Last Updated on February 14, 2017 by Carlos Alonso
There is a saying that if you aren’t growing your dying.
Growing sales is an art and a science. The art is the communication and the sales and marketing copy. This is the persuasion piece.
The science is the technology needed to discover the data for optimising the conversion paths in the journey from attention to sale. The rise of artificial intelligence and marketing automation provides scale and insights that we as poor mortal humans struggle to discover in the avalanche of data.
Some of the tactics needed to be applied in today’s social web are a world away from the old proven methods of door knocking salesman and cold calling. But the core motivations to human behaviour remain the same………Avoiding pain and running towards pleasure.
The change? Technology now sits at the centre.
But it’s not that different
The old school direct mail marketing world’s ongoing challenge was always optimisation and testing. Making many small mistakes revealed what were the best tactics to get someone to open that envelope.
Did you personalise or write compelling headline offer on the front. What color should it be? White or Yellow?
Does that sound familiar?
Email open rates, click throughs and high converting lead magnets are just digital versions of old school advertising copywriting measurement metrics.
The more things change, the more things stay the same. The message hasn’t changed just the medium.
Fail fast and often
The fast moving digital world almost taunts us to fail fast and often. Because sometimes the cost is just time. Make a small typo in the blog post and it can be edited out in seconds.
But I am not talking about aiming to make mistakes but be willing to commit to spending some of your resources on trialling and testing new tactics.
- We trialled one Flipboard magazine content tactic and on some days its organic traffic generation kicks sand in Facebook’s face.
- We also republished some of our best content on Medium as a trial and attracted a following of over 60,000 readers.
You won’t find that in your average marketing 101 course handbook.
Trial and error and testing can reveal new sources of traffic and improved lead generation because you moved out of your comfort zone.
Focus is key
The temptation is to run off in many directions. The mobile social web is a constant distraction and .
Three areas to focus on include:
- Multi-channel traffic tactics to ensure you aren’t at too much risk from one change in one channel.
- Creating compelling content and monitoring sharing, engagement
- Measuring, testing and improving your conversion rates in your entire sales funnel from engagement to sale.
Let’s have a look at some tactics and growth hacks that help you with achieving those.
#1. Create an online quiz
Many of us have seen the Buzzfeed’s quizzes. They look like simple fun and maybe seen as superficial.
They include these classics.
- Why Are You Single?
- Which U.S. President Are You? (This one is a bit topical at the moment!)
But one of their most popular with over 21 million views is “What Career Should You Actually Have? The reality is that the questio is so compelling that it drives a ton of traffic and engagement.
But there is a serious growth tactic that sits behind that simple tactic. They are great for building your email list and that is a growth tactic worth investing in.
You can custom build them yourself or you can use a platform that makes it easy. One of those is a simple to build templates from Interact and is used by people such Toni Robbins, Cindy Joseph and brands such as Forbes and NBC.
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So check out the Interact quiz building platform and start growing your email fast today. It is a much faster and cost effective way to implement a quiz rather than spending $10,000 on a custom build and take months of work.
It will also help you identify the top tactics and proven templates to grow your email list faster.
#2. Improve sales conversions with a better payment cart page
Increasing revenue online is not just about more traffic. Attention is vital but it’s what you do with that traffic is key.
The journey becomes one of constant optimisation. It’s simple steps like fine-tuning your lead magnet to convert at 3% instead of 2%. That alone can increase revenue by 50%.
SamCart is a tool that you can use to improve your sales funnel and one of its big features is it can improve your checkout page conversion rate by replacing the less than optimal PayPal page with one that converts better.
Here is a typical PayPal checkout page.
Here is a sample of the SamCart page that I created. It includes a guarantee, social proof and even testimonials.
The stats are currently showing around a 50% optimisation improvement. That means 50% more revenue.
The secret to many successful digital entrepreneurs is that they are always optimising every step of the buying journey.
Find more information on Smartcart Here
#3. Grow your traffic by getting more Twitter followers
The question that is often now asked “Is Twitter still worth using?”. The simple answer is “Yes”. The more complex side of that is “how”
Growing your traffic with a bigger email list, building a larger social media following on social and driving more page views with search engines is something that all smart growth marketers commit resources to.
Social Quant is one tool that is adding 10,000 followers a month to my Twitter account. It also helps to increase engagement, boost brand awareness and grow your industry influence.
If there is one key strategy that has been behind my success online then growing and using Twitter well has been key.
Find out more Here
#4. Scaling your efforts with automated webinars
Time is one thing we can’t buy, beg for more of or even steal. So we have to get smart and scale your time and resources. Marketing automation is one of those highly leveraged tactics.
I was watching an automated and pre-recorded webinar a couple of years ago by Russell Brunson who is the author behind “Dotcom Secrets: The Underground Playbook for Growing Your Company onLine”. I was looking to learn more on how to create and optimise my sales funnels. The secret behind effective sales webinars is that they educate first and sell second. The result. I bought an online course for $1,000. The revelation to me me was how effective an automated webinar could be.
That tactic didn’t stop it being a great educational resource and sales tool. Easy Webinar is one of those apps that can help you do that.
It is used by some big names in the online world and these include. Amy Porterfield, John Lee Dumas and Chris Farrell.
Marketing at scale is vital if you want to grow your business.
#5. Pop ups that convert
Getting attention is becoming harder. So using pop-ups that have a compelling offer is almost a requirement for most savvy digital entrepreneurs. This can double your current email list and can covert more than 3% of all your visitors into email subscribers.
One of the best apps to do this is that I have come across is SumoMe.
Their default designs are a great place to start. But you can create your own by using their large range of templates. The stats show that the welcome mat is one of the highest converting list building tactics you can use.
Sumome data shows that it can triple your conversion rate with its full-screen call to action.
Welcome Mat displays a full-screen call to action that shows when visitors land on your site. It encourages your visitors to join your email list and check out your latest and popular blog post!
Popular features include:
- Ability to customize the background, add gifs, videos and completely change the colors
- Mobile and web optimized
- Automatically loads when visitors arrive on your site
- Ability to use display rules to control where your popup shows
- Easy newsletter integration with Mailchimp, Aweber, Constant Contact, Campaign Monitor, GetResponses, Infusionsoft, Mad Mimi, Vero and many more!
Want to be a little less intrusive or even add to the popup then a “smart bar” will not get you the same conversion rate for clicks but it is a nice way to further optimise your list building tactics.
Smart Bar
If you go the top of my blog you will see the “Smart bar” that links to SumoMe and you can start setting it up today. You can also use it on your website to start building your email list.
Over to you
In a fast moving digital marketing landscape the effectiveness of your marketing tactics, the reach of social networks and platform algorithms can change overnight. This means a healthy sense of paranoia needs to be embraced. So looking for new ways to grow your business should be considered in your plans.
Constant innovation, adapting and testing new tactics should be part of your entrepreneurs mindset.
How are you adapting?
Source: New feed
