can be quite possible.

(anyone who has split-test Adwords ads will know this - it's fairly common to go from a 1% ctr to 1.5% or 2.0%)

So, if you're thinking "I don't know how to increase my conversion rate by 400%", just set up a split-test and try to increase it by 10%.

Lao-tzu said "a journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step".

Woody Allen said "80 percent of success is just showing up".

Most testing success isn't about doubling or tripling a metric, it's about testing relentlessly - i.e. "just showing up" and testing - and having those 10%-30% improvements multiply like compound interest.

So don't let Colin's story intimidate you into thinking testing is about being brilliant.

It's usually about knowing you're not brilliant, you're not all-knowing, and asking your prospects (via a test) what they'll respond to.

That's why I test. That's why Colin tests.

We could both guess. And we've both got the experience where we could guess pretty well.

But we make so much more money by letting our prospects tell us what they want - in a PPC ad, on a web page - than if we try to dictate to them.

Steve

 

[directmarketingadvice]

Because - like me - he would NEVER reveal the name or website of a particular client when he gives conversion data etc., in his posts.

That's right.

The only time I've ever shown the before & after of split-tests is my own sites and emails.

(Like my thread a couple of weeks ago where I showed 3 split-tests of email subject lines)

I don't give the explicit details of client stuff. There are some testimonials on my sites where you can read client comments about increases in conversion rate. And there are some screen-shots of split-test results from Website Optimizer.

But the details of the changes are confidential.

Competitors copy each other.

Just this week, I was using archive.org, spyfu and alexa to try to work out why a client's key competitor was able to be top of the PPC listings. What did they do to their site that allowed them to step up and take over?

I think I figured it out.

My client made the same change to his site and, within 2 hours of that change going live, he was raving about the increase in enquiries.

If I can do that without being able to see the competitor's test data, what do you think I could do if they made it publicly available?

Steve

 

[Scott-Copywriter]

Great thread. Stuff like this reminds me that I need to get a DM venture under way. Just need to find the time to do it.

 

[saxondale]

My client made the same change to his site and, within 2 hours of that change going live, he was raving about the increase in enquiries.


Steve

I`m raving about the changes I`ve made ................ my enquiries are up 300%















raving mad, for some reason google now thinks I`m the imigration agency and I`m getting all their calls





.

 

[Colin Parker]

I have not asked about revealing your site.. means nothing to me

My business sense tells me

If you have "decided to generate 200 leads".. and this costs £1000.
You can then sell these leads at £50 a pop=£10k
nett profit £9000.

If I were the client..what other biusiness would I need... I would happily pay you £5000, and plus even add your "small management fee" of £1000 per week

I would be more than happy to have £3000 every week in my pocket

Sleep well... happyy days!!

Does that scenario work? ( rough figures obviously)

You are assuming that:

a) my client wants to operate a lead selling business - he doesn't.
b) even if he did that I would not cut him out of the deal and go direct.
c) the increased profit from selling the leads within his own business would even make selling the leads an option.
d) selling leads is a consistent way to make money - it isn't - lead buyers are notoriously fickle and often don't pay you if they don't sell.
e) he might be as sceptical and have the same loser mentality that you do - he doesn't.

Colin Parker
http://www.killeredge.co.uk

 

[saxondale]

You are assuming that:

a) my client wants to operate a lead selling business - he doesn't.
b) even if he did that I would not cut him out of the deal and go direct.
c) the increased profit from selling the leads within his own business would even make selling the leads an option.
d) selling leads is a consistent way to make money - it isn't - lead buyers are notoriously fickle and often don't pay you if they don't sell.
e) he might be as sceptical and have the same loser mentality that you do - he doesn't.

Colin Parker

I made it more noticable incase any future clients miss it -



commercial suicide in real time .................priceless

 

[cmcp]

Good inspiration, thanks for sharing.

 

[Tej]

You are assuming that:

a) my client wants to operate a lead selling business - he doesn't.
b) even if he did that I would not cut him out of the deal and go direct.
c) the increased profit from selling the leads within his own business would even make selling the leads an option.
d) selling leads is a consistent way to make money - it isn't - lead buyers are notoriously fickle and often don't pay you if they don't sell.
e) he might be as sceptical and have the same loser mentality that you do - he doesn't.

Colin Parker

Sorry ... I have assumed nothing.... I asked a simple question.. and gave you a simple scenario....without any technical crap trap ( thats chinese for clap trap)...


You are the one asuming....

If £3000 every week is a loser mentality... happy days!!

( I am wishing that you do double that regularly)

... surprised that you have time/inclination to post on this forum with that kinda money every week in your bin

 

[adventurelife]

PPC is by far the best marketing tool I have every seen. It provides instant research and results both positive and negative in super quick time which no other route to market does.

I used it to research and launch my business years ago. I did it very , very badly and burned through over £12k per year for first few years. Even doing it very badly it still paid got the business going and paid the wages and gave me breathing space to get my other marketing up to speed.

Those that can do it correctly I suspect can bring great value to their business. I also suspect to be really good at it now with all the competition it requires huge amount of time using and testing and hence why I do not use as I would be a rank amateur competing with accounts managed by those that know what they are doing.

200 leads from one of our target sectors would make me a very happy man as we convert 55% of our leads at a revenue level current and 66% at a booking level.

 

[Colin Parker]

... surprised that you have time/inclination to post on this forum with that kinda money every week in your bin

So what is your point ... only failures post on this forum? Is that it?

I often do wonder why I post on this forum - and attitudes like yours are one of the reasons why.

Read my previous threads and posts - check the number of thanks I have had ...

I am either the biggest BSer ever or I tell it as it is.

I'll leave others to make their minds up - but as I have said it really does not matter at all what you or anyone else believes.

Myself and my clients know the truth ...

And that is ALL that really matters to me.

Your opinions are totally insignificant.

Colin Parker

Colin Parker

 

[Tej]

Why are you getting all worked up?

I have asked a couple of simple questions.. and you have had difficulty in answering them.

Read my initial post.. you have ignored it completely!!

You take one sentence out of context.. and spout further BS

Either give me an answer to a simple question or be a man, and say you have no answer..

its pretty simple isn't it?

You abuse me with all this loser mentality crap..

you can't take simple can you?

I have not disputed anything you have said... i dont do technical....

 

[papverpoppies]

I don't do techincal either, but if it is that easy - and more to the point that fast -why does everyone who has the know how, not do it for their clients?

Are you saying, that you can turn anyones business around in 72 hours or whatever, it all sounds too good to be true, so why are people not queueing up for this service.

Only asking in these terms, as I do not know how else to put it across, as a non techi!:|

Poppy

 

[Tej]

I don't do techincal either, but if it is that easy - and more to the point that fast -why does everyone who has the know how, not do it for their clients?

Are you saying, that you can turn anyones business around in 72 hours or whatever, it all sounds too good to be true, so why are people not queueing up for this service.

Only asking in these terms, as I do not know how else to put it across, as a non techi!:|

Poppy

Poppy

Thats similar to what I said in my very first post

He does not have any answers to simple questions.... looks like


and then will come the age old stuff

" I often do wonder why I post on this forum - and attitudes like yours are one of the reasons why."

 

[Scott-Copywriter]

Really powerful stuff... seems adwords could be the saving of all businesses that are in sh1t creek... and those that are doing well, to be doing miles better.

Why don't all business owners follow this simple solution?

I don't do techincal either, but if it is that easy - and more to the point that fast -why does everyone who has the know how, not do it for their clients?

Are you saying, that you can turn anyones business around in 72 hours or whatever, it all sounds too good to be true, so why are people not queueing up for this service.

Only asking in these terms, as I do not know how else to put it across, as a non techi!:|

Poppy

Because they don't realise how worthwhile it is. They're stuck in their ways and only see value on spending their budget on advertising. Unfortunately, it's common for the resulting traffic to convert poorly.

It's natural human behaviour causing the 'too good to be true' scepticism which is a shame. I often have to explain how worthwhile conversion optimisation is (double the conversion, double the sales without any extra traffic). Mind you, these days I'm noticing more and more business owners contacting me to look at optimisation. Seems to thankfully be catching on.

Business owners CAN follow the simple solution. They can either spend time learning how to do it themselves, or pay a specialist to do it for them. People who have the know how do actually do it for their clients. I improve conversion rates all the time. Mind you, it's rare to improve the rate to such a degree as Colin has done. It does depend on the state of the website prior to optimisation.

Many people just don't take the incentive to get it looked into.

 

[papverpoppies]

Poppy

Thats similar to what I said in my very first post

He does not have any answers to simple questions.... looks like


and then will come the age old stuff

" I often do wonder why I post on this forum - and attitudes like yours are one of the reasons why."

I was watching TV very very late last night, the part where they run the
gimmick ads - that will make us all, super thin, rich, beautiful, etc etc, and all for the amazing price of ££££ plus p/p.

Then they get the super thin 'already' beautiful models to tell you how this 'product' worked for them (like they ever used it in their lives)!

Or the business manual that will make you wonder how you ever 'survived' with out it!

My fav is that product that can make you lay a course of bricks in a staight line (just like the pro bricky)...and they show some women in her 60s slapping down the bricks!
What they dont say is you have got to mix the mortar, cut the bricks, you get the picture.

If everything was that easy - would we all not be beautiful, thin, building our own homes and running highly successful business's?

If it IS that easy - lead me to it - I have no probs with laying a few bricks.

Poppy

 

[papverpoppies]

Because they don't realise how worthwhile it is. They're stuck in their ways and only see value on spending their budget on advertising. Unfortunately, it's common for the resulting traffic to convert poorly.

It's natural human behaviour causing the 'too good to be true' scepticism which is a shame. I often have to explain how worthwhile conversion optimisation is (double the conversion, double the sales without any extra traffic). Mind you, these days I'm noticing more and more business owners contacting me to look at optimisation. Seems to thankfully be catching on.

Business owners CAN follow the simple solution. They can either spend time learning how to do it themselves, or pay a specialist to do it for them. People who have the know how do actually do it for their clients. I improve conversion rates all the time. Mind you, it's rare to improve the rate to such a degree as Colin has done. It does depend on the state of the website prior to optimisation.

Many people just don't take the incentive to get it looked into.

So does it also depend on the ability of the person to be able to make this happen?

If I did not find a Colin type person who was capable and understood this process, would I, could I, be loosing out.

How do you (as a non techi) person make sure you get the right person?

Poppy

 

[Tej]

. Mind you, it's rare to improve the rate to such a degree as Colin has done.

Thank you Scott... I now know a bit more

I have taken a sentence of your quote out of context, like the OP did to mine...

what does that make him out to be?

 

[directmarketingadvice]

I don't do techincal either, but if it is that easy - and more to the point that fast -why does everyone who has the know how, not do it for their clients?

Speaking as someone who tries to get his clients to split-test, it's usually like banging your head against a brick wall. I've got a couple of clients that'll test, but lots more that should test, but just don't want to.

So let me address a bigger question: why don't people split test?

I've been thinking about this for a while and here are the reasons I've come up with:

(1) Seems "too easy" - we're brought up to think "hard work= money", so when someone changes one sentence on their website and gets a 20%-30% pay rise, that doesn't fit our model of how to make money.

(2) People don't trust numbers - it's probably no coincidence that Colin and I have both worked in financial services. We're both from a background where "the numbers never lie". So we believe what we see.

Most people aren't that comfortable with numbers and the sorts of stuff I posted (the 233% increase from 5 improvements of 10%) makes them uncomfortable. "How can 5 x 10% = +233%?"

(3) Social proof - when we're unsure, we humans tend to look to people who are similar to ourselves and do what they do. On this forum we have dozens of people going on and on about SEO. We have 2 people talking about split-testing.

It's normal to think, "If split-testing was so good, more people would be doing it. More people aren't doing it, therefore it must be bollox."

(4) They think it's difficult - there's an expectation that the technical side of setting up a test is going to be confusing. In reality, Google Website Optimizer is easier to understand than Google Analytics (and not much harder to set up).

(5) They're being held back by web designers - many business owners are dependent on their web designers to do the techie stuff for them. However, most web designers have no understanding of how to do a split-test. So, the designers are reluctant to help.

In addition, some of them don't want their site to be split-tested, either because it's their "baby" or because they feel they'll be undermined when some of their design decisions are shown to be costing the client a bucketful of money.

(6) They just don't understand why it's necessary - the common things I hear from clients are "why do we have to test it, can't we just change it and see what happens?" or "are you sure it's going to work?".

They don't get that sequential testing (running one version for a while then running the other version) produces unreliable results. (particularly when the differences are less than 20%)

Nor do they seem to get that testing isn't about guaranteed winners. If you're winning all your tests, you must have a crap site (one with obvious weaknesses). Testing is about getting the answers to questions that can go either way.

Those 6 reasons are my half-arsed speculation about why people don't test. Or, to put it another way, those are the most logical reasons I can think of to explain why people behave illogically.

Steve

 

[Colin Parker]

Then they get the super thin 'already' beautiful models to tell you how this 'product' worked for them (like they ever used it in their lives)!

If everything was that easy - would we all not be beautiful, thin, building our own homes and running highly successful business's?

If it IS that easy - lead me to it - I have no probs with laying a few bricks.

Poppy

Thing is Poppy ... there isn't any easy way to lose weight.

As a lot of fat lasses and lads will tell you - if you can understand what they are saying while chewing a double cheesburger.

It takes months (normally) of proper dieting and perhaps exercise to get anywhere near the shape of those models.

And there isn't any easy way to get the PPC results I do.

Never mind months - I have spent nearly 30 years in direct marketing and sales and 80% of what I learnt and applied offline also applies online.

The other 20% for online I have learnt over the past 10 years - spending literally 100's of £1,000's on PPC (a big 6 figure total) - buying loads of ecourses (mostly rubbish) - and meeting and learning from some of America's most successful online marketeers.

So ... don't believe anything is easy. For a long time it wasn't for me.

But after nearly 30 years in direct marketing - and with 10 years of IM experience behind me - I'm more than starting to get the hang of it.

As my original post on this thread shows.

Colin Parker

 

[Scott-Copywriter]

So does it also depend on the ability of the person to be able to make this happen?

If I did not find a Colin type person who was capable and understood this process, would I, could I, be loosing out.

How do you (as a non techi) person make sure you get the right person?
Poppy

The same way you make sure you get anything else of quality. Look at the figures and look at the testimonials. Make the effort to understand the technical side so you can choose the right person for the job. You will only ever be rewarded for doing so.

Mind you, anyone selling their services should always explain everything in easily absorbent ways. Colin is only showing an example of what he did and how he did it. It's valuable information.

Thank you Scott... I now know a bit more

I have taken a sentence of your quote out of context, like the OP did to mine...

what does that make him out to be?

It still stands out of context. Colin is only showing an example of Adwords and the potential power for any business. He isn't selling his services and claiming he can get this kind of improvement for everyone out there. Is a five fold increase in conversion possible? Yes.

 

[Tej]

Steve.. a simple question.... I don't understand it to be honest...

main points I would make.

Do people actually know and understand what " split testing" is? ( I know I don't)

and would they be able to do it themselves if they had the inclination to do so?

personally... if I had someone who did the marketing for me.. did any campaigns for me etc.. I would rely on that person 100%... give him the responsibility and authority.. to achieve results. A kind of a carte blanche .. the limitation being the budget.

Does that make sense?

Does that make me a lazy barsteward?

 

[Tej]

It still stands out of context. Colin is only showing an example of Adwords and the potential power for any business. He isn't selling his services and claiming he can get this kind of improvement for everyone out there. Is a five fold increase in conversion possible? Yes.

That wasn't what I asked... but no matter.. I understand

 

[papverpoppies]

Steve.. a simple question.... I don't understand it to be honest...

main points I would make.

Do people actually know and understand what " split testing" is? ( I know I don't)

and would they be able to do it themselves if they had the inclination to do so?

personally... if I had someone who did the marketing for me.. did any campaigns for me etc.. I would rely on that person 100%... give him the responsibility and authority.. to achieve results. A kind of a carte blanche .. the limitation being the budget.

Does that make sense?

Does that make me a lazy barsteward?

That is the angle I would be coming in from.

What if I did not get a Colin, Steve or Scott type person, how would I, the non techinical person, know I could be achieving better results.

That is the scary part.

Poppy

 

[Jeff FV]

I have been following this thread (and other similar ones with interest) and I have come to the conclusion that little changes can have a big impact, but its not always easy to know, in advance, what change will have which impact and so you split test to discover this. I understand a split test to be something like this:

You have 2 pages that are identical, with one small change: e.g.

Page A may say "click here if you love chocolate"
Page B may "Chocolate Lover? Click Here"

and count what percentage of visitors click the link on Page A and compare to what percentage of vistiors click the link on Page B

I like numbers, and with a mathematical/scientific/engineering background the principles behind this seem pretty straight forward (although I appreciate the practice may be more complicated!) and, because they allow you to measure things, take away a lot of guess work, helping to do away with the old adage "I know half of my advertising budget is wasted, but I don't know which half". (I write the above not as an expert, but as someone who is trying to summarise their own understanding - I won't be offended if anyone says I've got it all wrong!)

I'd like to learn more about split testing, conversion testing etc. Can anyone recommend any good books, courses, projects I could undertake to help me find out more. Presumably you need a minimum sample size for the testing to be valid - is there a ball park figure? Any advice/pointers/help would be most welcome!

Thanks to all for a really interesting and thought provoking thread!

Jeff

 

[Mystro]

Thats a great example of a the right marketing for your business, marketing is not a one shoe fits all strategy.

Many things in marketing don't makes sense of why it works for one person and not for another, split testing is somthing i dont unserstand either, i get the concept of what it is and why its important when trying to create the right marketing strategy as its so easy to loose money on somthing just because you think it will work for you because Joe Blogs earned a fortune doing it ..

There seems to be a lot of post where people take the time to share some of their better learning experiences only to get bombarded with critisism or doubt.

Not pointing the finger at anyone in particular, just making an observation.

 

[Tej]

That is the angle I would be coming in from.

What if I did not get a Colin, Steve or Scott type person, how would I, the non techinical person, know I could be achieving better results.

That is the scary part.

Poppy

LOl.. its all surrounded in mystique... cloak and dagger kinda stuff...

I guess its geared that way... every discipline to have its own peculiarity.

Else people like the OP who has spent hundreds of thousands learning the art, would not be able to ply his trade and stop his clients from going broke in just 72 hours.

Gobsmacking time.. don't you think?

 

[directmarketingadvice]

Steve.. a simple question.... I don't understand it to be honest...

main points I would make.

Do people actually know and understand what " split testing" is? ( I know I don't)

If you've used adwords and split-test adwords ads, then you know what split-testing is.

Doing it with a web page is the same concept.

and would they be able to do it themselves if they had the inclination to do so?

Search for info on "Google Website Optimizer". Google have plenty of info on their site. They have videos on how to use it on youtube.

It's not a difficult piece of software to use.

personally... if I had someone who did the marketing for me.. did any campaigns for me etc.. I would rely on that person 100%... give him the responsibility and authority.. to achieve results. A kind of a carte blanche .. the limitation being the budget.

Does that make sense?

Yes.

You could learn how to do it yourself - and it's really not that hard, so I'd encourage people to find out about it - but hiring a marketer who knows about split-testing has its advantages:

(1) They've done a lot of testing and worked with a number of sites. This means they've developed an idea of "best practice" - i.e. the things that work more often than not. That experience can identify the best elements (on the page) to test and the best alternatives to test against them.

(2) If they have copywriting skill, they can test their copy against the existing copy and will beat it more often than not. The better their copy, the bigger the gains.

(3) They'll help with the techie side of using website optimizer. The first time I set up a test, it didn't work. (it's ok, it was on one of my own sites - I made sure I was my own guinea pig) I soon realised what I'd done. But there are other things I've figured out so my clients don't have to.

(there are some very old threads in the private section where I asked people to visit urls and tell me what they saw - that was to do with split-testing over multiple pages)

(4) If the marketer has a stats background, then he'll know how to set complex tests up so you're testing the right things. (when you're testing more than one element at a time)

(5) If the marketer understands testing, he'll know how to interpret the results and when to call a result. (to do with statistical confidence)

(6) It's just good to have an outside pair of eyes. Some of my test ideas have come from looking at a site and not understanding something. So, we test a version of the page with an explanation, or with clearer buying instructions.

I don't want this to be a sales pitch. I'll say it again: it's easy enough to learn about this. And, ideally, you should watch a couple of videos even if you're thinking about outsourcing it. There are some where google show their own testing and results.

And, because it's google talking about their own pages, I'm sure it has far more credibility than a couple of guys on a forum.

Steve

 

[directmarketingadvice]

I have been following this thread (and other similar ones with interest) and I have come to the conclusion that little changes can have a big impact, but its not always easy to know, in advance, what change will have which impact and so you split test to discover this. I like numbers, and with a mathematical/scientific/engineering background the principles behind this seem pretty straight forward (although I appreciate the practice may be more complicated!) and, because they allow you to measure things, take away a lot of guess work, helping to do away with the old adage "I know half of my advertising budget is wasted, but I don't know which half". (I write the above not as an expert, but as someone who is trying to summarise their own understanding - I won't be offended if anyone says I've got it all wrong!)

You're kinda right.

One way to think of a test is as a "forced survey". The problem with traditional surveys is that people give answers that are unreliable - i.e. what they say they'd do, or think they'd do, isn't what they'd actually do.

With a test, you're really asking the question "would you buy/opt-in if you saw this version of the page?" and, because the user doesn't know he's being surveyed, he behaves normally.

And you're doing that with two pages (original and test version) and then comparing the conversion rates.

I'd like to learn more about split testing, conversion testing etc. Can anyone recommend any good books, courses, projects I could undertake to help me find out more.

Go to youtube and search on "website optimizer". Watch the videos by google themselves.

Presumably you need a minimum sample size for the testing to be valid - is there a ball park figure? Any advice/pointers/help would be most welcome!

Website optimizer tells you the percentage chance each version has of winning. I usually work to 90% statistical confidence.

Here's a link to screenshot of a test I did:

http://www.stevegibsonconsulting.co.uk/optimiser.jpg

you'll see the info Website Optimizer gives.

Steve

 

[papverpoppies]

Thats a great example of a the right marketing for your business, marketing is not a one shoe fits all strategy.

Many things in marketing don't makes sense of why it works for one person and not for another, split testing is somthing i dont unserstand either, i get the concept of what it is and why its important when trying to create the right marketing strategy as its so easy to loose money on somthing just because you think it will work for you because Joe Blogs earned a fortune doing it ..

There seems to be a lot of post where people take the time to share some of their better learning experiences only to get bombarded with critisism or doubt.

Not pointing the finger at anyone in particular, just making an observation.

If you do not understand something - then you have to ask - surely.

The human race thrives on critisism and doubt, no human got injured in the making of this thread!

I have learnt a 'little' not because of the inability of the posters to this thread, just my lack of knowledge on this matter.

It is an interesting subject matter.

Thanks

Poppy

 

[AaronB]

I must agree with a lot of people "your" first post is like Cardell Media ( chris cardell inner circle) email I get, a blog of how good his marketing is,.

Aaron