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Holiday spends and conversion rates dropping while costs rise but higher sales volumes.

Ok, here is a constant complaint Marketing Managers get from their higher ups, mainly when the higher ups pay attention to their numbers or actually want to know what is going on and why.

It usually starts with the VP of Marketing asking why your costs are up and conversions are down, why aren’t we getting as many sales as we should, our search volume is higher, fix our conversion rates now!  The Director of Marketing then gets caught off guard because normally the Director is so far out of the loop because of their role (even though they think they have a grasp on everything), that they call the Marketing Manager into their office for a quick response and need information to back it up.

The thing though is the reasons are usually not acceptable if your higher ups don’t want to listen, and because the Director knows that the VP wants a reason that is not the obvious, it is going to seem to the Manager that the Director is unreasonable, but the Manager hasn’t had to be in an executive position yet or had to understand why the obvious answers aren’t good enough.

This lets the Marketing Manager use their staff and their talents to come up with some creative answers and solutions to their problems, as well as also give the obvious answer which is normally what will solidify the deal and make everyone happy in the end.  You just need to have alternates to why sales although sales have increased, your conversion rate has dropped and why are we ok with loosing sales since the conversion rate is lower with a higher search volume on the same keywords and traffic.  If the traffic is the same, which it is, we should be getting more sales.  That does sound like it makes sense, but at the same time, when you actually think about Q4 in most industries, this is one of the exceptions to the rule.

In Search Marketing we know that positions in PPC play a huge role in how well you convert.  Some products will barely even convert in the 1 to 3 spots and others will never convert in the 3 to 5.  You have to know what will work where and then explain and show data to back it up. The same goes for better rankings in the SERPs.

Your traffic volume will go up, your sales will probably also increase, but you can definitely expect to see a decrease in the actual conversion rate.

In the top spots, you get more people that are looking around for the products, they are comparing them to other sites, looking to do research or for parts or returns, etc…  Down lower you miss out on some and could be getting the people just looking for pricing and are ready to shop which is why your conversion rates increase since they find info, or data or whatever they were looking for in the top few results.

You also have to remember that in Q4, more people are shopping, but they are also doing more research online and then looking in stores for better deals and if they cannot find the better deals in the stores, then they come back to the site later on and finally make the purchase.

You get a lot more people browsing then just clicking and buying from your site and because there is a much larger search volume for products and gifts during the holiday season, but not everyone is ready to buy online, your traffic goes much higher on the same terms, you have to spend more because there is more advertising competition and your conversion rates do decrease, but that is because the traffic is not the ordinary traffic that was looking to shop randomly and not research where to buy gifts.

If you explain this without all of my rambling, the Director can go back to the VP and explain this which will make sense to the VP that you are actually not missing out on sales due to the traffic increase, the spend per sale increase and the decrease in conversions, since although the traffic is actually coming in off of the same terms, you have a lot more people researching online and looking for deals in stores, then sometimes coming back to shop if they cannot find them.  Plus, you may be the lowest price or more competitive normally, but during the holidays, stores and competitors offer coupons and discounts that they normally don’t have which could also make your price points higher, so it is important for your VP and Director to also monitor or have you monitor what your competitors are doing and then create deals for you and your team so that you can be just as competitive and keep your sales increasing.

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Merchants Don’t Forget to Put Your Name in the Subject Line!

I cannot believe how sloppy some Merchants have gotten this holiday season.  Most Marketers, especially who have been with a company for a long time or who are brand new don’t really remember something that is seriously important in Email Marketing and in communicating with not only your Customers, but also your partners like your Affiliates and that is to tell them who it is from, not just with your email address, but also in your subject line.

Not only do your Customers and your Affiliates get tons of emails from tons of Merchants every day this time of year, but they also have to be selective of who they actually open them from.  If you don’t make it easy and give them exactly what they need within three seconds from opening or even within a two second glance at the subject, then chances are you are missing out on people who would have opened your email and who may have bought something or added your banners to their sites.

Soo anyways, before you send your next Newsletter, make sure you use this checklist because if you do not, you’ll look either arrogant or amateur to your Customers and to your Partners and Affiliates.

  • Put the company name in the subject line
  • If it is a newsletter to Affiliates, include your company name, the links with their ids in the email, which network you are on.  The rest is just fluff.
  • Your messaging inside the email campaign should be able to be understoofd within seconds.  If the Sale cannot be understood within a glance and the end user seeing a call to action, guess what, you just got deleted.  If the Affiliate opens it and cannot find what they need and just copy and paste, unless you are Walmart, they will move on to your competitor who did do this.

There are a lot of other things that go into making Holiday Newsletters and Email Campaigns work, but these are the most important in my mind.  Short messaging, give them what they need with no fluff, make it clear how to use and do what you want them to do, make sure you give them all the information.  Affiliates use tons of Networks and promote hundreds and thousands of programs, they cannot remember every program and which Network they are on so do your job and go that extra step for them, and during the holiday season they will appreciate this even more and hopefully will also help to go that extra step for you and add you into their sites. Communication during Q4 is key and if yours is all fluff and not very usefull, or you make more work for the end user, then guess what, they will move on to the next one.

Put in the extra effort, double check your work and you and your Customers and Affiliates will have a much easier Q4.

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Washington DC, Baltimore, MD, VA, DE, PA Affiliate Meetup

Hi Everyone,

Quick note to remind you all or invite you to join some of your fellow Online and Affiliate Marketers, Merchants and Network Reps in the Mid Atlantic for some drinks and networking.

This is an unsponsored event this time, but if you would like to sponsor it, i.e. pick up the tab and get to distribute promotional materials ;-), leave a message here and I’ll put you in contact with everyone and give you more details.  Your comment will not be publicly visible.

So far we have a good list of people coming and it should be another great event.  This event is opened to everyone at all levels of Marketing and from all types of Marketing and will be help at:

The W Hotel in the rooftop bar on December 14th, 2009 at 4pm.

I hope you all can make it and you can respond here, on ABestWeb.com or by sending me an email to adamr (at) adamriemer (dot) me.

Looking forward to seeing all of you again and meeting some new people this time.

Best,

Adam

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Are you Poken? Time to Start Poken with StartPoken.com

Ok, these are some of the very coolest things on earth and they are seriously going to take over, not only this summer, but probably be a huge seller for next Christmas and Next Holiday Season, especially since everyone is just starting with them right now and they are just starting to take off.  They are sort of like Beanie Babies and Pokemon Meet Social Media and Marketing for Business People and for Teenagers to meet, exchange numbers and interact, without having to type in their information into their phone or to have to carry business cards.  They are called Poken and at first they seemed stupid or like ok, another gadget, but when looking at them further and realizing how easy they are to use and how much time and money they could easily save me, not to mention running out of business cards at events, I saw the huge demand that these Poken can have and need to buy one so I can start Poken.

Poken are esentially a way to start Social Networking in person.  What you do is you buy a Poken from StartPoken.com, upload your contact information and whatever you want to share onto your Poken, (They come in a ton of different styles from the more expensive sticks and profesional looking rectangles with the hands, to the fun vampires, aliens, animals, etc… for the teenagers and more lighthearted person) then when you run into someone else who has a Poken as well, you just tap the Poken’s hands together and automatically transfer your contact information to that person.

This is not only awesome for conferences since you can save on business cards and not have to spend hours doing data entry entering people’s information into your computer, but it is also great when you are out at a bar and don’t want to have to type information into your cell phone or loose the person’s card, etc…

At the Share a Sale Think Tank this year a ton of people had Poken and I kept wondering what they were talking about and finally my friend Jen bumped her Poken with some other well known Marketers and I was completely sold on them.  After seeing their site startpoken.com last night, I am now going to order one and come the next conference, my iPhone Bump application is going out the door and my Poken is going to be my new contact information.

I personally could have cared less about Poken when I first heard about them and saw them, but now that I have seen how usefull and fun they are, I am sold and think they are either going to seriously take off, or they could be a quick trend and flop within a month or two before they really had a chance to thrive.

If you want to try a Poken for yourself or want to show them off to your friends, click here to buy Poken, if not, well you are probably going to miss out on a new huge Social Networking and business card or information sharing trend.

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Adding a phone number to your website homepage is a great idea!

Merchants and Online stores, adding phone numbers to your website homepages and in really visible places is a seriously good idea; especially if you want to raise your costs, agitate your Affiliates and reduce your online sales, not to mention distract the person from shopping online.

Now I understand you don’t want to miss a sale or prevent someone who has a question from calling in, but the reality of having an online store is to not only be able reduce your costs by not having to have a call center or have to spend time on the phone taking orders, but also to not miss out on an order when your competitors are already taking online orders.

-So, for those of you who are scared to remove your phone numbers and 1-800 numbers from your headers and websites, here are some things to think about and some alternatives that work great to not only make it so you can save some money by not having as many people call in orders instead of shopping online, but also save on having to pay in house staff to take those calls.

Now, not having a phone number on your site is unaccpetable.  You will definitely miss out on some sales, it is more about knowing where to place it, then plastering it everywhere.  The thing is knowing where to place it so people are still encouraged to shop online, your Affiliates don’t get mad and you don’t have to pay an employee as well as PPC ad clicks, etc… for the sale and spend even more money on paying a staff member too for taking the order.  My suggesstion is placeing it on the contact us page right after someone clicks on contact us.

Not only does that simple one click make your Affiliates happier with you, and help you keep your sales online which can be much more cost effective; but it also allows you to show a number or give the option to submit a form to contact you instead of calling in which also helps in saving you time and money on a support and service staff since one person can answer more emails than one person can take phone calls at a time and during an entire day.  The one click probably will not discourge many sales and in all honesty, to gain the respect of your Affiliates and to be able to spend less while also make more money online without paying staff completely makes it worth it and the Customers that need to talk to someone can still have the number to call in, they just need to click one button to find it.  It really isn’t that big of a deal.

If you are still set on having a number on the homepage or in your header, you may also want to think about a LiveChat service button or logo instead on the homepage, just make sure they are not paid on commission or cookie tracked (trust me on this one, they’ll rip ou off like no tomorrow, especially if they get commissioned on saved sales through cookies, but that is for another post and should be classified as parasitic to Merchants and Affiliates in my opinion).  Not only will the LiveChat work as a phone number to awnser most of your customers questions, but one person can handle multiple chat windows and questions at once while they can only handle one call at once again saving you money on having to pay staff to answer phones.

If you still insist on having a phone number in a very visible place and in your header, you can at least incorporate something for your Affiliates to keep them happy.  1.  You should install pay per call for your Affiliates (Available via Share a Sale and Commission Junction) and deifnitely include a javascript that says priority code and shows the code as the Affiliate’s ID or if no Affiliate ID is clicked a dummy number so you can track and manually credit the Affiliate that sent the sale (Java scripts are available for Share a Sale Merchants).

Anyways, don’t be scared to pull of your phone numbers from your sites, just take some precautions so you don’t eliminate customers or sales and you can still provide it, just make it one click away instead of everywhere so you can not only save money on paying staff, but also by processing more orders around the clock instead of only during normal business hours.

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Are TypoSquatters and TypeSquatters Parasites or Thieves?

So a common thing you’ll find people complaining about that have never had a properly managed program, or that shut theirs down is that they got soo tired of people bidding on their trademarks and typosquatting or typsquatting.  The thing is, most of them didn’t even know about the toolbars and adware, but that is an entirely different story.  Anyways, we all know about trademark bidders and all have our own opinions, again I’ll save that for another post, but one thing that most people don’t really think about until after the fact is the typosquatter and how they can affect your Affiliate Program and your search marketing.

First lets talk about what a typosquatter is.  My definition of a typosquatter is someone that uses mispellings of your url or domain or trademarks.com and then redirects the end user to your site while also setting a cookie.  This can be through PPC, through Domain Name Purchasing and though the use of adware and partnerships with other companies and Internet Service Providers.

Now, what is a parasite?  In regards to Affiliate Marketing, I define parasites as anyone or anything that sets a cookie to take credit for a sale that they did nothing to earn.

So now that we have defined the focus of these two terms, lets discuss if Typosquatters are actually parasites and who they hurt, who they benefit and if they can be good for you or if you would want them as a part of your Affiliate Program or Marketing Model.

The first type of Typosquatter is the one that bids on all of the mispellings of your site names and trademarks, then uses a url that they may own, or types it in differently into google and combines letters like rn to look like an M, day part you out or geotarget you out so you don’t see their ads, and at the same time, they use the same ad you have, drop them on their misspelling site off of your trademark and copy your html or homepage or landing page to make it look like your site.  And whenever a click occurs anywhere on the landing page they created on the mispelling, or sometimes there is an automatic redirect; this Affiliate sets their cookie and takes credit for a sale when the end user already knew about you, your company or site and probably found out about you because you spent a ton of money building your site, your trademarks and brands.  For me, this Affiliate ads no value and actually takes away because not only did you have to spend money and time to build your brands and customer base,  but you also have to pay additional fees for the customers you already brought in and all these people did was capitalize off of your hard work.

To me, that is parasitic towards Merchants since the Merchant is the one who spent the money to bring in the customer and build their brand and all the Affiliate did was capitalize on your hard work and all of the money you spent.  So for me, this is Merchant Parasitic.

The next type of typo squatter is the one who buys all of your domain and trademark mispellings and then sets them with 301 redirects to your sites.  During the redirect, they also place their Affiliate Cookie onto the customer’s computer giving them credit for the sale.  To me, this type of Affiliate is the same as above and I would not work with them, if for some reason I had to, well they will get about a .5% commission if the Client is not a name brand and much less if it is. I rememer being at the Affiliate Marketers Give Back table at Affiliate Summit and this company came up to me to talk to me about a Major Name Brand program I was consulting for and actually said, after I asked how they promote Merchants, that they will buy all the mispellings of our domain and then redirect them.  I ended up saying are you kidding?  He said no, it works great…I thanked him and said that unfortunately we would not be able to partner with each other but I was really thinking “ya, it works great for you, you don’t have to do any work, you just collect a check, move along jack*ss” lol.

The last type is one that actually got me tricked before I really thought about it.  in 2006 I went to CJU (Commission Junction Univeristy) and was talking to this fantastic person who I am still friends with today.  (Even though we are friends that does not mean I will ever work with her or her company).

Anyways, my Commission Junction rep introduced us and said how great they are, I got the same story from Google Affiliate Network and Linkshare, these people are not allowed in Share a Sale though (Yet another reason I love Share a Sale), and she told me about how her company works and what they do.

This company partnered with a large Dial Up Internet Service Provider that you all know.

Because of this partnership, if you use this Internet Service Provider to connect to the internet, unfortunately you also have their software on your connection and computer.  The benefit from this software is that if the person who is searching the web types your company name into their browser window but mispells it, they will automatically be taken to your site so there could be a percieved benefit there.  The thing you don’t know is that they also set an Affiliate Cookie so they are actually just delivering your customers to you and charging you for them.  But it isn’t just that.

If you think about it, they would do this anyways because even if you didn’t work with them, their deal with the ISPs is to add value to their customers by helping them get to the websites they are looking for so they would still provide this to you for free anyways.  This in my mind is not only theft from the Merchant, but also really stupid for the Merchant that decides to work with them since the Merchant would get that visitor with or without the partnership.

There are other things to think about as well though.

What if the site the customer was looking for was the actual mispelling?  All of the sudden they cannot access it without having to do a search or find other ways around the software.  This creates a horrible end user experience since the end user can no longer get to the sites they want and chances are the customer service reps at the ISP won’t even know what to tell them is wrong.

A last thing to think about is your other Affiliates.

Most programs have cookies on their programs.  If you allow these people into your programs, then what if the person doesn’t shop immediately, only learned about you because of the blogger or forum or the Affiliate that recommended you and now because you partnered with this Typosquatter who will pretty much never send you a real customer that they brought to you without knowing about you before hand, you are allowing that Affiliate’s cookie to be overwritten.

For me, that is Parasitic for both the Merchant and the Affiliate and I would personally never work with them or recommend working with them.

It is important to know what is happening in your program and to actually hire someone who knows about these companies, otherwise you’ll be spending money paying people for sales that never actually earned them.

If you think they may be in your programs, or want me to look for you, please feel free to write me at adamr (at) adamriemer (dot) me.

Best,

Adam