Big Gains From Small Edits

In the world of Email marketing, there is always room for improvement.  Sometimes, the biggest improvement can come from the smallest of edits.

The most minor adjustments to your email template have the potential to cause click-through (the % of people who actually click on a link) and open rates (the % of people who open and view an email instead of just ignoring or deleting it) to suddenly skyrocket, and in turn, drive large amounts of sales, traffic, sign ups, or conversions. However, the only way to truly learn from your template adjustments is to implement them one at a time utilizing classic scientific procedure. By isolating your adjustments, you can learn which varying factors improve your campaigns and which hurt them.

A/B Split Testing for Email

The best approach for this experimental improvement is commonly referred to as A/B Split Testing: a function available within most email marketing services.

The actual process for Newsletter A/B Split Testing  involves splitting a small, randomally selected subset of your mailing list subscribers into two groups. Then, each groups receivs an email that is nearly identical, save a small tweak that you are testing. For example, you might test different subject lines to see how that affects open rate. Once the results are measured, you then send out the “winning” variation to the all the users who didn’t receive  one of the original test emails.

To reiterate, the only difference between the two emails going to the two small test groups should be the single factor that you are testing.

An Example

Acme, Inc. would like find out which color link attracts the most clicks. In the current version of their newsletter, link is displayed in a big red font with no special decoration.

In order to find out if this is the optimal presentation for clicks, they up an A/B test that includes two identical newsletters except for this big red link. Email #1 would include the standard big red link link with no special decoration while Email #2 would include a blue link with no special decoration.  While it may tempting to experiment with decorating the link or creating a special button, that should be saved for the next test in order to keep the currently tested color variable completely isolated.  The reason for only testing one tweak at a time is so that there is no doubt about what caused the increase.  To continue testing ways to improve click-through rates, further A/B tests could be done.

But links are not the only thing that can be tested in newsletters.  Other potential variables include:

• Subject-Line: Test subject lines to increase open rates.
• From-Line: Test which “from” address results in the highest open rate.
• Landing Page: Find out which landing page to link to by seeing which one results in a higher conversion rate
• Time of Delivery: The time of day that email is sent could have a significant impact on open rates and recipient activity across all metrics.
• Presentation of Calls to Action: Not getting enough clicks? Try testing the color of and style of buttons.
• Just About Every Aspect of A Newsletter: Almost anything in a newsletters can be tested for improvement.

Remember: scientific testing is the only true path to improvement in your campaigns.  While there are many preachers of best practices out there, what works for most may not work for your list. The only way to be sure is to test test test.

For some marketers, especially B2B companies, the holidays may be a time of year when things slow down, which can be the perfect opportunity to thoroughly cleanse your PPC account and get it to deliver more bang for your buck. On the heels of my blog post on landing page optimization, here are 10 ways to make your PPC campaign more profitable.

Give feedback either by commenting or by replying to my Twitter status.

1. Make changes that matter.


Don’t just look for what is not performing well in your campaign, look for areas that would have a big impact on your ROI if it were working better. See what campaigns and ad groups within each campaign represent the greatest share of your overall paid search budget.

Once you’ve identified the most critical areas of your campaign to optimize, start by taking a look at your Quality Score. Improving it will help you reduce your cost-per-click in relation to the position of your ads. This involves looking at each keyword’s CTR, associated ads and taking some of the following steps:

2. Create better targeted ad groups.


Look through your ad groups to find keywords with low Quality Score or low CTR and see what ads are showing up for them. Consider placing these keywords in another ad group with ads that are more relevant. In the case of broad match keywords, use the “See Search Terms” report to find some common queries you are getting clicks for. If some of the keywords that often get clicks are relevant to you, consider using them as a phrase or exact match in the same or new ad group.

Besides using the “See Search Terms” report to better target relevant keywords, use it also add to list of keywords that you do not want to target.

3. Curate your negative keyword lists.


Add negative keywords to your list so that your ads show for more relevant searches. You can find these in the “See Search Terms” report.

4. Use broad match modifiers.

If you have not done so already, add the new broad match modifier to your ad groups. This type of matching is more flexible than phrase and exact match while doing a better job of targeting than broad match. Bid on this match type higher than you would on broad match, and lower than phrase and exact match.

Your CTR does not only rely on your keywords, so it’s important that your ads get users to click.

5. Test your ads.


Look for ways to make your ads stand-out against your competition and test different ideas. Let ads compete against each other and gather sufficient data before eliminating one or more ads. When you come across a test result in one ad group, consider applying what you learned to other ad groups.

Everything I’ve listed so far is primarily meant to increase your CTR. But what about making sure that each click is the best click you can get?

6. Filter out unwanted clicks.


Provide information in your ad copy that will deter your most common unwanted customers. For example, if your services start at $5,000, consider using that in your ad copy. This may go against our strategy of increasing our CTR, but its benefits may outweigh the loss by increasing the value of each click.

7. Use match types to control bids.

Look at broad match keywords that are consuming a lot of your budget, without delivering the goods in the form of conversions. Consider reducing your bids on some of those broader keywords and increase bids on phrase and exact match keywords that are delivering good results.

8. Show ads at the right time.


After doing some preliminary testing by showing ads throughout the day and days of the week, configure your bidding schedule to get your ads more attention when it counts.

I’ve covered most things leading up to the click. Now let’s look at what to do about what visitors see after they click on your ad.

9. Improve device targeting.

Make sure that if you are targeting mobile devices that you are sending traffic to a mobile-friendly page and that this mobile traffic is in a separate campaign from your desktop computer targeting.

10. Conduct landing page optimization.

Work on continually improving the conversion rate of your landing pages. At the end of the day, no matter how cheaply you can generate traffic to your website by improving Quality Score or how well you can filter out unwanted clicks, if your pages are not focused on turning each visitor into a client, then you will always be spinning your tires in the mud. If you need a few tips to get you started, check out 84 Tips For A Killer Landing Page Design.

Below is a demonstration of the effects of conversion optimization on ROI:

EBay has come up with its affiliate program nearly 6 months ago. The idea was to get hold of publishers and affiliates who are worthwhile in attracting traffic to eBay. EBay has a huge array of properties globally. To cater to it, it is issuing an in-house format. EBay has drifted away from Commission junction platform which was owned by Value Click.

A dispute raged between the two, this led to eBay tying up with half.com. Presently it is running its affiliate campaign through an in-house format enabled by half.com. There have been few complaints regarding widespread sacking being performed by eBay.

There is news that eBay has already sacked 400 affiliates saying that it is difficult to mobilize resources. There is speculation that the affiliates are being dismissed because they were not able to drive quality traffic frequently.

EBay affiliate program drives new users and generates sign ups and sales for its site. This is done through various publishers, webmasters, and affiliates. EBay pays them for the effort either through a commission or in terms of pay-per-click.

The affiliates can use banners, flashes, text links and a lot of other inventive material to drag the traffic. They even get paid for winning bids. Sellers who have personal website can use quite a lot of affiliate tools. One such tool is the Editor’s Kit. Through this, an affiliate can promote his own listing and also direct the visitor to other seller’s items.

Now, we can understand how this is based on the core concepts of affiliate marketing; the merchant and the affiliate relationship. The affiliate gets the commission irrespective of the format of listing and also earns a part of revenue for sign-up (even when it does not convert into sale)

If you refer a person to eBay who happens to be a non-member and if he makes a purchase you get commission for it. If someone decides to be a member, you get 12USD for that, it rises to 16USD after a tally count of 499.

EBay has an industrious staff force which helps the affiliates with 24×7 services. This means that the staffs are ready to help the affiliates completely with the program and this refers both to the bloggers and serious men in business. It can be about ad placing, ad serving, tracking and a lot more.

EBay affiliate program uses unnamed cookies and various beacons on the computer which perfectly analyses the visitor track and also takes care of any manipulation from the affiliate’s side. All important contents and real time visitor clicks are being ably found out by the process.

EBay does not require a cost to join the group. Payment is made through online money transfer units like Paypal and Escrow. It can also be made through check.

You can look to become an EBay affiliate in many countries. People look at the monumental size of eBay and it partly shadows the affiliate program, but hey! Even this program is worth involving oneself, and with some discipline, sky is the limit for revenue-generation.