The #1 Way For An Affiliate To Increase Conversions

Increasing conversion rates is a science. Achieving it requires knowledge, and testing. It often seems complicated, but for me, regardless of who you are, what your niche is, what you sell, or how much traffic you get, it all starts with this one idea…

MEETING YOUR VISITORS EXPECTATIONS.

A visitor first comes into contact with you via an ad. Whether that’s your page’s description ranking for a search term, or some paid ad, this is how your relationship with that person starts.

Right at that moment, an expectation is set. They read what your “ad” says, and they get some idea in their heads about who you are and what you’re going to give them.

Then they get to your site.

How well your site meets the expectation you set them determines how deeply they’ll engage with your content.

They read your content and if it’s what they were looking for, they see your affiliate link. They’re considering the product you promote.

When they look at your affiliate link, another expectation is set.

They’ve listened to what you said about the product and there’s a set of things they’re expecting to see when they reach the sales page for that product.

How well the sales page meets the expectation you set in your presell determines how likely they’ll be to buy the product.

These two meetings of expectation are what conversions rest on.

You therefore have two bits of analysis to do, if you want to increase affiliate sales on your site that’s getting SEO traffic.

1. “DOES MY TITLE TAG & META DESCRIPTION ACCURATELY REFLECT MY CONTENT”?

There’s plenty of talk about mentioning your keyword here. Or about being seductive and appealing so as to generate the click.

But neither of those will improve sales if you’ve set an expectation with your title tag and meta description that isn’t met in your actual page content.

Here’s an example.

The wonderful, and rather wise Priscilla Schoeman wrote a review of the Rankings Institute last year. It ranks for the keyword “Rankings Institute review”.

Here’s what it looks like to a searcher:

So the expectation is set.

I click this link thinking “I’m going to see whether RI is worth the investment… maybe she’ll tell me something no one else can, and maybe there’ll even be some special deal”.

Then here’s what I see when I get to the page:

Now this is by no means bad.

She’s established that this page is definitely about the Rankings Institute… like I expected when clicking.

She even shows the Logo of RI, to prove it’s definitely THAT RI we’re talking about. (This is quite important in many niches, when there are a lot of different products that are quite similar, perhaps even for the same brand).

But there are some bits that she doesn’t do straight away, which would certainly help those expectations be better met. Namely:

1. It’s not going to hurt to state right there at the top that this is a review, and from the perspective of someone in the course. Remember the expectation was set of “inside info”. I’d want to tell people straight away that what was promised, is exactly what they’ll get.

2. She didn’t say anything about the “investment” in this early paragraph.

Most of us have heard the phrase “tell them what you’re going to tell them” and this is key at this point, because expectations will be met if  tell them that what you said you’d tell them… you’ll definitely be telling them…

In other words, you need to assure them that this page is definitely going to have what you promised them. And assure them IMMEDIATELY.

Reading that first paragraph they have no trust in you. They’re still considering hitting the “back” button and choosing another site.

But that thinking stops if they instantly see that they’re going to get what you promised them.

To me, Priscilla’s review is more engaging (and will have more people reading on) if it says in that first paragraph:

 “I’ve made the investment in the Rankings Institute program and this review attempts to help others decide whether the same investment will pay dividends for them”.

Boom. Exactly what they thought they’d find at this page. They can feel confident to keep reading.

When you’re doing this analysis, you go through your own content in that same way, continually asking “Are readers clearly getting what I promised them here?”

2. “DOES MY REVIEW, (AND MY CALL TO ACTION IN PARTICULAR) ACCURATELY REFLECT MY PRODUCT SALES PAGE”?

It’s great to get people excited about the product you’re promoting. You want to tell them why the product is great and why people like it.

But if you aren’t also accurately reflecting what they’ll see when they click your affiliate link, it won’t be effective.

Here’s an example from a different site. This is a review of a GPS watch.

Here’s what I see on the review…

And here’s what I see when I click that – rather small – link to Amazon underneath the watch.

Let’s play spot the difference.

For one, the price is different. I was expecting $177 and I got $183. 

Maybe I won’t care about the $6 difference but there’s no reason for an affiliate to risk it. Probably this review just hasn’t been updated but this is definitely the kind of thing you need to watch out for.

For two, the image of the watch is slightly different. A different face is showing. This is negligible but in other cases it can be more significant. What they see on the merchant page has to be exactly what they saw on your page.

The point is, your prospect is close to making a purchase here. You don’t want to give them a reason to even blink, let alone wonder whether your review was definitely accurate.

That was an easy one, but common issues are things like:

- You promote a product that comes in 3 colors. Your affiliate site shows an image of the product in one color, and the first image visible at the sales page is the other color. It looks like a different product and people might be put off.

- You tell people there’s a special offer or some bonus currently available and they can’t see it mentioned on the sales page.

- You tell people about the 5 star reviews but when they get to Amazon there are a couple of 1 star reviews high up on the list, that you didn’t mention.

- Something you told people about the product is contradicted by something else on the sales page (can happen when a reviewer on Amazon contradicts something your review, and the manufacturer says)

And there are many more.

Making sure you’re meeting customer expectations at the content/call to action level is easy enough.

You just double check to make sure all the details are right, and that all the impressions you gave them about the product will be confirmed when they hit the sales page: No ambiguity, no confusion.

THAT’S THE BASIS OF HIGH CONVERSIONS

Everything else comes next. There’s no need to test different buttons, or colors, or adjust your pre-sell copy… or heck even abort a product review because it’s not converting… before you’ve taken the steps outlined here.

Go run the analysis on your sites and keep those affiliate sales coming.

http://andrewhansen.name/affiliate-marketing/the-1-way-for-an-affiliate-to-increase-conversions/

7 EMAIL OPT-IN TIPS THAT IMPROVE CONVERSIONS

Okay guys, here we go… I am sharing 7 tips that we use to improve conversion on landing pages and squeeze pages to get opt-ins and new leads. First, I want you to know that, from my experience, nobody will buy or opt-in for crap. Your offering needs to be good, good enough to make you opt-in. Keep this in mind as we continue. I believe your emails are the little pots of Gold that you have in the safe of your business, if they are segmented and fresh, even better. Really, your emails are much more valuable than you would think, and will be more so in the future. Many of these ideas below are not new. It’s just that many professionals don’t follow their own advice; so, I am hammering in these key techniques again.

There are many deciding factors when someone opts-in to something.  But, we can see that the following problems can be solved by putting a little bit of love into the mix. Our theory is that you can always improve campaigns and CTA’s with some A/B testing and better content development.

So, if you’ve got a good offer and well-qualified traffic, you will IMPROVE your existing opt-in rates from 30% to 60% by using these techniques below.

So, here they are:

1. Opt-in Form Copy Optimization

Write an amazing opt-in form text for your user.

Don’t discount the importance of accurate writing and great verbiage for your pages. The copy is easy to gloss over and say “Oh yeah, the copy is fine on our page”, because you are usually under the gun to quickly produce a page and sometimes a quantity of pages for various ads. But,  if you A/B test your landing pages, you will find performance differences with even the smallest copy changes to your landing and lead pages.

The headline should grab attention and tell people exactly what they get when they sign up for your emails. Example: “Get Your Free Content Marketing Toolkit” – The body should qualify people and nudge them to take action.

Example: “If you’re serious about content marketing, enter your email address below to receive the Content Marketing Toolkit.” –  The Call-to-Action should be simple and immediate. Example: “Get The Toolkit.”

Look at the pages your competitors use, review and dissect them with your marketing team.  Decide what works, why and how it applies to you, and how you are presenting the same product or service verbally. What is effective and what is not, how can you learn from this? It’s obvious.

2. The One Goal

Your landing page has one purpose: to attract email subscribers and lead them to the opt-in. Every element, whether design or copy, is meant to lead the visitor DIRECTLY to the opt-in box.

The landing page design is not the same as your website, so stop trying to complicate things. Eliminate the header, navigation, and any other element that has nothing to do with the opt-in. Period. Done.

Have as little as possible on the landing page and opt-in form, NO CLUTTER!

Display your opt-in box above the fold, so visitors can see it immediately when they land on your page. Also, the landing page should not distract from the main call to action. The main CTA should be the most prominent and the only goal, to get them to click on it.

Use whatever you can to build trust on the page so the opt-in is easy. Do you have testimonials that are great? Do you have letters from the happiest customers? Do you have reviews that would sway someone’s opinion, if they read it while staring at your lead page, waiting to press the giant button? Any way you can add social proof will increase your opt-in rate conversion too, so try to build confidence to focus on the one goal.

3. Make your Offer Match your Intention.

This is first because, to me, this is where the disconnect occurs and why your opt-in will not convert—this seems overlooked by many experts but should be part of the checklist to make sure it’s clear for the user.

So, ask for someone’s email because you are going to send them something… Period.

YOU DON’T NEED someone’s email address to play a video.

YOU DON’T NEED someone’s email address so they can download a document.

People can access things for free, without giving up their email all over the net, so if the user experience is such that the person has to stop and think, “Why is this person asking for my email?”, they will bounce.  This also clearly shows your intention, and that what you are really after, in a backhanded way, is their personal data so you can sell them something else. Not cool!

If it’s clear to the user that the only way they can get your content is via email, then it all makes sense that you need it for this one reason… Oh!, as well as to re-market to them later

If you have a 5 or 10-part series of something, or need to send emails to the user more than one time, this can also be a much clearer way to gain their email and for them to feel comfortable giving it.  Makes sense?

4. Don’t offer more, Offer Less.

So, many people offer FREE this and FREE that.  I guess, some marketers have the idea that giving away more free content to “build value” is an effective way to offer. I believe that too much free stuff adds to the information overload that will turn this user against you.

There is only so much that people can comprehend and implement at one time. Even though it seems like more work, to break your offering down into 5 emails of simple information may be more effective than a 15-page pdf that has 10-point types and requires hours of reading. People just don’t have the time these days, so design your content accordingly.

Even if you have the most amazing document on “How to” or “Tips for”, your potential customer may not be able to digest it like you think. If your customer can’t make it through what you offer, they will get little or no value, therefore you failed at helping them.

So, offer small pieces at a time and offer words of confidence and motivation to help get them through your offering. The less he or she has to do, or “thinks they have to do”, the more successful result they will have after utilizing your offering. Pretty simple, aye?

So, send your emails with content in small bites, and consider that the user may not even have the time to get through as much as you think. Be considerate and make it easier for them to gain value and better results with less pressure and more support.

You want to be sure that they will definitely use what you send and not go into the black hole of stuff they will only “get to later.”  It should be content or offerings that can be used and implemented so as to show results easily and quickly.

5. Limit submission fields to 1

Based on the pot of Gold theory, all you need is their email…that’s it. You can reach them.

Every opt-in form I have seen, or nearly every form, asks for more than is really needed. I mean all you need is their email to get to them so, why do you need their address, first and last name, phone, and a message as to why they are opting in, etc…?  You don’t, of course, and your potential customer realizes this too, so you are not fooling anyone by asking for more data, you are making it evident that you want more before you will give them that little bit of offering. Full details and more… are too much.

Just two fields (name and email) seem reasonable to fill out, but, it’s twice as much field, and this means twice as much friction—and potentially, half the conversion rate.  As you can see, we must be considerate and thoughtful as to equate the value of what we are offering to a realistic expectation by the user.

6. Make your Call-to-Action text Clear and Give the Result.

Even after spending so much time on strategy, messaging, testing, and targeting, you still have to have the right CTA. With that comes the best verbiage to drive that click.

What we are talking about here is the Call To Action (CTA)—we are asking our prospects to take action.

The problem is, what we really want to do is tell them the result, the prospect wants to know what they gain and what they get before clicking, so the more clear that driving text is, the better % of clicks. We need to give the user the text that best describes the final result or benefit they will gain from clicking now. They need to be told the benefit and what they will gain. We don’t want to remind them what they have to do.

It’s not easy to have the payoff or driving text on the buttons. You want to have the best text that can drive the specific action, SEND or SUBMIT is not enough to convert most often. This is the standard pre-defined button text and it’s not enough anymore. The button is the most obvious CTA, and most commonly passed by when optimizing for better conversions. Below are some examples of most commonly used button copy, with optimization and improving the implied value; and by slightly tweaking the verbiage, you can have a stronger message to action:

Button text CTA Optimized Button text CTA

Instead of Submit – how bout Send Me My 10 Tips!

Rather than Subscribe –  how bout Get Me on the List!

Instead of Join –  how bout Be Part of Our Elite Group!

Instead of Sign up – Sign Up NOW!

7. Splash Pages

Rather than being driven straight to a form, which… Blah, who wants that? Instead of a form, you can create a better user experience with an interim page or lead into a squeeze page. These types of warm and fuzzy splash pages are easier on the eyes and decrease the bounce rate.

You can have your forms embedded on the page or you can have popup forms.  But it’s a proven fact that popups aren’t effective and don’t give the best user experience. In some surveys of user-experience research, it shows that almost 100% of users are affected negatively by popup forms that appear out of nowhere and use persistent opt-in forms that put users in a bad loop they can’t get out of, unless they close their browser, yuck!

You want your experience for your new customers to be a positive and easy journey right? You want to show prospects that you already care about them and are respectful enough to give them a choice of embracing your brand.

Always start a new business relationship with a positive experience and you will have more loyal customers. They are people, you know, not robots, ha!

You solve these problems, while still giving you the chance to capture prospects, when they get to the page: If clients go to the URL, they’re directed to your squeeze page, which also includes an optional big fat button saying something like, “No thanks, take me to the main site.”

I don’t recommend splash pages before a website entrance, but I do recommend a splash page for a direct URL-to-landing page. This will give the user a better experience because they won’t have to think about what to do when they get to your website’s home page. They’re usually taken from a PPC ad or social link to a splash page, this has been known to be the most effective in the last few years.

Thanks and get Optimizing!http://www.zddesignagency.com/blog/7-email-capture-opt-tips-improve-conversions/