7 Steps To Test Prices and Convert More Sales

7 Steps To Test Prices and Convert More Sales

by: Charles Kangethe

Hereกs a really simple way… to customise your product offer from the headline to the prices in order to suit local tastes.

We all know people do business with people they กknow and trustก. So how can you convince shoppers half way across the world that you are reliable and someone they should do business with ?

What I am about to show you will make your business กLocal to the Localsก, wherever in the World they might be.

Step #1 What Is A Split Test

Split testing is a vital task for any Online Business.

By testing different headlines, captions, graphics, copy and prices you can gradually point your business towards better conversion rates.

A basic split test adheres to these guidelines.

1) You start with a base sales page This is called the กControlก

2) Set up a new page for each component you want to test.

For instance set up a new page where everything is the same as กControlก except the Headline. Test various components such as price, ad copy and bonuses, each with its own page.

3) Using software, set the test criteria in terms of how long you want the test to run or alternatively set the number of visitors you want to visit each page.

During the test the Ad tracker will record the statistics, and you can tell which page converted the most.

For future tests, that page can then become กControlก as you change another component.

Step #2 A Shortcoming Of Many Split Tests.

Your Online Business has a big advantage over local Bricks and Mortar businesses.

Your marketplace is Global.

However, this is also a weakness.

Despite the shrinking of the World, depending on what you sell, people still feel more comfortable doing business with กLocalก companies.

Until now…

If you could tell which specific region converted best for your product offer, you could concentrate your offers there instead of wasting advertising money trying to capture a huge unresponsive Global Market.

Step #3 Breakdown Your Marketplace Into Regions.

Decide the level to which you want to breakdown your global market place.

Depending on your knowledge of the World and the type of product you sell, you may want to target sales at a country level.

For more specific products you may feel a regional approach within each country is best.

Finally for some offers you may want to target people in specific named cities within a region in a country.

Once you have decided on your breakdown you need to set up your sales pages.

Step #4 Set Up Test Pages

If you have decided to track sales at the lowest level, then you will need a page for the country, the region and the city in addition to กControlก

For each regional page, change your product offer so that it appeals to the people of that region.

Do this by use of text and graphics that appeal to :

Local Language

Local Arts

Local Cultural references

Local Historical references

Local Geographical references

Local Social, political and economic references

The aim is to build an impression in the visitors mind that your business is กLocalก to them.

Step # 5 Redirect Traffic To The Relevant Local Page

Now that youกve set up the regional pages, you must redirect people from that country, region or city to the relevant กLocalก page when they visit your site.

You want visitors from your Local region to be redirected to the correct Local page rather than กControlก. Redirecting traffic is as simple as applying JavaScript code to your กControlก page In Relevant Resources, below, I tell you where to get these scripts for F’reE.

Your visitor IP addresses are cross referenced against a database by the script so they are directed to the right page.

On their relevant กLocalก page your visitors can order at discount Prices or with different bonuses that you set up.

If you do this right, your กLocalก business pages can outperform the conversion rates you get on กControlก.

Step # 6 A Few Words Of Caution

Use the tactics in this article to make Local offers that are of big relevance to locals in specific, chosen areas of your Global market.

However, when people realise that you are giving discounts to กLocal area Xก, they may try and find a way to get the discount even if they are not in กLocal area Xก.

Theft and fraud online are a price all direct marketers have to bear from time to time.

There are two pieces of advice I can give you :

1) Make it difficult for opportunists to read your JavaScript by hiding it in a .js file

2) Make your กLocalก offer one where you are better off with a sale than without. In other words do not give the product away for F’reE. That way you will always make some money on the offer.

Step #7 Become Local To The Locals

Develop your knowledge of the World and with your product range you can rapidly target small markets rather than the universal Global Internet market.

This can do wonders for your conversion rates.

Relevant Resources

* Split Testing Software

Pro Analyzer from http://www.proanalyzer.com/ DynaTracker from http://www.dynatracker.com/ AdTrackz from http://www.adtrackz.com/

* GeoBytes

Get your Javascript for redirecting your visitors according to location from here http://www.geobytes.com/

More Information and Software For Ad Tracking http://profits.cc/tracking.html?16oct

Conclusion

Good marketers split test.

Take this a step further and test your market in terms of location.

Be กLocal to the Localsก and see your conversion rates rise.

(c) 2004 Charles Kangethe

About The Author

Charles Kangethe of http://www.simplyeasier.com is a leading new wave Netpreneur and a published author from England. The กSimply Easierก brand name is your guarantee of high value, quality Marketing Products, Services and Resources.

[email protected]

This article was posted on April 08, 2004

by Charles Kangethe

Test Your Headlines for Maximum Profits

Test Your Headlines for Maximum Profits

by: George Dodge

Professional copywriters do not simply write or select one headline and then hope for the best. They create a number of different headlines; often times as many as a hundred before selecting the headline they think will perform the best.

But they don’t stop there! Professional copywriters know that their choice will often not be the choice of the public and therefore they test their headlines in the market place.

Believe it or not, even professional copywriters find that half or more of their ads, sales letters, or campaigns fail to become winners. But, by testing, they are able to cut their losses early and maximize their successes.

The method of testing most commonly used is known as split testing. With headlines, split testing involves the exposing of two different alternating headlines to prospects. This can be done both online and offline, but online is much easier and the testing process is quicker.

Here is the way headline split testing works online. Visitor A comes to your website and sees headline #1 while visitor B comes to your website and sees headline # 2. When visitor C comes to your website, headline # 1 is shown again and the alternating process continues for the length of the test.

After a number of actions have been recorded for each headline, such as clicking through to the order page, the results are compared to determine which headline resulted in the largest number of desired responses (the click through to the order page, in this example).

The larger the number of total responses recorded, the greater the accuracy of the test to determine the headline winner. Once a winner is chosen, that headline becomes the new control. A control is the current best performing item being tested, in this case, a headline.

Now that a control has been established, a new headline is tested against the control to see if the response can be improved. This process continues on until a given headline has been the control for a large number of tests.

Initially the two headlines that are being tested can be quite different. What you are looking for in the early test is what general kind of headline seems to work for the target market. Once a general kind of headline appears to be a winner over competing types of headlines, then you begin to tweak and split variations of the winning headline itself.

Letกs take a look at an example.

This headline example comes from Jimmy D. Brown, a very successful Internet marketer. The following two headlines were split tested to determine a winner.

Headline # 1: ‘the Power of Viral eBooksก

Headline # 2: กHow to Create Automated Profit Generatorsก

The Result? Headline # 2 out pulled headline # 1 by multiple times.

Now to simplify this process, letกs assume for the sake of this example that Headline # 2 proved to be the winner, not only of this test, but a number of follow on test against a number of other headlines. So, you have determined the type of headline that seems to work well for your particular target market. Now, it is time to tweak the headline by split testing variations of this particular headline.

When you split test variations of a headline, you want to only change one thing at a time. Perhaps you will change only one word in the headline, or the color of the headline, or the using of quote marks around the headline, etc. But you only test one item at a time. Each item you test is called a variable; it is the thing that varies between the headlines in the test.

Everything in the headline can make a difference in the headline response rate. Things that make a difference in response are called response modifiers. In addition to the items mentioned above, other response modifiers in a headline might include the font used, the size of the font, the capitalization of the first letters of each word, etc. Everything in your headline can and should be tested.

For an example of how a very minor change can make a difference in your headline response, take a look at these two headlines:

Headline # 1: กPut Music In Your Lifeก

Headline # 2: กPuts Music In Your Lifeก

The only difference between the headlines is the addition of the letter กsก to the first word. Again the second headline greatly out pulled the first headline. Some copywriters assume that this is because the first headline implies some work on the part of the reader, while the second headline implies that something or someone else does the work. But the reason is not important, only the results matter.

Each tweak of your headline that results in a new control improves the desired response rate of your headline leading to a maximization of profits, if your headline involves the selling of a product or service.

You can never know for sure why one headline out pulls another, but while you can guess, the reason is not important. What is important is the results, no matter what the reason.

Jim and Audri Lanford of www.netrageous.com, now www.scambusters.org, once made a change of color to a sub headline on one of their online sales pages and orders almost dropped to zero. When they changed the headline color back, their normal order rate returned. They guessed that this was because the color change may have caused the headline to look more like hype, but as noted above, the reason is not important. What are important are the results.

Are you testing your headlines? If not, you should be. Every little positive change continues to increase your profits and it all adds up in the end. While some changes may only increase your desired response by a fraction of one percent, some people have seen changes of as much as 1,500% with a single headline change while the rest of their copy remained the same.

How would you like to see either a single or cumulative improvement over time of 1,500% in your desired response rate? I thought so! Then go forth and test, test, and test some more!

About The Author

George Dodge is owner of the Headline Creator Pro Website at http://www.HeadlineCreatorPro.com where you can download software that saves you time and effort by allowing you to quickly and easily create headlines with push button ease.

This article was posted on September 12

by George Dodge