90 Days PPC Plan

8/3/2019 90 Days PPC Plan

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90-Day PPC Plan Tested

Tuesday, 23 August 2005

Paid Search Certification:Learn How To Maximize Your Paid Search (PPC)

Topic: How to use pay-per-click (PPC) search campaigns to boost website traffic andmaximize profits from day one: a 90-day plan.

We recently released the audio recording of our clinic on this topic. You can listen to arecording of this clinic here: 90-Day PPC Plan

Whether you are launching a new site or simply want to generate a large traffic spike toan existing site, we have found the best way to do this is with PPC advertising.

However, if you don't know exactly what you're doing with PPC, here's what canhappen:

1. In your efforts to dramatically grow the number of visitors to your site, you canfind yourself over-spending on keywords.

2.If you're paying too much for PPC traffic, your ROI drops and your campaignsbecome unprofitable.

There is a key point to recognize here.

Some companies will view PPC advertising as an expense, and will not expect to see animmediate, positive ROI, particularly during the early weeks of the campaign.

This needn't be the case.

In this brief we will show you two things:

1. We will show you how we drove 1,644,732 visitors to a new site over a 90-Dayperiod, AND MADE MONEY FROM DAY ONE.2. We will share with you a 90-Day Plan that will enable you to design and

implement the best possible PPC program for your business.


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For our testing, we selected a recently launched site that provided useful informationusing a paid-subscription model. Traffic to the site without pay-per-click wassubstantial but not spectacular:

Test Site A Natural Search Traffic

Search Engine May - July 2005

MSN 9,728

Yahoo! 5,371

Google 6,826

Other 1,563

TOTAL 23,488

What You Need To UNDERSTAND:In three months of testing, natural (non-PPC) search traffic amounted to 23,488 unique visitors.

Test Site A Other Traffic Sources

Search Engine May - July 2005

Other Websites (Links) 17,875

Email and Banner Ads 25,430

TOTAL 43,305

What You Need To UNDERSTAND:In three months of testing, traffic fromnon-search sources (website links and email) amounted to 43,305 unique visitors.

KEY POINT: Without PPC traffic, we would have generated only 66,793 visitors toour test site. With PPC traffic, we were able to generate closer to 1.7 MILLION visitors.

Here are the results of our test site's PPC campaign over three months:

Test Site A PPC Traffic

May 2005 June 2005 July 2005

Cost Per Click $0.09 $0.09 $0.09

Total Clicks 549,565 416,785 678,382

Cost $48,731.45 $36,833.87 $61,647.57

What You Need To UNDERSTAND:In a three-month period, we generated1,644,732 visitors using PPC search marketing. In addition, we were able to optimize


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our campaign to create an additional 128,817 in July versus May. This is an increase of23.4%, WITHOUT INCREASING OUR AVERAGE COST PER CLICK.

The strategy for this site was to capture as much of the market share as possible whileremaining profitable. It's certainly not difficult to spend a lot of money on PPC traffic,

but to do so while maintaining a positive ROI can be a daunting task.

There are a number ways to increase the profitability of a PPC campaign. Theseinclude:

1. Buy more traffic that converts at a defined minimum rate. (This minimum ratewill depend upon your average order size, profit margin, and other factorsunique to your business.)

2. Eliminate unprofitable keywords that drain your marketing budget.3. Reduce bids on keywords with a negative return on investment (ROI). However,

this may also substantially reduce the amount of traffic to the site.4. Increase the conversion rate of PPC traffic once it has reached your site.5. Increase the order size of converting traffic.

If you PPC campaigns become unprofitable, keep these points in mind as ways torecover. In addition, before implementing the protocol below, you may wish to reviewour report, Avoiding Unprofitable PPC Campaigns.

The following section describes the protocol used to generate 1,644,732 profitable PPCvisits to the test site in 90 days.

90-Day PPC Protocol:

1. Focus. Focus. Focus.Focus your efforts on one major search engine to start. Google AdWords may

offer the greatest potential for most businesses, followed by Overture. Youshould not completely neglect the smaller PPC engines, but launching and

optimizing a PPC campaign is very time consuming and you should focus yourefforts on that which will yield the most fruit for the time invested.

Focus on your unique value proposition. Decide what you are selling and whatmakes you stand out from your competitors. For example, if your price is lowerthan your competitors', experiment with ads that contain actual pricinginformation.

Focus on the most relevant keywords. These terms will convert better thanwords or phrases that are not as appropriate for your offer.

Consider both PPC and natural search, but if you are trying to generate thegreatest amount of traffic with the least effort, PPC will create more immediate

results. But do not neglect building a spider-friendly site as well.

2. Reap the benefits of a fresh start.


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If you are launching a PPC campaign for a new site, you don't have to correctpast mistakes and can begin with a well-structured search approach right away.Remember to use:

1. Well-designed landing pages;2. Optimized ads with relevant keywords;3. Negative keywords to reduce less relevant traffic;4. Smart bids (not round numbers);5. A free, valuable email newsletter to capture the addresses of potential

customers so you don't have to pay to reach them again; and6. A well-organized campaign structure (see below).

3. Build a list of keywords.Build a list of the keyword "themes," phrases, and single words you plan totarget. Build this "map" outside of the constraints of the PPC interface. This willallow you to focus your thoughts and more easily implement the keyword bidsover multiple PPC platforms.

4. Stay organized.The more thoughtful and organized your approach to PPC campaignmanagement, the better your campaigns will perform and the better you will beable to navigate through testing and optimization. Be sure to plan for campaignexpansion from the start.

5. Use smart initial bids.When creating a new Google AdWords campaign, consider bidding higher thanyou normally would for some important terms. This is an approach unique to

Google because it rewards a higher click-through rate (CTR). In a simplerworld, CTR would depend solely on the quality of the ad copy. However, yourCTR will be higher if your ads appear higher in the search results.

KEY POINT: By bidding slightly higher during initial launch and thengradually lowering your bids, you can achieve and maintain better placement atlower cost per click.

Currently, our test site is one of 16 sites bidding on its most popular word. Wehold one of the topmost positions, yet have been paying less than 8.5 centsaverage CPC (over the last ten days) because of the high historical CTR it builtup during initial launch, from which it still benefits.

6. Test your ads.Set up split-testing to optimize your PPC ads. Optimize for click-through rate,which will help you achieve higher placement at lower cost, especially forGoogle AdWords.

You can now choose to allow Google to automatically manage your campaignsbased on the CTR of your ad creatives. Google will serve the highest CTR ads


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more often. Note, however, that the ad with the highest CTR may notnecessarily be the ad that drives the most relevant traffic with the highestconversion rate.

For more on this topic, read the recent related MEC Journal article, PPC AdCopy Tested.

7. Test your landing pages.Split-test your landing pages as well. Here, you will be optimizing forconversion.

For more on this topic, read these recent related MEC Journal articles:

Landing Pages Tested

A/B Split Testing Brief

8. Refine and optimize your campaign.After 30-60 days, you should be able to evaluate the initial success of your PPCcampaign. Have you been able to tap the full potential of this PPC engine, or isthere more potential for improvement? Can your ads be better? Have youexperimented with keywords in the title copy? Have you utilized the rightnegative keywords to avoid accidental clicks from unsuitable traffic?

If a desired keyword is too expensive, try to break it down and go after phrasesthat are more specific. Identify words and phrases that may not receive as muchtraffic but can be purchased at a lower bid.

Consider creating customized landing pages for specific keywords. Certain typesof pages will convert better for some terms than for others.

9. Expand your campaign.Most companies set up a PPC campaign for terms they know their customers arelooking for. But take a step back for a moment. Ask yourself what led yourcustomers to search for those terms. This will often help you find targeted

phrases that your competition hasn't thought of.

There are also some online tools that will help you brainstorm keyword phrases.Overture, Google, and Teoma will help you identify more relevant keywordswith their keyword suggestion tools.

Do not be afraid to go after highly specialized terms. The most specializedterms, while they may see much less traffic, often also yield the highestconversion rates.


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KEY POINT: Think BROAD instead of (or in addition to) thinking DEEP.Rather than focusing on getting the number-one position for a few keywords,

purchase as many (relevant) keywords as possible. 200 terms at $0.10 per clickwill usually perform much better than 15 terms at $0.50 per click.

10.Analyze profitability at the keyword level.Certain keywords will yield a higher ROI than others. To optimize your PPCcampaign, analyze the return at the keyword level.

Some words you will eliminate while others may deserve higher bids. But keepin mind that ROI is not the most important metric for your overall business.Your true success indicator should be total net profit, so it may be worthwhile tokeep all terms that have a positive ROI, even if they are quite low. Yourmarketing budget and cash position will be the determining factors here.

Our report on Avoiding Unprofitable PPC Campaigns further clarifies thedistinctions and importance ofROI vs. profit.

11.Replicate your successes.Now expand your campaigns to other PPC search engines.

Pay-Per-Click Search Engines lists 659 PPC search engines, including a list ofthe "Top 10" that will produce the greatest results for your efforts. Also, read our

previous reports:

Small PPC Engines Tested

Five Pay Search Engines Tested

Overture Tested

12.Continually revisit steps 6 and 7. Your ad-copy and landing-page optimizationefforts should be recurring, periodic processes as the markets evolve.

This protocol has proven itself over time with hundreds of millions of profitable clicks.Using it will help you launch your own profitable PPC campaigns and achieve a highlevel of profitable traffic in a short amount of time. As always, however, no formulaicapproach to Internet marketing can substitute for your own testing.

As our further research unfolds, we will continue to share our findings with you. If youwould like to suggest a topic for future study, please contact us via the website.


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PPC Ad Copy Tested

Wednesday, 22 June 2005

Paid Search Certification:Learn How To Maximize Your Paid Search (PPC)

Topic: PPC Ad Copy How our testing improved our click-through rate by as muchas 121%

We recently released the audio recording of our clinic on this topic. You can listen to arecording of this clinic here:

PPC Ad Copy (Windows Media Audio)

PPC Ad Copy (RealMedia)

This research brief will answer the following questions:

1. How do you determine the best ad copy for your business?2. What are the most important practices to keep in mind when optimizing your

PPC ad copy? (16 Techniques)

The primary purpose of any online ad copy is to get a user to click through to visit yourwebsite. While it is true that the best ad copy will also contribute to high conversionafter the click, the easiest factor to measure the "effectiveness" of your ads is click-through rate (CTR).

On the pay-per-click (PPC) search engines, ad copy can be tested to optimize CTR quite

easily. On Google AdWords, for example, multiple ads can be created in the same adgroup to test a variety of ad copy approaches. The best ad copy can then be isolated and

optimized even further.

Often, the best ad will be one that sets your offer apart from those of the competition.

Consider the following when creating an ad:


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y Do you have the lowest price? You may have success with listing the price ofyour items in the ad itself, perhaps in the title.

y Do you have the best variety? Listing the number of products you carry in the admay be most effective.

y Do you have high-quality products? Emphasize this in your ad copy, citingspecific awards or "prestige" brands, if appropriate.

y Is top-notch customer service your strongest selling point? What credibilityindicators can you use in your ads to emphasize this?

y Is the site content-driven or informative? Mention how your site can meet theneeds of potential customers.

Without giving potential customers a reason to buy from you, you are inviting them tovisit your competition. Customers often search so fast that they make decisions about a

purchase in just a few seconds. On the Web, you are just a click away from rejection.Therefore, to be effective, your ads need to capture the attention of a potential customerat first glance.

But it doesn't stop there. Your copy should not only garner attention, but should also beinteresting enough to get a customer to slow down, read, and most importantly, click.

An additional benefit of optimizing ad copy for the PPC engines is that it helps you

discover effective copy for other media. One of the quickest ways to test a newmarketing message is to measure its effectiveness in the PPC engines. Granted, this may

require that you break a marketing message into its constituent parts due to the characterlimitations in PPC ads, but key phrases and short sentences can be tested quite easily.

1. How do you determine the best ad copy for your

business?

We continually stress at MEC that although some wisdom can be gained from viewingcase studies and other research, a true indicator of your potential success will come

through your own micro-testing.

To measure the effectiveness of a number of PPC ad copy approaches, we set up micro-tests for two different online industries. We were able to derive meaningful results in

just a few days of testing.

These were the testing parameters:

y Two sites were selected for micro-testing, an Internet marketing-related site anda specialty pet products site.

y Each site had a single Google AdWords ad group driving traffic to it.y Cost-per-click bids were set at very low levels for each respective industry in an

attempt to control position in the engine.

y Five pieces of copy were developed for each site. All the remaining ad groupsettings remained identical so we could isolate the impact of the changing copy.

y The ads appeared in both Google search results and the AdSense content-basedad syndication network.


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y Results were gathered over a period of 4 days.Below is an overview of the results for both campaigns:

Campaign Summaries

Internet Marketing Site Specialty Pet SiteDays Tested 4 4

Search Clicks 162 99

Content Clicks 555 715

Avg. Position Search 11 5.8

Avg. Position Content 2.9 4.4

Avg. Cost-Per-Click $0.21 $0.05

What You Need To UNDERSTAND:In two micro-tests, we generated

approximately 800 clicks for each of the two test sites. These clicks came both fromGoogle search results and from Google AdSense content ads.

Here were the ad copy click-through results for each site:

Test Site A - Internet Marketing Site

Impressions Clicks CTR

Ad #1 175,256 149 0.0850%

Ad #2 175,256 149 0.0850%

Ad #3 176,178 185 0.1033%

Ad #4 197,393 92 0.0466%Ad #5 199,238 145 0.0728%

What You Need To UNDERSTAND: Ad #3 performed 21.5% better than thenext best ad for this Internet marketing-related website. It performed 121% better thanthe worst ad.

Test Site B - Specialty Pet Site

Impressions Clicks CTR

Ad #1 23,687 303 1.2792%

Ad #2 14,689 164 1.1165%

Ad #3 14,920 160 1.0724%

Ad #4 13,228 111 0.8391%

Ad #5 10,382 76 0.7320%

What You Need To UNDERSTAND: Ad #1 performed 14.6% better than the


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next best ad for this specialty pet-products site. It performed 74.8% better than the worstad.

Why did some ads perform better than others? We can look specifically at the featuresof the five types of copy used for each site:

y Ad #1 This ad had a well written body copy and used keyword insertion in thead title. In other words, we included the actual bid-for search terms into the ad"headline" or "title", which is the prominent first line and the actual hyperlink ofthe ad.

An ad of these specifications performed the best for test site B, a specialty pet-products site.

Here were the ads we used:

o {KeyWord:Free Marketing Research}Web Marketing Techniques & ResearchPPC, SEO, EBay Marketplace & More.www.*****.com

o {KeyWord:Bulldog Info & Resources}Family website devoted to Bulldogs.Photos, Info, Resources & Communitywww.*****.com

y Ad #2 This ad had a "poorly written" body copy with keyword insertion in thead title. Some examples of poorly written copy are included below.


o

{KeyWord:Free Marketing Research}We hold all the secrets to internetmarketing. Buy Now!www.*****.com

o {KeyWord:Bulldog Info & Resources}Site about family dogPictures and links herewww.*****.com

y Ad #3 This was an "over-the-top" piece of poorly written body copy, usingkeyword insertion in the ad title. Examples of "over-the-top" copy are included

below.

Interestingly, this ad type performed the best for the Internet marketing-relatedsite.


o {KeyWord:Free Marketing Research}Lousy Marketing Ideas.Don't Come to our Site.www.*****.com


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o {KeyWord:Bulldog Info & Resources}Vaguely useful pet siteAffiliate links and pictureswww.*****.com

y Ad #4 This was well-written body copy with a poorly written ad title (and nokeyword insertion).


o Make Money OnlineWeb Marketing Techniques & ResearchPPC, SEO, EBay Marketplace & More.www.*****.com

o Dog SiteFamily website devoted to Bulldogs.Photos, Info, Resources & Communitywww.*****.com

y Ad #5 This was well-written body copy and an "over-the-top" title.Here were the ads we used:

o Lousy Marketing IdeasWeb Marketing Techniques & ResearchPPC, SEO, EBay Marketplace & More.www.*****.com

o Useless Pet SiteFamily website devoted to Bulldogs.Photos, Info, Resources & Communitywww.*****.com

Interestingly, the kind of "reverse psychology" Internet marketing ad we described as"over-the-top" actually outperformed all the other ads for that site. In general, online

marketers are used to being sold to, and in this case the ad copy was meant to do theopposite. So this ad performing well, although not predicted prior to the campaign, was

also not completely unexpected.

The impact on CTR with a poorly written body copy was slight, but the effect of poorlywritten title copy was quite significant, which leads us to the conclusion that most

potential customers focus on the title rather than on the body or on the ad copy as awhole.

For Test Site A above, ads with a good title (ads 1-3) performed 53.6% better than thosewith a poorly written title (ads 4-5).

For Test Site B, ads with a good title (ads 1-3) performed 48.5% better than those with a

poorly written title (ads 4-5).

KEY POINT: The most important factor of your PPC ads is the headline or title. Morethan any other part of the ad, the title can impact the CTR of your ads.


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It is impossible to infer a concrete plan of action for the best possible PPC ad copybased on two micro-tests. Ideally, you will implement your own testing and discover theoptimal ad copy for your own unique offer. In the following section, we offer the mosteffective techniques we have learned from several years of PPC ad copy testing.

2.

What are the most important practices to keep inmind when optimizing your PPC ad copy? (16

Techniques)

1. The most important element of your PPC ad copy is the heading or title. Themore potential customers identify with your heading, the more likely they will

be to click your ad. The number of characters allowed in your heading is quitelimited, so optimizing the best possible combination of words is of utmostimportance.

2. Using relevant keywords in the ad title usually work very well. This techniquecaptures the attention of users by putting their search terms in the most

prominent position in the ad.

To match your title keywords to search terms, you will have to set up individualad groups for important search terms. On Google AdWords, you can useautomatic keyword insertion, which will save a tremendous amount of timewhen setting up campaigns spread over numerous keywords. For example, ifyou have 1500 keywords and want to put all of them into a single ad group, youcan set up your account to automatically insert the search terms into your title(as long as they don't exceed character limitations).

3. If your prices are the lowest or close to the lowest in your industry, placingproduct prices in the ad title can boost CTR and skyrocket conversions.

4. "Free" add-on offers work well in the ad title. For example, if you offer freeshipping, free bonus software, or a free 30-day trial, try mentioning that in the adtitle and the primary offer in the body.

5. Make sure the "display URL" is the shortest possible URL. Display URLs arebasically free brand exposure for your domain name. Even when no one clicksyour ads, you are still receiving exposure. If your site domain iswww.MarketingExperiments.com, do not usehttp://www.marketingexperiments.com/adcopy_article/ as the display URL.Make it as simple, uncomplicated, and memorable as possible.

6. It is best to display URLs with the "www" in front of them rather than simplymarketingexperiments.com. Although it might not be necessary to use the"www" to reach your site, it lets customers clearly know that they are seeing awebsite URL. It thus becomes more likely that they will remember your site.

7. Google will let you use some capitalization in the displayed URL. So usingwww.MarketingExperiments.com instead of www.marketingexperiments.commay make your URL more memorable.

8. When possible, try to quantify your ads. If you have the most or greatest varietyof products in your niche and you believe that gives you a competitiveadvantage, use that in the ad. If the price of your service is relatively low

compared to alternatives, advertising the price in the ad copy or even in the ad


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title can be quite effective.9. Avoid using hype in your ads. This is especially true for those products and

services whose potential customers may be inherently skeptical. For more on anhonest approach to writing copy, review the article Transparent Marketing.

10.Create a sense of urgency in your ads if it can be done without hype. Rather thanusing words like "amazing" or "unbelievable," try "limited-time offer" or

"available for overnight shipping."11.Use clear, precise sentences, not just keywords.12.When space is available, always add a credibility indicator. Examples of these

include: 30-day money-back guarantee, 5-star rated merchant, etc.

13.Be aware that CTR is not the only important factor in a highly effective PPC ad.Conversion rate is also very important. The temptation on PPC engines is to use

highly specific ad copy to pre-qualify your clicks. This may allow you to pay forless clicks while achieving a higher conversion rate.

However, Google has minimum CTRs that must be maintained for your ads toremain active. The minimum CTR varies by keyword. In addition, a high CTRwill also positively influence your ad placement in Google, so sacrificing CTRto increase conversion, while it could save you money, is often quite risky.

14.Create a unique approach that focuses on the opposite or reverse of what yourcompetitors are advertising. As we saw in Test Site A above, a reverse-

psychology approach can often outperform the expected approach for some adtypes.

15.KEY POINT: You cannot write PPC ads in a vacuum. Testing is essential.Furthermore, you must pay attention to what your competitors are doing in thePPC engines. Study your competition's ad copy to determine how your ownmarketing voice can be distinctive from that of your competitors.

16.Review our previous PPC-related reports, listed in the "notes" below.These sixteen techniques should help you develop the best possible ad copy for avariety of PPC campaigns. But again, nothing should replace ongoing testing as your

primary means of optimizing your copy.


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Landing Pages Tested

Thursday, 15 July 2004

Topic: Landing Pages How Optimizing Our Test Site's Landing Page IncreasedSales Revenue by 31.5%

We recently released the recording of our landing pages clinic. You can listen to arecording of this clinic here:

Windows Media Audio:

http://meclabs.com/cgi-bin/pl/pl.cgi?clw

RealMedia:

http://meclabs.com/cgi-bin/pl/pl.cgi?clr

The online notes for the landing pages clinic are available here:

http://mecgroups.com/mec_research_log/archives/001501.html

What are landing pages and why are they important? Is it possible that these pages mayeven be more important that your home page? Are you spending too much timeoptimizing the wrong pages on your site? What are the important elements of your

pages?

How did our test site improve its total site conversion and increase revenue by 31.5%just by optimizing its primary landing page? What did we learn from simplifying theirsite design, placing strategic credibility indicators, and clarifying their value

proposition? How can you apply this information to your site?

This report will answer those questions and will provide eight key points to help youoptimize your website's landing pages.

::Top Of Page::


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WHAT ARE LANDING PAGES?

Many companies fail to recognize that their "homepage" is not necessarily the first oreven the most visited page on their website. A "landing page" is the first page acustomer lands on when they click through to your website. Your "primary landing

page" is the landing page that gets the most incoming traffic.

For most companies (especially retailers), the "product" page is most often the primarylanding page. For publishers, it is often the pages with the best content. Service

providers with a limited offering usually use their homepage as their primary landingpage.

The best way to know for sure is to take a look at your website statistics. By identifying

the pages with the most unique visits, or by identifying the most popular "entry pages"to your site, you can pinpoint where you should focus your page-optimization efforts.

HOW MUCH OF AN IMPACT CAN

OPTIMIZATION HAVE?

Our test site is an Internet Technology reseller. It features an excellent offeringincluding the following selling points:

1. Free ground shipping with no minimum purchase2. Products guaranteed to be compatible with your computer3. A lifetime warranty

In this case, the site's primary landing page is its homepage. Some of the additionalelements of the homepage included:

1. Product categories in sections with heavily weighted headings2. Testimonials3. Headline text focusing on their shipping offers4. Third-party credibility indicators from the Better Business Bureau, Bizrate,

Verisign, etc.

The site already had a superb total site conversion of 3.6%. By looking at the websitemetrics, we were able to identify that more than half of the site's visitors go down thesame path, which is the highest converting path on the website. So our optimizationefforts were focused on sending more visitors down this specific path.

In May of 2004, we optimized the primary landing page of this site and achieved thefollowing results:


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Test Site A - PPC and Natural Search Traffic May 2004

Original Page Optimized Page

Unique Visits 2,176 2,223

Orders 73 96

Path Conversion Rate 3.35% 4.32%Average Order $75 $75

Total Revenue $5475 $7200

What You Need To UNDERSTAND: By optimizing the landing page for thistest site, we were able to raise the conversion ratio by 31.5% (an increase from 3.35% to4.32%). The average order price for this site is $75, so our optimization effortsrepresented an increase in revenue of $1725 (31.5%) in the test period alone.

These are some of the specific changes we implemented:

1. We changed the category navigation to use text links instead of images, whichwe thought distracted visitors from the primary offer.

2. We moved the category navigation from the left column of the site to the rightso that it was NOT in a visitor's natural eye path. Again, we did not want thenavigation to distract from the primary offer.

3. We repositioned the testimonials to a more prominent location on the page.4. We positioned one of the third-party credibility indicators adjacent to the

"action" button of the primary offer path.5. We changed the headline text to focus on the "Compatibility Guarantee".6. We made the FREE SHIPPING offer the primary selling point in the header of

the page, so that it would not be missed by any visitor to the site.

7. We added spacing to let the page breathe, and we removed any information thatdid not contribute to referring visitors to the primary sales path of the site. (Thisreduced the length of the page significantly.)

8. We used shape and color to differentiate the primary offer. We used ahighlighted box that included bullet points, a credibility indicator, and a

prominent button they needed to click to take the next step in the primary path.

WHAT EIGHT KEY POINTS SHOULD YOU KEEP

IN MIND WHEN OPTIMIZING YOUR LANDING

PAGES?

1. Are you sending people to the right landing pages? If you are using any paidadvertising (such as PPC engines) where you can choose the landing pages ofyour campaigns, it is essential that the visitor is directed to the most specific

page related to the keyword or product they clicked on. In the majority of cases,this is NOT your homepage unless you have very few products or a smallservice offering.

For example, if someone searches Google for "Canon digital camcorder", you


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have a much better chance of closing a sale if you send them directly to a pagefeaturing Canon digital camcorders (complete with pictures, products specs,

price, and so on) than if you were to send them to the homepage of your cameraretail site.

2. Make an effort to understand your traffic. Define the major sources of incomingtraffic to your site (and be as specific as possible). Within each major source oftraffic, define the most popular click you are receiving and which page they arelanding on. From the click-through information identify the main reason theyclicked through to your page:

1. Did you have the lowest price?2. The best company rating?3. The largest selection?4. A special promotion or offering?5. The highest ranking on a search engine?6. A specific keyword from a pay-per-click campaign?

3. Using the information developed in point 2, design your landing pagesspecifically for the reason they clicked through.

For example, if you had the lowest price make sure you include headline textsuch as "The lowest price on Dealtime.com".

If you have the highest company rating, use text like "The highest rated

company on PriceGrabber" (and include your actual rating).

If they clicked because of a special promotion or 10% discount, use a headlinethat applies the discount to the product they clicked.

4. You must use an effective "hook" to keep the shopper on your site. You haveonly 5 seconds to grab his or her attention, so don't waste valuable page space onirrelevant information.

Besides click-specific information (point 3), you should also emphasize yourcompany's value proposition. Focus on elements such as these:

1. Product guarantees or money back guarantees2. Free or discounted shipping3. Quantity purchases or bulk discounts4. Same-day or next-day shipping5. Special offer or sale information6. Exceptional customer service or satisfaction guarantees

5. Utilize third-party credibility indicators. Third-party credibility indicators areone of the most effective ways to communicate that you have a reputablecompany (no fraud), that customers' privacy and personal information are safe,and that other customers have had a positive experience shopping with you.

Some examples of credibility indicators would be:

1. Comparison engine ratings (Yahoo!, PriceGrabber, DealTime, etc.)2. Ratings from sites such as BBBOnline, Bizrate, etc.


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3. Site security and protection indicators (Verisign, Trust-e, Thawte, SSLCertification, Hackersafe)

4. Testimonials from your existing customers6. Utilize effective sales copy that devoid of hype. Focus on implying integrity and

accuracy. Review our article "Transparent Marketing" for information on how toearn the trust of skeptical online shoppers:

http://meclabs.com/cgi-bin/pl/pl.cgi?mtm7. Do not overwhelm the visitor with too much information on the page.

Strategically placed bold, colored, highlighted, italicized, or enlarged fonts canhelp to organize content for the reader. Beware of using long paragraphs on the

Internet. Use bullets, headers, and white space. Allow the page to breathe.

Review our reports on website design, listed in the notes below.

8. KEY POINT: Utilize an A-B split test. This will show every other visitor adifferent page, which will ensure that you get the most reliable numbers intesting your page optimization efforts. Without this, other factors such as time,

source of traffic, etc. can affect the outcome of your tests.

In our literature review, below, we list several pieces of software that will helpyou implement an A-B split test on your site.

By optimizing your website's landing pages, and by sending your visitors to the RIGHTlanding pages, you can have a significant impact on your site's revenue. Our test site,which was already very well designed, was able to increase its revenue by 31.5% fromour efforts. We believe that for many sites, the potential is even greater.


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A/B Split Testing

Tuesday, 16 August 2005

Topic: A/B Split Testing How to use A/B Split Testing to Increase Conversion

Rates, Challenge Assumptions and Solve Problems

We recently released the audio recording of our clinic on this topic. You can listen to arecording of this clinic here:

A/B Split Testing

Most of us are familiar with the concept of using A/B split testing to determine whichelements on a page are helping the performance of a web page, and which are not.

For instance, one might typically test two different headlines on a landing page. Onewould then outperform the other, and you would know which is the top-performing

page.

However, there is more you can do with A/B Split testing.

1. You can use A/B split testing to better understand visitor behaviors and priorities whenvisiting your site.

2. You can use A/B split testing to solve specific problems you have with your site pages.In other words, use it as a diagnostic tool to find out what is going wrong and how to

fix it.

3. You can use A/B split testing to dramatically challenge assumptions you may haveabout the "best" way to design or write a page. (Test not only changes in minor

elements, but also complete and dramatic redesigns of an entire page.)

This brings up another important point. Testing yields the most valuable results onlywhen you test repeatedly. A one-shot test will tell you very little. But when you make aconsistent habit of testing, cumulative tests over time can have a dramatic impact on thesuccess of your site.

Our own test results, outlined in this brief, reveal just how much can be achieved andlearned though a "simple" A/B split test.


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Let's look at three tests and their results, each showing how we can not only improve

results, but also learn more about what works, what doesn't... and what readers arelooking for.

TEST 1: Testing the Impact of Current Events of Email Response Rates.

We set up a simple test with two emails, both of which were written to drive click-throughs to a site and convert leads into sales.

y In email A we wrote the sales text within the context of an emotionally charged newsstory that was making headlines at the time.

y In email B we wrote the email without specific mention of the event, but still alludedto "recent events in the news."

y The essential difference between the two emails is that one mentioned the event byname, and the other didn't.

y We tested our messaging to more than opt-in 337,466 email addresses.y We compiled the results after 12 days, although some clicks continue to trickle in.

Here are the results of the test after the first 12 days:

Email Copy Test Results

Email A Email B

Emails Sent 168,733 168,733

Clicks 5,119 4,395

Click-Through Rate (CTR) 3.03% 2.60%

Sales 175 122

Conversion (Click to Sale) 3.42% 2.78%

Conversion (Email to Sale) 0.104% 0.072

What You Need To UNDERSTAND: Email A (specifically mentioning thenews story and events surrounding it) significantly outperformed Email B. CTR


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increased by 16.5% and overall conversion (email to sale) increased by 43.4%.

The email that disclosed the specifics of this news piece generated 53 more orders (anincrease of 43.4%) than the email that only alluded to the events surrounding the storywithout mentioning specifics.

TEST 2: Testing a Specific Problem

In our second test, we believed that customers visiting our test site with an 800x600 or1024x768 resolution monitor were not finding the relevant sales language for the

primary site product unless they scrolled down that page.

We set up an A/B/C split to test this hypothesis:

y Page A was the original page.y Page B featured slightly shortened data and used a "click here" anchor text to take

visitors down the page. This page showed the order process on a 1024x768 resolution

monitor and on an 800x600 resolution monitor it displayed the offer copy for the

primary product.

y Page C was a radical redesign in which the order process was partially viewable on800x600 and higher. It used two columns to make more information available "above

the fold."

Here are the results of our testing:

A/B/C Split Test

Page A Page B Page C

Percent of Traffic 34% 33% 33%

New Sales 244 282 114

Change N/A 15.57% - 53.28%

What You Need To UNDERSTAND: Page B outperformed the original page by15.57%. Page C was a dismal failure.

Screen shots of the pages above are available below:

y Page Ay Page By Page C

In a recent web clinic, we surveyed our audience as to which of these pages wouldperform the best. They overwhelmingly chose Page C, showing that what seems


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"intuitive" to most marketers is not always revealed as the best page after testing.

The survey results and clinic notes are available here.

In this test, our hypothesis about important sales language appearing higher on the pageproved correct. However, the two-column approach of Page C was ineffective.

TEST 3: Challenging Assumptions by Testing the "Obvious" and Learning from theResults

In this test we created two versions of a simple sales page online. Each page wasapproximately two screens in length and asked the reader to complete a short form inorder to receive a free informational product.

y In version A we added some personal elements to the page, including a photoof thewriter, a personal introduction and a signature. In other words, we created a personal

"sales letter" on the web page.

y In version B the sales copy was largely the same, but without the personal elements:no photo, no salutation, and no signature.

Which version won? Conventional wisdom online suggested to us that the personalversion would be the winner. Here are the results of our testing:

A/B Split Test

Version A (Personalized) Version B (Institutional)

Conversion Rate 34.6% 39.9%

What You Need To UNDERSTAND: Version B outperformed Version A by15.3%.

In this case, our expectation that the personalized copy would perform better wassimply not met.

There are two points to consider here:

First, if we had never tested these pages, we would have left money on the table by

assuming the personal version would do better.

Second, this was only one test. What if we had taken the personal version and doubledthe length of the copy as well, adding more of an individual sales pitch? What if we hadchanged the photo in some way, or repositioned it on the page?

KEY POINT: Each test provides answers. But each test should also stimulate further


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thought and additional rounds of testing to learn more.

A/B Split Testing Protocol:

Whether you have conducted any A/B split testing before or not, the following stepsmay help you formalize a regular testing program, and help you improve your results.

Test Protocol for A/B Split Testing for Landing Pages:

1. Develop Your Capabilities and Select the Right ToolsA/B split testing tools vary from simple CGI scripts to sophisticated softwareapplications. You will find a list of services in the Literature Review at the endof this report.

Even without sophisticated A/B testing capability, sequential testing offers youan opportunity to learn many insights about your pages. For more on sequentialtesting, see the Concluding Comments, below.

2. Identify Your Established Control PageYour control page will be the page against which you test all subsequentoptimization efforts. If you are just getting started with A/B testing, your control

page will be your current landing page before any optimization. When a newpage performs better than the existing control page, it then becomes your controlpage in subsequent testing.

3. Establish Your Testing Goals and Parameters

What are you trying to accomplish with A/B split testing? Are you after moresubscribers, a higher conversion rate, or a greater return on investment on yourPPC campaigns? Your goals will determine your testing parameters, which willdetermine the potential success of your testing efforts.

4. Determine Your Sufficient Test IntervalThis time period should allow you enough time to gather sufficient data to gaugereal insight about your A/B tests. Identify the number of unique visitors and/orconversions needed to establish good data and then determine how long it willtake you to generate this traffic. This number will vary from business to

business, but should give you enough data to confidently declare a "winner."

5. Create 1-3 Radical RedesignsKEY POINT: These pages are not subtle optimizations changing only one ortwo elements on the page, but are wholly different pages representing a radicallydifferent approach.

6. Evaluate These Redesigns in A/B Split Tests


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Test these alternate landing pages against the control page. Ideally, each pagewill be tested against every other page, but if that is impractical, test two pagesat a time and keep the best as your control for subsequent testing.

7. Based on Results, Determine Your True Control PageThe radical redesign method will be more likely to generate a quantum leap inimproved conversion rate than optimizing a mediocre page with little potential.

Once you have identified the best general approach, you are now ready tooptimize individual elements on the page.

8. Optimize with Traditional Variable-Specific A/B Testing Variables to test:Headline

Call to ActionPage CopyGraphicsColorConfiguration of Page ElementsEtc.

Concluding Comments:

There are a few important points to remember about A/B split testing:

1. Even if you can't set up a true A/B split test (where two versions of a page are beingdisplayed one after another to alternate visitors to your site), it is very easy to create a

sequential A/B split test.

KEY POINT: A sequential test is when you show one version of a page for acertain period, like two days or a week, and then show another version for thefollowing two days or a week. The results may be a little less reliable, but canstill yield valuable information and trends.

2. Testing gives you the opportunity to maximize conversion rates, solve problems, andchallenge assumptions. And keep in mind that you have opportunities beyond testing

small changes to a page.

You can also challenge an existing page by designing and writing a radicallydifferent version, where almost everything is different. In fact, it is through thesedramatically changed approaches that you are most likely to achieve

breakthrough improvements.

3. Testing provides companies with an invaluable means to demonstrate to companyheads and management the hard figures behind any suggested changes or

improvements.

Persuading management on the basis of subjective expertise alone is a toughroad to follow. But if you have hard test results on your side, the persuasion


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process becomes much easier.

4. Use of consistent testing will increase the knowledge base of your web group orcompany significantly. You will learn more, and soon be able to determine a set of

optimized practices that work best for your particular business.

The absence of rigorous testing leaves you in the dark, depending on guessworkalone when creating your pages.

5. Establish a testing protocol for your web sites and emails. In the section above wehave outlined a protocol to get you started. In addition, the following document will

provide a template for A/B testing that will help guide the experimentation process.

ABTestingTemplate.doc

If you have suggestions for topics you think we should study, please let us know.

As we glean practical, accurate data, we will share the results. We promise to do our

best to help you discover what really works.

3. What are the best techniques to optimize your

PPC campaigns? (26 proven techniques)

Our search analyst Aaron Rosenthal helped in compiling this list of techniques toincrease the profitability of your PPC campaigns.

1. Focus on the most relevant keywords. These terms will simply convert betterthan words or phrases that are not as appropriate for your offer.

2. If a desired keyword is too expensive, try to break that keyword down and goafter words that are more specific. Identify words that may not receive as muchtraffic but can be purchased for less money.

Do not be afraid to go after very specialized terms. The most specialized terms,

while they may only see minimal traffic, have the capability and the likelihoodof converting impressions to clicks and eventually sales much more easily.

3. Think BROAD instead of (or in addition to) thinking DEEP. Rather thanfocusing on getting the number-one position for a few keywords, purchase as

many (relevant) keywords as possible. 200 terms at $0.10 per click will usuallyperform much better than 15 terms at $0.50 per click.


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Overture, Google, and Teoma will help you identify more relevant keywordswith their keyword suggestion tools:

http://inventory.overture.com/d/searchinventory/suggestion/

https://adwords.google.com/select/main?cmd=KeywordSandbox

http://teoma.com/

4. Utilize a free email newsletter or a similar opt-in email strategy. If your PPCvisitors don't purchase from you on their initial visit, but do sign up for yournewsletter, you will have future opportunities to convert them to payingcustomers (without having to pay to reach them again via the PPC engines).

Forrester Research, in a recent survey (The State of Retailing Online 6.0), stillidentifies "Email to house list" as the most effective marketing medium online.This is despite the negative impact that unsolicited commercial email (UCE orspam) has had on email marketing.

5. Create customized landing pages for specific keyword bids. Review our reporton landing pages here:http://meclabs.com/cgi-bin/pl/pl.cgi?mlp

6. Focus on developing clear, effective ad copy. Test a variety of approaches tocopy and then revise your campaigns to feature the most effective ads.

While a higher click-through rate is the clearest indicator of effective copy (andwill help your rankings on Google AdWords), don't ignore how individual adsCONVERT once traffic reaches your site. Don't set up unrealistic expectationsin your ad copy.

7. Focus on your unique value proposition. For example, if your price is lower thanyour competitors, experiment with PPC ads that contain actual pricinginformation.

8. Avoid hype-laden PPC ads. Hype will deter many skeptical shoppers from doingbusiness with you. It may even encourage the wrong kinds of visitors to click-through to your site, thus incurring more click fees without creating additionalrevenue.

For more on creating marketing copy for skeptical consumers, see our report onTransparent Marketing:

http://meclabs.com/cgi-bin/pl/pl.cgi?mtm

9. Create a sense of urgency with your ads. This can be done without resorting tohype. Phrases like "limited supply" or "reserve yours today" can be effective.

10.On Google AdWords, utilize negative keywords, smart display URLs, and geo-targeting (where appropriate). For more on optimizing your site for GoogleAdWords, see our recent report on that topic:http://meclabs.com/cgi-bin/pl/pl.cgi?mg2


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11.Narrow down "Broad" traffic to "Phrase" or "Exact Match" terms. We havefound that using exact or phrase match searches can be at least as effective as

broad search terms, if not more so.12.Review our 4000+ word report on Overture:

http://meclabs.com/cgi-bin/pl/pl.cgi?mov13.Utilize Google AdWords and Overture, but don't overlook smaller PPC engines

as well, which will often allow you to bid less (due to less competition) andachieve a higher ROI. For more on this topic, see our report on Smaller PPCEngines:http://meclabs.com/cgi-bin/pl/pl.cgi?msp

14.Comparison search engines should also not be overlooked. In previousexperiments, we have found comparison search engines to be some of the most

profitable sources of PPC traffic. Review our report on comparison searchengines here:http://meclabs.com/cgi-bin/pl/pl.cgi?mcs

In addition, our search analyst Jeremy Brookins offers his succinct list of Dos andDon'ts:

15.Don't play bidding wars unless you have very deep pockets.16.Don't rely solely on broad keywords; they're expensive.17.Don't rely solely on very specific keywords; they don't bring much traffic and

limit exposure.18.Don't launch when you can't monitor. If you spend $400 in 5 minutes, you're

probably not doing something right.19.Don't over-commit. Everything should start as a test.20.Do wait long enough to get sufficient data before pulling the plug on a

campaign.21.Do be patient and realistic. All things (including PPC campaign optimization)

take time to figure out. Rome wasn't built in a day.22.Do your homework. Know what your competition is up to and what snags this

might create for you.23.Do use liberal amounts of negative keywords.24.Do be careful with those negative keywords. You don't want to cut out relevant

traffic accidentally.25.Do keep your campaigns easy to navigate and analyze. Poor organization can

make accurate review extremely difficult, if not impossible.26.Do your keyword research. You never know what small word or phrase may

turn into a goldmine of high-converting traffic.

Documents

90 Days PPC Plan