Conversion rate optimization has been a common topic for quite some time in internet marketing. But with blogs? Not so much. Many marketers still consider blogging a good strategy, but not one that is super-effective at generating large amounts of business. This is so not true. The truth is that your blog CAN be a converting machine. The trick is a) you have to create amazing value for your readers and b) you have to actually no how to increase your conversion rates. That’s why i’m here to help. Because I basically have no life (jk) and spend 3/4 of my life on the web… I am able to find the time to read and research thousands of articles across many topics. In the past year conversion rate optimization or CRO has been a major source of curiosity for me. I’ve come across some amazing resources in my journey and [...]

7 free web applications that can help you improve your website conversion rates. Don’t worry… expensive tools like Omniture’s Test & Target are not your only resources for CRO. 1. ClueApp Are visitors to your site not performing the actions you want them to perform? That might be because those actions just aren’t standing out enough! ClueApp is a tool that lets you create a “memory test” for your website to see what things visitors notice/remember from your site. This is a great way to see what things are standing out to your visitors, as well as what impression they’re getting from your site. It can help with conversions by seeing if your call-to-orders/products are highly noticeable or not, or if the actions that you are wanting people to perform are standing out to visitors. ClueApp works by showing a 5-second screen shot to visitors, then asking them what they [...]

The following are 5 tests you can run to help you increase your blogs traffic, conversion rate, and SEO rankings. Testing alone will not increase these metrics however. You must record the data and learn from it. That is the key to success. Test #1 = Increasing Traffic Through Twitter Reposting I wanted to run a test that involved testing various Tweet Content to promote certain articles that I have had struggles getting more people to see. Sometimes your content can be great but might need a little extra effort to go viral. In this test you want to experiment with the following: Text before the URL Text after the URL The Time and Day of the Tweet Testing and analyzing your results with this can give you a tremendous amount of information about your Twitter following and will help you leverage Twitter more efficiently for the growth of your blog. I [...]

If you find yourself needing to create a landing page, it wouldn’t hurt you to get some design inspiration along the way. One of the best things to do before creating your landing page is to look at other landing pages first and take down notes of the things you most like. Then start to sketch out with a pen and a pad… your new concept for your landing page. It can be very difficult however to find high quality landing page examples which is why I created this blog post. No messy, ugly, 1999 looking landing pages allowed here! Just high quality examples of how landing pages should be done. Let’s take a look. Note: each landing page listed incorporates many landing page principles that you should be following. For the sake of this article I just pointed out a few of the main things I like about each [...]

WordPress + Dreamweaver + Google Website Optimizer = Awesome Sound cool? Yeah, you bet it does. For those who still aren’t convinced, let me show you why people like you and me need Unbounce: I am a Marketer. Like most marketers, I am constantly trying to think of new ways to improve my landing pages. A/B testing is essential in this process. Unbounce allows you to set up A/B tests and optimize your landing pages for your specific audience without having to call IT. Not only will you improve conversion, you’ll also have data to back you up; it’s all about the numbers. Access your test stats in real-time and make real-time adjustments to your pages. They’ve made the whole process incredibly simple. You can check out their tutorials to see what I mean. Seriously, anyone can use this tool effectively and efficiently. Here is a snapshot of their A/B [...]

In an ongoing effort to help people realize the value in using the FREE Website Optimizer tool from Google, I’m compiling a list of popular sites/companies utilizing Website Optimizer. These companies see value in using this tool and so should we. The concept of A/B Testing is by no means a new thing. But the tools available to us from Google are and they create a new horizon of opportunity for our websites. So far I have found 10 popular websites using Google Website Optimizer. I plan on adding to this list weekly. If you have any that you know of please leave a comment below and I will add them to the list. 1. MailChimp 2. SquareSpace 3. ZenDesk 4. Dreamhost 5. SiteSell.com 6. 1-800 Flowers 7. Outrigger Hotels & Resorts 8. Famous Footwear 9. Western Governors University 10. Booking.com FYI: I found this by simply viewing the source [...]