Your robots.txt File: One Reason You’re Not Appearing in AI Citations

You've done everything right. Structured content. Schema markup. Direct, concise answers targeting the exact questions people type into ChatGPT, Claude, and Perplexity. You've read the AEO and GEO playbooks. Your content is genuinely good.

And you're getting zero AI citations.

Here's one thing that could be causing that...

For AEO (Answer Engine Optimization) and GEO (Generative Engine Optimization) to work, AI bots need to be able to crawl your pages. If they can't access your content, they can't cite it. 

The file that controls that access is your robots.txt. Unfortunately, many sites have it wrong because they block the wrong AI Bots in that file.

The problem isn't your content. The problem is you locked the door before the bots ever arrived.

How common is this? I haven't exhaustively tested yet, but I research hundreds of sites a week and typically find that 1-3 of the sites that show up in the top ten Google search results for almost any search can't be accessed by AI.

Killing their ability to be recommended by AI.

Are you one of them? I wouldn't be surprised if you are.

What Is an AI Citation?

An AI citation is when an AI tool like Google AI Overviews, ChatGPT, Perplexity, Claude, etc. answers a question and names your page as a source or recommendation.

It is not a ranking, not a position in a list. It's your site, attributed by name, linked, possibly with an excerpt pulled from your content, sitting right next to the answer the AI just gave.

Google AI Overviews pull sources into a collapsed block around organic results. ChatGPT surfaces a source panel. Claude links inline when it's pulling from the web. Perplexity shows citations on every single response. It's built that way by design. 

Most people still think of search as a list of 10 blue links. You rank, someone clicks. That model still works at the moment (but Google's changing it as we speak.)

But the visitor who clicks a citation is a different person from the one who clicks the fourth result in the list. Citation clickers have already built some trust from the answer AI's response. They're clicking to learn more from the source the AI pointed them to. That's a warmer, higher-intent visit than almost anything organic search delivers.

And here's the thing most sites are missing right now: citation competition is still wide open. Most sites haven't optimized for it at all. The ones that figure this out, getting access and content right, are filling a gap that won't stay open long.

Access comes first. Everything else follows.

Why Your robots.txt Matters for AIO, AEO, and GEO

AIO, GEO, and AEO all depend on one thing: the AI bot being able to read your page.

For example, before a page is eligible for AI citation in Google AI Overviews, it has to be a regular indexable page. Block the AI bots, and you block the citation. No amount of schema markup overrides that.

The same applies to GEO; AI generally has to see the page to recommend it.

Does this sound familiar? You've done all the optimization work, and nothing worked. 

Check the door first. If you're blocking AI from seeing the pages on your site, it's unlikely to show you in its results.

You Also Need to Allow Snippets

There's a second layer to check. Google requires that a page allow it to pull snippets before it will include it in AI results.

The AI-Blocking Problem Started Years Ago

Here's what happened in 2023 and 2024. Site owners like you and me saw headlines about AI companies scraping the web, got scared that all our hard work was going to be added to the Borg, and instituted blanket AI bot blocks.

Reasonable instinct. Bad execution.

Site after site blocked training crawlers AND search indexers at the same time. We thought we were protecting our content. We were also unknowingly opting out of every AI citation.

We had no idea.

And since we think we're "protected from AI stealing our content," many site owners have never checked whether that assumption is correct.

The key to blocking the AI Bots we don’t want while allowing the citation and retrieval bots free access is your robots.txt file.

Configuring Your robots.txt to Allow the AI Bots You Want, Blocking Those You Don't

Your robots.txt file is a plain-text file at the root of your website that tells web crawlers which pages or sections of your site they can access.

Let’s start with an optimized example of what a good one could look like.

This is the actual configuration I have running on doncrowther.com that I recommend you use too. This is not a template. Not a hypothetical. Here's what I’m really using. (I'll explain why each of these elements is included below):

Why this robots.txt is Structured the Way it is

Every line in this robots.txt file serves a specific purpose. Here's why they're there:

Section 1: Training crawler blocks

This section contains eleven explicit blocks. Each bot gets its own stanza. This is not redundant formatting. It's necessary to block each of them individually.

If you used User-agent: * to block everything, that would catch the search indexers too: the exact bots you need to allow. This process of surgical naming is the entire point.

Disallow: / blocks those bots from the whole site. Not a folder. Not a section. Every page, every URL, nothing gets through for that crawler. 

Section 2: User-agent: * (opening things up for the search/citation indexers we want)

Because the AI bots we want to access the site, like OAI-SearchBot, Claude-SearchBot, and PerplexityBot, aren't named in any block above, they hit this catch-all rule. They’re allowed to read everything except the paths you see I've explicitly blocked here. That's how they end up with access to your content.

Admin and login paths

/wp-admin/ is your site's backend: your settings, your users, your drafts. There's nothing a bot needs to see in those files. 

/wp-login.php is the login page. Blocked. You don't want that page showing up in the search engines.

The Allow: /wp-admin/admin-ajax.php line is a WordPress quirk you need to know about. Some front-end functionality, like dynamic content, live search, and contact forms, routes through that endpoint. Block it, and things break for real users. Allowing access to it is deliberate.

WordPress system files

xmlrpc.php is an older API endpoint and a known attack vector. There is no legitimate indexing reason to allow it. 

readme.html and license.txt expose your WordPress version number. They have no SEO value. They're also a minor security risk. This is an easy block.

API and privacy

/wp-json/wp/v2/users/ is a WordPress REST API endpoint that returns a list of your site's usernames. It's public by default for some reason. It shouldn't be. Block it.

Duplicate and low-value pages

?s= and /search/ are your site's internal search result pages. They generate unique URLs for every search query, but the content is thin and inconsistent. That's crawl budget waste at scale.

?p= is the numeric post ID format WordPress generates alongside your clean slug URLs. You don't need both indexed. Block the ID format. (Of course, you want to be using page titles as your URLs. If you're not, you'll want to allow this parameter.)

Pagination duplicates

Category and tag archive pages past page 1 are repetitive and thin. Page 1 of a category archive has value. Page 47 of /category/marketing/ does not. Keep page 1. Block the rest.

Cache and plugin artifacts

The WPO plugins JSON file is internal housekeeping for a caching plugin. There's no content there. No one should be indexing it.

Rendering assets

This one matters more than most people think. The Allow rules for CSS and JS files are not optional if you care about how Google reads your pages. (And yes, for you purists out there, I realize there's redundancy here...)

Googlebot renders pages before making quality judgments. It's not reading raw HTML like it's 2005. Block your CSS and JS files, and Googlebot sees unstyled markup. It misses layout signals, structured elements, and visual context that factor into quality assessment. These allow rules are cheap insurance.

Sitemap

robots.txt Is a Request, Not a Lock

Here's something most guides leave out, but you should know:

robots.txt is a voluntary standard. There's no technical mechanism that prevents a bot from ignoring it. You publish the file, you signal your preferences, and then you trust that the bot's operator chose to build a compliant crawler.

Malicious scrapers, spammers, and shady data resellers? They ignore it regularly. That's a separate problem robots.txt was never designed to solve.

But here's why this doesn't undermine what you just set up.

The bots in this configuration: GPTBot, ClaudeBot, OAI-SearchBot, PerplexityBot, Google-Extended, are run by companies with legal teams, public commitments, and business incentives to behave. OpenAI has explicitly documented that GPTBot honors robots.txt. Anthropic has done the same for ClaudeBot and Claude-SearchBot. Google has done it for Googlebot, Google-Extended, and the rest of its fleet.

These companies are probably not going to blow up their legal exposure, their publisher relationships, and their public trust to grab your content after you've told them not to. The risk-reward doesn't work for them. Compliance is in their interest.

So for the bots that matter to AEO and GEO, robots.txt works. Not because it's technically enforced. Because the companies running these bots have chosen to make it work.

That said, if you want a hard technical block rather than a polite request, one that issues a 403 before the bot even reads your file, that's what Cloudflare's AI Crawl Control does. Robots.txt and Cloudflare serve different purposes. This article covers one. Another article will cover Cloudeflare.

llms.txt: The Emerging Complement to robots.txt for AI Access

robots.txt controls access. llms.txt is a proposed standard for giving AI systems a plain-language summary of what your site is, what you publish, and what's worth reading.

The format is simple: a plain text file at the root of your site, written in Markdown, that describes your site's purpose and links to your most important content. Think of it as a briefing document for AI systems that have permission to read your site but don't know where to start.

It's not required. It's not widely adopted yet. Google both claims it's totally unnecessary and looks for it in certain cases. You won't get penalized for having it, and no AI system is penalizing you for not having one today.

Create your llms.txt file now. The effort is low, and the standard is forming. A few hours of work now puts you ahead of a requirement that may become expected. When it matters, you'll already have it.

Three Things to Audit Right Now

1. Check your robots.txt against the bot list above.

Open your current robots.txt and look for GoogleBot, OAI-SearchBot, Claude-SearchBot, and PerplexityBot. If any of them appear in a Disallow rule, or if you have a blanket block that would catch them, fix it. Leaving them blocked is cutting off your citation pipeline at the source.

2. Search your page templates for nosnippet, max-snippet:0, and X-Robots-Tag headers.

robots.txt is the first gate. These meta tags and X-Robots-Tag HTTP headers are the second.

A page can be perfectly crawlable but still ineligible for AI answer features because of a snippet restriction baked into the template.

nosnippet tells search engines not to show a text snippet from the page. max-snippet:0 sets the snippet length to zero. Either one in a meta tag or an X-Robots-Tag HTTP header will block your content from AI answers, even if the page is fully crawlable.

Check every page type: posts, pages, category archives, and landing pages.

3. Make sure your sitemap is declared in robots.txt and resolves correctly.

Open the sitemap URL in a browser. Does it load? Does it contain your actual content pages? A declared sitemap that 404s is worse than no declaration.

Access First. Everything Else Follows.

The reason much of the work people are doing in AEO and GEO doesn't produce results isn't bad advice. It's that this prerequisite was never checked.

You can write the cleanest, most citation-worthy content on your topic and get nothing. Nothing. Not. A. Single. Citation if the bots responsible for those citations were blocked before they ever read a word of it.

Copy the configuration above, check it against your current file, and deploy it. Then worry about what you're publishing.

What do you think? Have you checked your robots.txt lately? Let me know in the comments. And let me know if there are any improvements I should make to that document. I’m always open to feedback.

This is Don Crowther saying, just go do this stuff.

Frequently Asked Questions About AEO, GEO, AIO and AI Bots

AEO, GEO, and robots.txt basics

What is GEO optimization?

GEO (Answer Engine Optimization) means structuring your content so AI-powered search tools like Google AI Overviews, ChatGPT, Claude, Perplexity, and others surface your pages as cited sources. Instead of ranking in a list of ten blue links, the goal is to be the answer, or the source cited alongside it. It starts with making sure AI bots can actually reach your content.

What's the difference between AEO and GEO?

AEO focuses on coming up in special elements of search, like snippets, people also ask, etc. GEO is broader, covering any generative AI system that pulls from web content. In practice, the tactics overlap almost entirely. The biggest difference is that AEO tends to target traditional search features, while GEO includes Google AI Overviews and standalone tools like Claude and Perplexity as primary targets.

So you know, according to Google, it's all SEO and none of these distinctions matter.

Why does robots.txt affect AEO and GEO?

Because robots.txt is the first thing a crawler checks before deciding whether to read your site. If your robots.txt tells a bot to stay out, it stays out. No page on your site becomes eligible for citations if the bot responsible for those citations can't access the content. Every AEO and GEO tactic you apply is irrelevant until this prerequisite is met.

What happens if AI bots can't crawl my site?

They don't cite it. The AI systems powering ChatGPT citations, Claude citations, Perplexity answers, and Google AI Overviews all depend on bots that have crawled the relevant pages. A blocked bot means a missing source. Your content can be perfect: direct answers, clean structure, strong schema. It still won't appear in a single AI-generated response if the bot couldn't read it.

What is the difference between training crawlers and search indexers?

Training crawlers collect web content to build or improve AI models. Blocking them opts your site out of training data. Search indexers crawl your pages to serve live citations in AI products. They're what drives real-time answers in ChatGPT, Claude, and Perplexity. Blocking a training crawler has no effect on citation eligibility. Blocking a search indexer removes you from the citation pool entirely. Most sites that accidentally opted out of AI citations blocked both at the same time.

Should I block all AI bots to protect my content?

No. And this is the mistake that's costing sites citations right now. Blocking all AI bots simultaneously shuts out training crawlers AND the search indexers that drive live citations in ChatGPT, Claude, and Perplexity. The correct approach is surgical: block the training crawlers by name, leave the search indexers out of the block list, and let them fall through to the catch-all rule. Protecting your content from training and staying eligible for citations are not mutually exclusive. You just need the right configuration.

How do I know if my site is currently blocking AI search indexers?

Open your robots.txt file at yourdomain.com/robots.txt and search for OAI-SearchBot, Claude-SearchBot, and PerplexityBot. If any of them appear in a Disallow rule, you're blocking them. Also check whether you have a blanket User-agent: * block, then look at whether search indexers get an explicit Allow override. If they don't, they're blocked. Fix it before doing anything else for AEO or GEO.

Do AI bots actually have to follow my robots.txt?

No. robots.txt is a voluntary standard. There's no technical mechanism that forces compliance. A bot can ignore it entirely. The reason it works for the bots in this article: GPTBot, ClaudeBot, OAI-SearchBot, and the rest, is that the companies running them have publicly committed to honoring it and have business, legal, and reputational reasons to follow through. Malicious scrapers are a different story. robots.txt was never designed to stop them. If you want a hard technical block that actually denies access at the network level, that's a Cloudflare conversation, not a robots.txt conversation.

Search Indexers (allowed by default in the sample robots.txt file shown above)

What is OAI-SearchBot?

OAI-SearchBot is OpenAI's search indexer, the bot that crawls pages to serve citations in ChatGPT responses. It's not the same as GPTBot. GPTBot builds training data for ChatGPT. OAI-SearchBot handles live citations. Allowing it, by not explicitly blocking it, is how your content becomes citable in ChatGPT. If you blocked all OpenAI bots in the past without distinguishing between them, you blocked this one too.

What is Claude-SearchBot?

Claude-SearchBot is Anthropic's search indexer, separate from ClaudeBot. ClaudeBot is the training crawler: blocking it opts you out of your data being used to train Claude. Claude-SearchBot drives citations in Claude's responses. Not blocking it means Claude can cite your content. The names are similar enough that people confuse them, which is exactly how the blanket-block mistake happens.

What is PerplexityBot?

PerplexityBot is Perplexity's crawler. Perplexity is citation-first by design. Every answer it generates shows the sources it pulled from, with links back to the original pages. Allowing PerplexityBot means you're in the pool of potential sources. Blocking it means you're not, regardless of how well your content answers the question.

What is Googlebot, and how does it relate to AI?

Googlebot is Google's primary search crawler. A page has to be indexable by Googlebot before it's eligible for Google AI Overviews. If Googlebot can't reach it, AI Overviews can't surface it. Googlebot access is the baseline requirement for everything Google AI does with your content.

What is ChatGPT-User?

ChatGPT-User is OpenAI's user-initiated fetcher. When a ChatGPT user asks a question that requires pulling a live page, ChatGPT-User retrieves it in the moment. It's distinct from GPTBot, which builds training data, and from OAI-SearchBot, which maintains the search index. Blocking it can stop your page from being pulled into a live ChatGPT answer. OpenAI's crawler documentation no longer treats robots.txt as a dependable control mechanism for ChatGPT-User, so website owners should not rely solely on robots.txt if they need to restrict access. Blocking or otherwise restricting ChatGPT-User may reduce your chances of being used as a live source in ChatGPT responses.

What is Claude-User?

Claude-User is Anthropic's user-initiated retrieval agent. When a Claude user asks a question that requires accessing a webpage, Claude-User retrieves the content in real time. It is separate from ClaudeBot, which gathers training data, and Claude-SearchBot, which indexes content for search features. Anthropic states that Claude-User honors robots.txt directives, so blocking it prevents your content from being retrieved for live user queries. Leaving it unblocked allows your content to remain eligible for citation and retrieval within Claude.

What is Perplexity-User?

Perplexity-User is Perplexity's user-initiated retrieval agent. When a Perplexity user asks a question that requires live web access, Perplexity-User retrieves content on demand. It is separate from PerplexityBot, which is used for indexing. Perplexity states that its crawlers respect robots.txt directives, although its crawler practices have been the subject of public disputes and criticism from Cloudflare and some publishers. For publishers seeking visibility in Perplexity answers, Perplexity-User should generally be allowed access.

Training Crawlers (blocked in the sample robots.txt file shown above)

What is GPTBot?

GPTBot is OpenAI's training crawler. It crawls the web to collect data for training future versions of GPT models. Blocking it with Disallow: / opts your site out of that data collection. It has no role in ChatGPT's live citation system. That's OAI-SearchBot's job. Blocking GPTBot does not prevent ChatGPT from citing you.

What is ClaudeBot?

ClaudeBot is Anthropic's training crawler. It collects content for training Anthropic's models. Blocking it opts you out of training data. Claude's live citation system uses Claude-SearchBot, a separate bot with a separate user-agent string. Blocking ClaudeBot doesn't affect whether Claude cites your content.

What is Google-Extended?

Google-Extended is Google's dedicated opt-out for Gemini and Vertex AI training. Blocking it prevents your content from being used to train Google's AI models while keeping Googlebot access intact for regular search and AI Overviews. Google built this specifically so sites could opt out of AI training without losing search visibility. Use it.

What is Applebot-Extended?

Applebot-Extended is Apple's training crawler for Apple Intelligence, the AI features built into iOS and macOS. Blocking it opts out of Apple AI training. Standard Applebot, which handles Siri search results and Spotlight suggestions, is a separate bot and is unaffected. The "-Extended" suffix is Apple's equivalent of Google-Extended: a surgical opt-out without broader crawl consequences.

What is Meta-ExternalAgent?

Meta-ExternalAgent is Meta's training crawler. It collects web content to train the AI models behind Facebook, Instagram, WhatsApp, and Meta AI. Blocking it prevents your content from becoming Meta training data. Meta doesn't have a public citation-focused search indexer the way OpenAI and Anthropic do, so there's no citation tradeoff. Block it.

What is CCBot?

CCBot is the Common Crawl bot. Common Crawl is a nonprofit that publishes open web archives used as training data by a wide range of AI companies. It's one of the most widely used training data sources in the AI industry. Blocking CCBot reduces the availability of your content across a broad set of AI training pipelines, not just one company's product.

What is Bytespider?

Bytespider is ByteDance's crawler. ByteDance runs TikTok. Bytespider collects data for training AI models across ByteDance's products. It's not a search indexer. There's no TikTok citation system that requires access to your content. Blocking it is straightforward.

What is cohere-ai?

cohere-ai is Cohere's training crawler. Cohere builds AI models for enterprise applications. This bot collects web content for training those models. Cohere doesn't operate a public AI answer product that cites web sources, so there's no citation consideration when blocking it.

What is Amazonbot?

Amazonbot is Amazon's web crawler, primarily used for Amazon's AI and machine learning work. Some sources suggest allowing it for Alexa voice result eligibility, though Amazon hasn't published clear documentation on this relationship. If Alexa citations matter to your site, test before blocking. If they don't, blocking is the conservative choice.

What is Diffbot?

Diffbot is a data extraction company that turns web pages into structured data and sells that data to businesses, developers, and AI companies. It's not a search indexer. Blocking it prevents your content from being packaged and resold as training or enrichment data without your knowledge or consent.

What is AI2Bot?

AI2Bot is the Allen Institute for AI's crawler. AI2 is an academic research organization that builds datasets for AI research, including the Dolma dataset used to train the OLMo family of open-source models. AI2Bot collects web content for those research datasets. AI2 doesn't operate a public AI answer product that would cite your content in user-facing responses.

The Pomodoro Technique: Why Millions Use It (And Its Limitations)

Before we dive into the 48-Minute Technique, let's talk about the elephant in the room: the Pomodoro Technique.

If you're reading this, you've probably tried it. Maybe you still use it. And that's fine—it has its place.

What Makes the Pomodoro Technique Popular

The Pomodoro Technique is brilliantly simple:

• Work for 25 minutes straight
• Take a 5-minute break
• Repeat four times
• Take a longer 15-30 minute break

It's easy to understand, easy to implement, and it creates a sense of urgency. That timer ticking down pushes you to focus because you know you only have 25 minutes to make progress.

For people who struggle with procrastination or getting started on tasks, the Pomodoro technique is fantastic. It makes big projects feel manageable: "I don't have to write the whole chapter, I just have to write for 25 minutes."

The Problem with the Pomodoro Method

But here's where the Pomodoro Method falls short for serious knowledge work:

25 minutes is too short for deep work. Research on flow states indicates that it takes most people 15-20 minutes to achieve deep focus. Right when you're hitting your stride, the timer goes off and breaks your concentration.

Constant interruptions kill momentum. If you're doing creative work, such as writing, coding, strategic thinking, or design, you need longer blocks. Getting interrupted every 25 minutes is like trying to run a marathon with someone yelling at you to stop every quarter mile.

It doesn't align with how our brains actually function. Your brain operates on ultradian rhythms—natural cycles of high and low alertness that run about 90-120 minutes. Cutting these into 25-minute chunks fights against your biology.

Don't get me wrong: Pomodoro methods work great for simple tasks, administrative work, or when you're so scattered that you need training wheels to stay focused. But for the work that really matters? You need something better.

What Is Time Blocking? (And Why It Matters for Productivity)

Time blocking is the practice of scheduling specific blocks of time for specific tasks—rather than just keeping a to-do list and hoping you'll get to everything.

Instead of saying "I need to write that report today," you say "I'm writing that report from 9:00-10:30 AM, and nothing else is happening during that time."

Here's why this matters: research shows that time blocking significantly reduces decision fatigue. When you've already decided what you're working on and when, you eliminate hundreds of micro-decisions throughout your day about what to do next.

Time blocking also dramatically reduces context switching—that productivity killer where you bounce between tasks and lose significant focus every time you switch. Studies from the University of California, Irvine, found that it takes an average of 23-25 minutes to return to a task after an interruption is fully resolved.

The science is clear: our brains work better with structure than with chaos.

Introducing the 48-Minute Technique: A Science-Based Time Blocking Method

Here's the system I originally learned about from Alex Mandossian, and have practiced for over two decades of testing:

Work for 48 minutes straight. Take a 12-minute break. Repeat.

That's it. Simple, right?

But there's real science behind these specific numbers.

Why 48 Minutes?

This number wasn’t pulled out of thin air. Here's the reasoning:

It's long enough to enter flow state. Research on flow states shows that achieving deep focus typically takes 15-20+ minutes. With 48 minutes, you get 25+ minutes of high-quality, flow-state work. That's where the magic happens.

It's short enough to maintain intensity. Continue for much longer than 48 minutes, and your focus starts to degrade. Your brain gets tired. Quality drops. By stopping at 48 minutes, you're working at peak effectiveness the entire time.

It's based on ultradian rhythms. Your brain naturally cycles through periods of high and low alertness every 90 to 120 minutes. The 48-minute work sprint, combined with a 12-minute break, creates a perfect 60-minute cycle that you can repeat throughout the day without fighting against your biology.

It creates urgency without panic. You know you need to make progress in the next 48 minutes, but you're not in a frantic race like you might feel with 25 minutes. It's focused intensity, not stressed scrambling.

Why 12-Minute Breaks?

The breaks are just as important as the work:

It’s long enough for genuine recovery. Five minutes isn't enough to actually rest. You're still in work mode. Twelve minutes lets you truly shift gears—get up, move around, grab water, use the restroom, step outside. Your brain actually gets a break.

It’s short enough to avoid distraction death spirals. We've all done it: you take a "quick" break to check social media and suddenly 45 minutes have disappeared. Twelve minutes is long enough to recharge but short enough that you can't get completely derailed.

It prevents the "just one more minute" trap. When breaks are too short, you're tempted to skip them or cut them short. "I'll just finish this one thing..." With 12 minutes, the break feels substantial enough that you actually take it.

The 4:1 ratio is backed by research. Studies on sustained attention show that a 4:1 work-to-rest ratio is optimal for maintaining focus without burnout. The 48-minute to 12-minute ratio hits that mark perfectly.

The Real-World Results

I started using this technique because I needed to write a course. I was drowning in a sea of other tasks, and I knew that if I didn't create a system, the course would never get done.

Using the 48-Minute Technique for four blocks per day (about 3.2 hours of actual writing time), I completed an entire $2,000 course in just four weeks.

That's not superhuman productivity. That's just the power of sustained, focused work blocks without the constant interruptions that kill momentum.

Since then, I've used this technique to:

• Write a book
• Create training programs
• Write countless articles and blog posts
• Develop marketing strategies
• Even handle administrative tasks that I used to procrastinate on

The technique works because it aligns with how humans are naturally wired to work.

48-Minute Technique vs Pomodoro vs Traditional Time Blocking

Let me lay this out clearly so you can see exactly how these methods compare:

The 48-Minute Technique hits the sweet spot: long enough for real work, short enough to maintain intensity, with breaks that actually let you recover.

Benefits of the 48-Minute Technique for Different Professionals

This technique isn't just for writers and programmers. I've seen it transform productivity across every type of knowledge work.

For Remote Workers

Remote work is supposed to be flexible and freeing. Instead, for most people, it's an endless blur where work bleeds into personal time and you never feel like you're truly off the clock.

The 48-Minute Technique fixes this:

• Structures your unstructured days so you're not just randomly bouncing between tasks

• Creates clear boundaries between work time and personal time

• Prevents burnout by ensuring you actually take breaks instead of working straight through

• Combats Zoom fatigue with forced movement breaks between meetings

For Entrepreneurs & Business Owners

When you're running a business, everything feels urgent. You're constantly pulled in seventeen directions, and the important work—the strategic thinking, the business development, the creative work—never gets done.

The 48-Minute Technique helps you:

• Protect time for high-impact work instead of just firefighting all day

• Reduce decision fatigue by planning your focus blocks in advance

• Actually complete projects instead of having seventeen things 30% done

• Work ON your business instead of just IN your business

For Students

If you're studying for exams or working on major projects, you know the struggle: you sit down to study for "a few hours" and somehow accomplish very little while feeling completely exhausted.

The 48-Minute Technique transforms studying:

• Perfect length for a deep understanding of complex concepts

• Better retention than marathon study sessions

• Prevents burnout during finals week

• Builds sustainable habits instead of cramming

For Creative Professionals

Writers, designers, developers, strategists—anyone who does creative work needs long blocks of uninterrupted time to produce their best work.

The 48-Minute Technique gives you:

• Protection for your flow state without interruptions every 25 minutes
• Sustainable intensity that prevents creative burnout
• A framework for consistency, even when inspiration is lacking
• Permission to rest is built into your process

Best Tools & Apps for the 48-Minute Technique

You don't need fancy tools to make this work, but the right tools can make it easier.

Kitchen Countdown Timer

One of the easiest and most effective ways to implement the 48-Minute Technique is to purchase an inexpensive kitchen countdown timer, available from Amazon, WalMart, Target, or many other retailers. The thing I look for most in these is a screen that stays on as long as the timer is running, so you can always see how much time there is left, which has a motivational aspect for me.

Focus Timer Apps

Be Focused (Mac/iOS): Clean, simple, and customizable, allowing you to adjust the work/break intervals to 48/12. No frills, just a timer that works.

Focus@Will: Combines a timer with music scientifically designed to improve concentration. Worth trying if you work better with background music.

Forest: Gamifies focus by growing a virtual tree during your work session. If you leave the app, your tree dies. Surprisingly effective for phone addicts.

Session: Combines time blocking with a timer, so you can plan your entire day in 48-minute blocks.

Your phone's plain old timer: Honestly? Your phone's timer works fine, except for the feature that turns the screen off after x seconds of inactivity, which I don’t like. Don't overthink it.

Time Blocking Calendar Tools

Google Calendar: Free, simple, and you can color-code your 48-minute focus blocks to visually see your deep work time.

Calendly: Prevents others from booking meetings during your protected focus blocks.

Motion: Uses AI to automatically time-block your calendar based on your priorities. Expensive, but powerful.

Sunsama: Combines daily planning with time blocking. Great if you want to map out your entire day in advance.

Distraction Blockers

Freedom: Blocks distracting websites and apps across all your devices simultaneously. You can schedule blocks in advance or start one immediately.

Cold Turkey: The nuclear option for website blocking. Once you start a block session, you literally cannot access blocked sites until the timer runs out. No exceptions.

Focus Mode (macOS/iOS): Built into Apple devices. Free, and does a decent job of limiting notifications and app access.

Common Mistakes When Time Blocking (And How to Avoid Them)

Let me save you from the mistakes I made (and that I see other people make constantly).

Mistake #1: Not Scheduling Breaks

The breaks aren't optional. They're not a "nice to have." They're an essential part of the system.

If you skip breaks, you're not being more productive—you're just burning yourself out faster. Your fourth 48-minute block, without breaks, will likely be worth only 20 minutes of actual, focused work.

The fix: Treat breaks as seriously as work blocks. Set an alarm. Stand up. Leave your desk.

Mistake #2: Overestimating What You Can Accomplish in a given 48-minute block of time

People are wildly optimistic about how much they can get done in 48 minutes. They plan eight focus blocks in a day, get through three, and then feel like failures.

Here's reality: if you complete 3-4 high-quality focus blocks per day, you're doing great. Six is exceptional. Eight is probably unsustainable long-term.

The fix: Start with scheduling just two blocks per day. Once you see how much you actually accomplish, you can add more if needed.

Mistake #3: Not Protecting Your Time Blocks

You put focus blocks on your calendar, but then you let people schedule meetings during them. Or you check Slack "just for a second" and break your concentration.

The fix: Block focus time on your calendar and mark it as "busy." Tell your team when you're unavailable. Treat these blocks as seriously as you would a client meeting.

Mistake #4: Working Through Breaks

"I'm on a roll, I'll just finish this section..." Famous last words. Three hours later, you're mentally fried and your productivity has tanked.

The fix: Stop when the timer goes off. Always. Even mid-sentence. Trust the system.

Mistake #5: Being Too Rigid

Life happens. Sometimes you'll get interrupted. Sometimes you'll need to take a call. Sometimes a task will take three blocks instead of one.

That's fine. The technique is a tool, not a religion.

The fix: Adjust as needed, but don't use flexibility as an excuse to abandon the system entirely.

48-Minute Technique FAQ

What's the ideal work-to-break ratio for productivity?

Research on sustained attention suggests a 4:1 ratio is optimal—4 units of work to 1 unit of rest. The 48-Minute Technique (48 minutes work, 12 minutes break) hits this ratio perfectly. It's long enough for deep focus but short enough to prevent mental fatigue.

Is the 48-Minute Technique more effective than the Pomodoro Technique?

For deep work, complex tasks, and creative work—yes, absolutely. The Pomodoro method's 25-minute intervals are too short to achieve a state of flow for most knowledge workers. However, the Pomodoro technique works well for simple administrative tasks or when you're struggling with procrastination. Use the right tool for the job.

How many 48-minute sessions should I do per day?

Start with 1-2, though most people can sustain 4-6 high-quality focus blocks per day. That's 1.5, or 3.2 to 4.8 hours of genuine deep work. Beyond that, you're likely experiencing diminishing returns. Quality over quantity.

Can I use the 48-Minute Technique for studying?

Absolutely. It's ideal for studying because 48 minutes gives you enough time to understand complex concepts, work through practice problems, or engage with dense material. The built-in breaks prevent burnout that can occur from marathon study sessions.

What if I get interrupted during my 48-minute block?

If it's genuinely urgent, handle it and restart your timer for a fresh 48-minute block. If it can wait (and most things can), jot it down on a notepad and address it during your break. Train people to respect your focus blocks.

Why 48 minutes instead of 50 or 60?

The 48:12 ratio creates a perfect 60-minute cycle (48 + 12 = 60). This makes it incredibly easy to schedule multiple blocks throughout your day—each block is exactly one hour on your calendar. It's also based on the research around sustained attention and ultradian rhythms.

What should I do during my 12-minute breaks?

Move your body. Get water. Use the restroom. Step outside. Do light stretching. Look at something far away to rest your eyes. What you should NOT do: check email, scroll social media, or do anything screen-based. Your brain needs genuine rest.

Does time blocking really work?

Try the 48-Minute Technique Today

Here's my challenge to you: don't just read this and move on to the next productivity article.

Start with just ONE 48-minute block tomorrow.

Pick your most important task. Close all distractions. Set the timer. Work.

That's it.

You don't need to commit to doing this forever. You don't need to plan out your entire week. Just do one block and see what happens.

After one week of using the 48-Minute Technique consistently, most people report:

• Significantly more focused work completed each day, (many reporting a 40-60% increase in productivity)
• Lower stress levels because they're not constantly multitasking
• Better work-life boundaries
• A genuine sense of accomplishment at the end of each day

The technique works. But only if you actually use it.

So what are you waiting for? Your next 48 minutes start now.

Have you tried the 48-Minute Technique? I'd love to hear how it's working for you. Please leave a comment below and let me know what changes you're noticing in your productivity.

What if changing just one word or a single phrase on your lead generation landing page could double your email signups? That's what A/B split testing and landing page optimization can do for your business!

Most digital marketers create beautiful lead capture pages, drive traffic through SEO and paid advertising, and then wonder why their email list growth stagnates around 2-3% conversion rates. They guess at what might work better—maybe a different call-to-action in their button, perhaps a shorter headline—but they never actually test their assumptions with systematic split testing methodologies.

Meanwhile, data-driven growth hackers and conversion rate landing page optimization specialists are quietly doubling and tripling their email subscriber acquisition rates by systematically testing the webpage elements that actually move the needle in their sales funnels and marketing campaigns.

The difference isn't luck or bigger marketing budgets. It is methodology and systematic conversion funnel optimization.

This guide reveals the exact landing page split testing strategy that top conversion rate optimization specialists use to consistently achieve 15-25% email capture rates. Based on analysis of over 20 optimization studies and 300+ documented case studies, you'll discover the 10 prioritized elements that create the biggest conversion improvements, plus a 90-day implementation plan to double your own email signups through systematic website optimization.

Whether you're capturing 100 emails per month or 10,000, these proven growth hacking strategies and conversion optimization techniques will help you get more subscribers from the traffic you already have through systematic website testing and user experience optimization.

What is Landing Page Optimization for Email Opt-in Pages?

Landing page optimization for opt-in pages is the systematic process of improving webpage elements specifically designed to capture email addresses from visitors.

Unlike general landing page optimization that might focus on sales, downloads, or other actions, opt-in page optimization has one primary goal: maximizing the percentage of visitors who willingly provide their email address in exchange for a valuable offer.

Key Components of Opt-In Landing Page Optimization

Primary Goal

Convert anonymous website visitors into identifiable email subscribers who have given you permission to send them promotional email offers.

Core Elements to Optimize

• Lead magnet offer: The free resource, tool, or content offered in exchange for email signup
• Value proposition: Clear communication of what subscribers will receive and why it's valuable
• Email capture form: The actual form fields and submission process
• Trust signals: Elements that build credibility and reduce signup hesitation
• Call-to-action: The button or link that initiates the email capture process

Success Metrics

• Conversion rate: Percentage of visitors who provide their email address
• Cost per lead: How much it costs to acquire each new email subscriber
• Lead quality: How engaged and valuable the captured leads become over time

Unique Considerations for Opt-In Pages

Unlike product sales pages, opt-in page optimization focuses on:

• Reducing perceived risk: Email addresses are valuable, so visitors need strong reasons to share them
• Building trust quickly: First-time visitors must feel confident about data privacy and email frequency
• Emphasizing value exchange: The free offer must feel more valuable than the "cost" of sharing an email
• Minimizing friction: Simple, fast forms that don't overwhelm visitors with requests

Psychology-Focused Approach

Opt-in optimization heavily emphasizes psychological triggers like:

• Social proof (subscriber counts, testimonials)
• Authority (credentials, media mentions)
• Reciprocity (valuable free content)
• Commitment consistency (progressive form completion)
• Loss aversion (limited-time offers)

The ultimate goal is creating a frictionless experience where visitors eagerly provide their email address because the perceived value of what they'll receive far exceeds any concerns about sharing their contact information.

The Cost of Not Doing Landing Page Optimization Testing: Poor Email Capture Rates and Conversion Funnels

Here's the uncomfortable truth: if your landing page converts at 2% (the industry average), you're wasting 98% of your traffic.

Let's put that in real numbers. Say you're driving 10,000 visitors per month to your lead magnet landing page through paid ads, SEO, and social media. At a 2% conversion rate, you're capturing 200 email subscribers.

But what if you could use landing page optimization to double that to 4%? You'd get 400 subscribers from the same traffic—that's 200 additional potential customers every month without spending another dollar on traffic.

If those subscribers are worth $5 each to your business over time (a conservative estimate for most industries), that's an extra $1,000 per month in potential revenue. Over a year, that single improvement creates $12,000 in additional value.

And here's the compound effect: those email subscribers don't just disappear after one month. They continue generating value through purchases, referrals, and lifetime customer relationships through your email marketing automation and customer retention strategies. A 2% improvement in conversion rate can literally transform your business economics and marketing ROI.

What Landing Page Optimization Through A/B Split Testing Can Achieve

The results from systematic landing page split testing and conversion rate optimization often surprise even experienced digital marketers and growth hackers:

• Headline optimization: According to Neil Patel's analysis of 100+ case studies, headline changes can improve conversions by 25-106%, with one unnamed website achieving a 106% improvement by making their headline less vague and adding clear value propositions.
• Form field reduction: Multiple CRO studies consistently show 10-25% improvement for each field removed, with some companies seeing dramatic improvements when moving from complex forms to email-only capture.
• Social proof addition: MarketingSherpa case studies show social proof can increase conversions by 34-300%, though the impact varies significantly based on implementation and audience.
• Mobile optimization: Google's mobile speed research shows mobile sites that load in 5 seconds earn up to 2x more mobile ad revenue than those that load in 19 seconds, demonstrating the massive impact of mobile optimization on conversions.

These aren't outliers. They're the predictable results of testing the elements that actually influence human psychology, user experience design, and marketing psychology principles.

The ROI on A/B testing is remarkable because you're not buying more traffic—you're extracting more value from traffic you already have. Most tests cost less than $500 to implement but can generate thousands in additional revenue.

The 10 Highest-Impact Split Testing Elements for Landing Page Optimization to Build Your Email List

Tier 1: Foundation Elements Most Likely to Increase Conversion (Test These First)

Landing page optimization starts with your headline. Your headline shapes how visitors interpret everything else on your page. It's the lens through which they evaluate your offer, images, and call-to-action. A weak headline kills conversions before people read another word, making this the most critical element in your conversion optimization strategy.

Impact: Up to 60% conversion increase documented across multiple studies.

What to test:

Specific numbers versus generic claims: Test "Download Our 23-Point SEO Checklist" against "Get Our Complete SEO Guide." Numbers create specificity and set clear expectations.

Pain-point versus benefit focus: Compare "Stop Losing Customers to Competitors" with "Attract 50% More Qualified Leads." Both approaches work, but different audiences respond to different psychological triggers.

Question-based versus statement headlines: Test "Are You Making These 7 Marketing Mistakes?" against "Avoid These 7 Marketing Mistakes." Questions can increase engagement by creating curiosity gaps.

Theoretical example: Imagine you run a digital marketing course business. Your current landing page converts at 3% with the headline "Get Our Free Marketing Guide." You test it against "The 47-Point Digital Marketing Checklist That Generated $2.3M in Revenue." The specific, results-oriented version could easily convert at 5-8%, nearly doubling your lead generation without any additional traffic costs.

Every form field creates friction. Each additional piece of information you request reduces the likelihood that visitors will complete your form. The goal is finding the minimum viable information needed for your business goal whenever you are optimizing your landing pages.

Impact: Approximately 10% conversion increase for each field removed.

What to test:

Email-only versus name plus email: Test requiring just an email address against requesting name and email. Email-only forms typically outperform name+email forms by 15-20%.

Phone number inclusion: Adding a phone number field typically reduces conversions by 40% compared to email-only forms. Only include phone numbers if your sales process absolutely requires them.

Single-step versus multi-step forms: Test traditional single-page forms against multi-step forms that collect information progressively. Multi-step can reduce form abandonment by making the initial commitment feel smaller.

Field labels and placeholder text: Compare labels above fields versus placeholder text inside fields. Also test descriptive labels ("Your email address") versus simple labels ("Email").

Real data from form optimization studies: Analysis of 40+ lead generation form optimization studies shows:

• Email only: 100% baseline conversion rate
• Name + Email: ~15% decrease in conversions
• Name + Email + Company: ~25% decrease
• Name + Email + Phone: ~40% decrease
• 4+ fields: ~60% or greater decrease

Source: Compiled from multiple conversion optimization studies including data from Unbounce https://unbounce.com, VWO https://vwo.com, and CXL https://cxl.com research databases.

Theoretical testing example: Consider a B2B SaaS company offering a lead magnet to generate sales leads. They might test:

• Control: "Email and Company Name Required"
• Variation A: "Email Only - Instant Access"
• Variation B: "Email + Job Title for Personalized Results"
• Variation C: Two-step form starting with "What's your biggest marketing challenge?"

The email-only version will likely perform best for top-of-funnel lead capture, while the two-step version might generate higher-quality leads for sales follow-up.

Your CTA button is the final step in the conversion process. Everything else on your page should guide visitors toward clicking this button. Small changes in copy, design, or placement can create dramatic conversion improvements.

Impact: 20-40% improvement is typical for CTA optimization.

What to test:

"Yes, I want [specific benefit]" versus generic copy: Test psychological agreement phrases against standard CTAs. "Yes, I want the free templates" outperforms "Download Now" because it frames the action as accepting a benefit rather than completing a task.

Action-oriented versus passive language: Compare active verbs ("Get," "Grab," "Access") against passive phrases ("Submit," "Sign Up"). Action words create momentum and urgency.

Button size and visual prominence: Test larger buttons against standard sizes. Test high-contrast colors against brand colors. The CTA should be the most visually prominent element on the page.

Urgency and specificity: Test "Get Instant Access" versus "Download Now" versus "Send Me the Guide." More specific copy often outperforms generic alternatives.

Real examples of high-converting CTA copy:

• "Yes, I want the free ROI calculator"
• "Send me the 30-day content calendar"
• "Get my personalized audit results"
• "Download the case study now"
• "Access the exclusive toolkit"

Theoretical CTA testing example: An online fitness coach might test these variations:

• Control: "Download Now"
• Variation A: "Yes, I want the free workout plan"
• Variation B: "Get my personalized fitness roadmap"
• Variation C: "Send me the 30-day transformation guide"

The psychological agreement phrase (Variation A) often outperforms generic CTAs, while personalization (Variation B) can increase perceived value.

Tier 2: Trust and Credibility Elements

Modern internet users are increasingly concerned about email privacy and spam. Addressing these concerns directly can eliminate a major barrier to email signup.

Impact: Reduces form abandonment by 15-25% by addressing privacy concerns.

What to test:

"No spam" prominence: Test subtle privacy messaging against prominent "No spam, ever" statements. Some audiences need explicit reassurance.

Unsubscribe assurance: Compare "You can unsubscribe anytime" against no mention of unsubscribing. Ironically, making unsubscribing easy often increases initial signups.

Email frequency expectations: Test setting clear expectations ("Weekly insights, no daily spam") against generic opt-in language.

GDPR compliance messaging: For international audiences, test prominent compliance statements against minimal legal text.

Contrary to popular belief, adding social proof doesn't always improve email capture rates. In fact, many lead generation pages convert better without testimonials, about us sections, or other trust elements that can distract from the core conversion goal.

Why social proof can hurt opt-in rates:

• Creates distraction: Draws attention away from the lead magnet offer
• Introduces doubt: Testimonials about other services may not apply to the free resource
• Adds cognitive load: More elements to process before making a decision
• Suggests selling intent: Makes the page feel more commercial than helpful

What to test:

Clean, minimal page versus social proof inclusion: Test a focused page with just your offer, benefits, and opt-in form against a version with testimonials, company logos, or founder photos.

Testimonial relevance: If testing social proof, compare generic business testimonials against specific testimonials about the lead magnet itself. "This checklist saved me 3 hours" is more relevant than "Great company to work with."

Social proof placement: Test social proof above the fold versus below the opt-in form. Sometimes social proof works better as confirmation after someone has already mentally committed to downloading.

Social proof type: Compare subscriber counts ("Join 10,000+ marketers") against testimonials against company logos. Different audiences respond to different types of credibility signals.

Real testing example: A marketing consultant tested their lead magnet page with and without a testimonials section. The clean version without testimonials converted 34% better, likely because visitors focused entirely on the lead magnet value rather than being distracted by social proof about other services.

When social proof helps vs. hurts:

• Helps: When visitors are unfamiliar with your brand and need credibility
• Hurts: When your lead magnet offer is strong and visitors are already motivated
• Helps: For expensive or complex offers that require trust
• Hurts: For simple, valuable resources where trust isn't the main barrier

Theoretical social proof testing example: A business consultant might test:

• Control: Clean page with only lead magnet offer and form
• Variation A: Page with client testimonials and logos above the fold
• Variation B: Subscriber count ("Join 5,000+ business owners")
• Variation C: Social proof placed below the opt-in form

For an unknown consultant, Variation B (subscriber count) might provide credibility without distraction. For an established consultant, the clean version (Control) might perform best by maintaining focus on the lead magnet value.

Tier 3: Advanced Optimization Elements

Where and how you present your opt-in form significantly impacts conversion rates. The optimal placement depends on your content length, audience intent, and page design.

What to test:

Above fold versus after content: Test placing the opt-in form immediately visible versus after visitors have consumed your content. High-intent traffic often converts better with immediate forms; educational content may require trust-building first.

Inline versus sidebar versus popup: Compare different form presentations. Inline forms feel less intrusive; popups can capture exit intent; sidebars work for content-heavy pages.

The arrangement and emphasis of page elements guides visitor attention and influences conversion decisions.

What to test:

Single-column versus multi-column layouts: Test focused, linear page flows against traditional multi-column designs. Single-column layouts often perform better on mobile and create clearer conversion paths.

Benefit placement: Compare featuring benefits above the form versus below the form. Test bullet points versus paragraph format for benefit lists.

Psychological triggers like urgency and scarcity can motivate immediate action, but they must be authentic and relevant to be effective.

What to test:

Limited-time bonuses: Test adding time-sensitive bonuses ("Download this week and get our bonus checklist") against evergreen offers.

Countdown timers: For time-sensitive offers, test visible countdown timers against static urgency messaging.

Exit-intent technology detects when visitors are about to leave your page (by tracking mouse movement toward the browser's close button or address bar) and triggers a final conversion opportunity. This represents your last chance to capture visitors who have already decided to leave without subscribing.

Impact: Exit-intent popups typically achieve 2-4% conversion rates on their own, effectively recovering 20-40% of abandoning traffic that would otherwise be lost forever.

What to test:

Exit-intent popup versus no exit capture: Test implementing exit-intent technology against your current setup with no abandonment recovery. Even a basic exit popup often captures 2-4% of abandoning visitors.

Offer variations in exit popups: Compare your main lead magnet against exit-specific offers like "Wait! Get our quick-start checklist before you go" or "One more thing - grab our free toolkit." Sometimes, different offers work better for exit intent than your primary value proposition.

Exit popup timing and triggers: Test immediate exit-intent triggering versus delayed triggers (after 30 seconds on page). Also test scroll-based triggers (when someone scrolls up toward the browser controls) versus pure mouse-movement detection.

Exit popup design and messaging: Compare urgency-based messaging ("Don't miss out!") against helpful messaging ("Before you go, grab this free resource"). Test minimal designs against more elaborate popups with testimonials or social proof.

Exit-intent for different page types: Test exit popups on blog posts versus dedicated landing pages versus product pages. Other content types may require different exit strategies and offers.

Showing visitors exactly what they'll receive before they provide their email address can significantly reduce uncertainty and increase perceived value. Content previews act as "try before you buy" for your lead magnets, building trust and setting clear expectations.

Impact: Content previews can increase conversion rates by 15-35% by reducing the perceived risk and uncertainty of downloading unknown resources.

What to test:

Preview pages versus mystery content: Test showing actual pages/screenshots from your lead magnet against keeping the content mysterious. For ebooks, show the table of contents and sample pages. For templates, show screenshots of the actual templates.

Sample chapter or section access: Compare giving immediate access to a sample section (like Chapter 1 of an ebook or one template from a toolkit) against requiring email signup for any content access. Sometimes free samples increase trust and desire for the complete resource.

Video previews versus text descriptions: Test short video previews showing you walking through the resource against written descriptions. Video previews can be especially effective for courses, templates, or complex guides.

Interactive content previews: For tools, calculators, or templates, test allowing limited interaction before email capture. For example, let visitors use a budgeting template with sample data before requiring them to sign up for the blank template.

Social proof in previews: Test including download counts, testimonials, or usage statistics in your content preview sections. "Downloaded by 12,000+ marketers" can increase perceived value and reduce hesitation.

Frequently Asked Questions About Landing Page A/B Testing

How long should I run an A/B test on my landing page?

Run A/B tests for at least 2 weeks or until you reach statistical significance with a 95% confidence level. You need a minimum of 1,000 visitors per variation to get reliable results. Avoid stopping tests too early, even if one variation appears to be winning—statistical fluctuations can be misleading.

What's the most important element to test first on my email capture page?

Start with your headline and value proposition. This has the highest potential impact because it shapes how visitors interpret everything else on your page. Test specific, benefit-focused headlines against your current generic version.

How many visitors do I need to run an effective A/B test?

You need at least 1,000 visitors per variation to achieve statistical significance for most tests. For smaller changes or lower-impact elements, you may need 2,000-5,000 visitors per variation. Use a sample size calculator to determine exact requirements based on your current conversion rate.

Should I test multiple elements at once or one at a time?

Test one element at a time for clear, actionable results. Testing multiple elements simultaneously (multivariate testing) requires exponentially more traffic and makes it difficult to determine which change caused the improvement.

What's a good email capture conversion rate?

Industry averages range from 2-5%, but top performers achieve 15-25% conversion rates. With the right offer and optimization, exceptional results of 30-80% are possible for highly targeted campaigns with valuable lead magnets.

Do I need expensive tools to run A/B tests?

Start with built-in testing features in your existing tools like ThriveThemes, Kajabi, ClickFunnels, or Elementor Pro. Google Optimize is also free and sufficient for basic testing. Upgrade to

How do I know if my A/B test results are statistically significant?

Use your testing tool's built-in statistical analysis or a significance calculator. Look for 95% confidence level with at least 1,000 visitors per variation. Don't declare a winner based on early results—statistical significance takes time to develop.

What should I do if my A/B test shows no clear winner?

If results are inconclusive, either run the test longer to gather more data or test a different element with potentially higher impact. Sometimes "no result" is valuable data indicating your current version is already well-optimized for that element.

Can I A/B test landing pages with low traffic?

With under 1,000 monthly visitors, focus on qualitative research methods like user surveys, heatmaps, and customer interviews rather than A/B testing. These provide faster insights for optimization without requiring large sample sizes.

How often should I run A/B tests on my landing pages?

Implement an "Always Be Testing" approach with one test running at all times. Plan sequential tests that build on previous winners. Maintain a prioritized list of test ideas so you can immediately launch the next experiment when one completes.

Ready to Start A/B Testing? Get Expert Guidance

A/B testing transforms guesswork into growth, but getting started with split testing can feel overwhelming. The difference between successful conversion testing and wasted effort often comes down to having a proper strategy and executing it effectively.

A/B testing (also called AB testing or split testing) can increase small business conversion rates by 10-50% when implemented correctly (and sometimes even more, see the case study section below for examples,) yet less than 0.2% of websites actively use A/B testing tools. This massive gap creates a huge opportunity for small businesses to increase their conversion rates, increase the size of their email list through landing page optimization, build their profits, and gain competitive advantage through data-driven website optimization.

Key Takeaway: 

Many small businesses already have A/B testing and split testing capabilities built into their existing website builders and marketing platforms - they just don't know it. This comprehensive A/B testing guide reveals how to unlock these conversion testing features, or buy more powerful tools, and implement systematic website testing that delivers measurable results without breaking your budget.

What is A/B Testing? A Complete Beginner's Guide

Simple Definition: A/B testing (also known as split testing) is a method that compares two versions of a webpage, email, or marketing element to determine which performs better using statistical analysis. Instead of guessing what your customers want, you let them tell you through their actual behavior.

Why Test? Why Not Just Make the Changes and Save Time and Effort?

Great question. The answer is that most of us guess wrong about half the time. When we consider making a change to a webpage, we instinctively process it through our personal likes and dislikes, as well as our experience, and choose what we think will yield the best results.

Unfortunately, proven through hundreds of tests, most marketers guess correctly only about half the time. Even the most experienced A/B split testers, those who have run 1,000 tests or more, are still wrong about 30% of the time.

In short, if you rely on your personal opinion and choose not to test, you’re almost certainly leaving money on the table, with conversion rates unchanged and profits unrealized.

Trust me, it’s worth it to establish a culture of testing virtually everything in your company!

How A/B Testing Works: Step-by-Step

A/B testing follows a simple process:

1. Create two versions (A and B) of the same webpage or element (most tools automatically do this for you)
2. Randomly split your traffic between the two versions (again, most tools do this automatically)
3. Measure performance using conversion tracking
4. Analyze results for statistical significance
5. Implement the winning version for all the traffic visiting that page

In different words, here's how split testing works: half your visitors see Version A (the original), while the other half will see Version B (your variation with one changed element). After collecting sufficient data, you can confidently determine which version converts better and implement the winner across all your traffic.

The Business Impact of A/B Testing for Small and Medium-Sized Businesses

The numbers speak for themselves when it comes to the effectiveness of website testing. A Harvard Business School study found that A/B testing adoption leads to a 5-20% increase in page visits. Currently, 60% of companies use A/B testing for conversion rate optimization, with another 34% planning to adopt split testing - but most of these are larger enterprises.

This creates a golden opportunity for small businesses. While your competitors rely on guesswork, you can make data-driven decisions that systematically improve your marketing performance. Unlike expensive website redesigns that can backfire, conversion testing lets you make incremental improvements with minimal risk.

Consider this: if A/B testing helps you increase your conversion rate from 2% to 4%, you've just doubled your revenue without spending an extra dollar on advertising.

Why Most Small Businesses Don't Use Split Testing (And Why They Should)

Many small business owners believe A/B testing is too complex, expensive, or requires massive traffic volumes. These misconceptions prevent them from accessing one of the most powerful tools in digital marketing optimization.

The Reality About A/B Testing:

• You can start website testing with just 1,000 monthly visitors to a page
• Many website builders include A/B testing features in the tools you're already paying for
• Setting up a basic conversion test takes less than 30 minutes
• Even "failed" split tests provide valuable insights about your customers

The truth is, if you're running any digital marketing campaigns, you can't afford NOT to use A/B testing. Every day you delay is potential revenue left uncollected.

A/B Testing Tutorial: A Step-by-Step Implementation Guide

Success in A/B testing and split testing comes from systematic execution, not random experimentation. Follow this proven website testing process to ensure your conversion tests yield reliable and actionable results.

Phase 1: A/B Testing Setup and Planning

Choose Your Focus Page for Split Testing

Start with your highest traffic pages that have clear conversion goals. You need a minimum of 1,000 monthly visitors to a page for fast, reliable A/B testing; however, 5,000+ visitors will yield results faster and with greater confidence in your split tests.

Ideal pages for conversion testing include:

• Lead generation pages with forms
• Homepage (if it has a clear conversion goal)
• Landing pages from advertising campaigns
• Product pages with purchase buttons
• Email signup pages

Avoid A/B testing pages with multiple competing goals or extremely low traffic.

Form Clear A/B Testing Hypothesis

Never run split tests on random changes. Every A/B test should start with a clear hypothesis based on data or user feedback. Use this template for your conversion testing:

"If we change [specific element] from [current version] to [new version], then [specific metric] will improve because [logical reason]."

Here’s a good A/B testing hypothesis example: "If we change our CTA button from 'Learn More' to 'Get Free Quote,' then form submissions will increase because the new copy is more specific about the value and action."

Poor split testing hypothesis example: "If we test a red button, conversions might improve."

And here’s something I’ve found incredibly valuable - create a document tracking every test you run. For each test, list your hypothesis, what was tested, dates of the test, the numbers, the action derived from the test, and the next test you plan to run based on that information. This helps you be more intentional and allows you to answer questions in the future, possibly eliminating the need for a future test.

Test Only One Thing at a Time

What’s the most common mistake people make in split testing? They try to test multiple changes (variables) simultaneously.

The problem of doing that is that you can’t tell what part of the test caused your results to change. And, sometimes you’ll inadvertently create a situation where one change increases conversion, while another decreases it, resulting in no improvement.

That’s why we always recommend testing only ONE element at a time, especially when starting your split testing program. 

What Tests Tend to Yield the Highest Conversion Rate Increases?

Many people ask, “What should I test?” There are many options, but most probably won’t give you a significant increase in your conversion rate.

That’s why we recommend starting with tests like these, which are common high-impact possibilities for conversion testing:

• Headlines (often the highest impact change in A/B testing)
• CTA button text
• Hero images or product photos
• Value propositions or benefit statements
• Form fields (number and types)
• Testimonials
• Social proof placement

Again, a reminder - testing multiple elements simultaneously in your A/B tests makes it impossible to know which change caused any improvement.

Use Free A/B Testing Calculators for Planning

Before launching any conversion test, use free online A/B testing calculators to determine required sample sizes and test duration:

• CXL's AB Test Calculator - Comprehensive planning and analysis tool with clear explanations for website testing
• Optimizely's Sample Size Calculator - Helps estimate how long your A/B test needs to run

These A/B testing tools prevent common mistakes, such as ending conversion tests too early or running split tests that can never reach statistical significance.

Phase 2: A/B Testing Implementation

Traffic Allocation for Split Testing

Use a 50/50 split for most A/B tests unless you have specific reasons to do otherwise. Ensure your A/B testing tool randomly assigns visitors to avoid bias from timing, traffic sources, or user behavior patterns.

Duration Planning for A/B Testing

Although split tests are measured by the number of results, not time, most small businesses simply don’t receive enough traffic to an individual webpage to achieve statistically significant results from a test quickly.

You should therefore plan on running conversion tests for a minimum of 1-2 weeks to account for weekly patterns in user behavior. However, the most critical factor is reaching statistical significance - many tests are stopped before achieving this, leading to false conclusions.

Most successful split tests on small business websites run for 2-6 weeks, depending on traffic volume. Resist the temptation to stop early if you see promising results in your A/B testing dashboard unless those results are statistically significant, as shown by a testing tool.

Phase 3: A/B Testing Analysis and Implementation

Statistical Significance in Split Testing

Aim for 95% confidence level before declaring a winner in your A/B tests. This means there's only a 5% chance your results occurred by random chance. Use one of these free A/B testing calculators to verify significance rather than relying solely on your testing platform.
Here are 3 free split test significance calculators:

1. VWO's A/B Test Significance Calculator

• URL: https://vwo.com/ab-test-significance-calculator/
• Features: Simple input fields for visitors and conversions, shows statistical significance with confidence levels, includes a sample size calculator

2. Evan Miller's A/B Testing Calculator

• URL: https://www.evanmiller.org/ab-testing/chi-squared.html
• Features: Multiple statistical tests available (chi-squared, t-test), detailed explanations of the math behind the calculations, no-frills academic approach

Each calculator will help you determine if your test results are statistically significant, typically using a 95% confidence level as the standard threshold for significance. You'll need to input your sample sizes and conversion numbers for each variation to get the significance results.

What if a Test Doesn’t Achieve Statistical Significance?

Most people are unaware that many tests fail to reach statistical significance when exposed to a reasonable number of participants. In fact, only 1 out of 7.5 A/B tests typically shows a significant improvement. This doesn't mean those conversion tests "failed" - they still provided valuable data about what doesn't work.

If, and when that happens to you, don’t feel frustrated. Feel glad that you now have an additional set of data proving that the change you tested was not sufficient to significantly affect conversions. Note the results in your testing log and proceed to the next test.

Interpreting Your Test's Results

It’s essential to consider more than just conversion rates in your split tests. Ask yourself about its:

• Practical significance (is the improvement meaningful for your business?)
• Consistency across different user segments
• Impact on secondary metrics
• Long-term implications

Document everything from your A/B testing program, including tests that show no significant difference. These insights inform future split tests and help build institutional knowledge.

Implementation After A/B Testing

When you have a clear winner from your conversion testing:

1. Implement the winning variation for all traffic
2. Monitor performance for 1-2 weeks to ensure results hold
3. Plan your next A/B test based on learnings
4. Share split testing results with your team to build a culture of testing

Common A/B Testing Mistakes That Hurt Your Results

Learning from others' mistakes in split testing saves time and prevents false conclusions that can hurt your business. Avoid these common conversion testing pitfalls.

Website Testing Without Sufficient Traffic

The Problem: Many small businesses attempt A/B testing with insufficient traffic, resulting in inconclusive results or false positives in their split tests.

The Reality: You need a minimum of 5,000 unique visitors for reliable statistical significance in website testing, though conversion tests can work with smaller numbers if you're patient.

The Solution: If website traffic is low, start with email A/B testing. 89% of US companies test email campaigns because you can get meaningful results with smaller lists. Test subject lines, send times, or email content in addition to website A/B testing.

The Biggest Mistake: Testing Too Many Elements at the Same Time in Split Tests

The Problem: Testing headlines, images, and CTA buttons simultaneously in your A/B tests makes it impossible to know which change drove results.

Better Approach: Test one element at a time in your conversion testing. Start with the element most likely to impact your primary goal. Once you have a winner from your A/B test, test the next element.

Exception: Only test multiple elements if you're comparing completely different page concepts (like comparing a long-form vs. short-form landing page) in your split testing.

Stopping Split Tests Too Early

The Second Biggest A/B Testing Mistake: 80% of conversion tests are stopped before reaching statistical significance. Early results from split testing are often misleading due to small sample sizes or timing factors.

Why It Happens: Business pressure to make quick decisions, excitement about early positive results, or impatience with the A/B testing process.

The Solution: Set test duration in advance based on traffic calculations for your conversion testing. Stick to your plan regardless of early results. If you must check A/B testing results early, do it only as a sanity check, not to make decisions.

Ignoring Mobile Users in A/B Testing

The Problem: For most businesses, over 60% of web traffic is mobile, yet many only test desktop experiences in their conversion testing.

The Solution: If you have sufficient traffic, run separate A/B tests for mobile and desktop users. Mobile users behave differently and may respond to different optimizations. At a minimum, ensure your split test variations work well on mobile devices.

A/B Testing Examples: Real Case Studies with Results

Learning from real-world examples helps you understand what's possible and avoid common pitfalls. These case studies demonstrate that significant improvements often come from seemingly small changes.

Case Study 1: Beckett Simonon - Website A/B Testing Strategies for an Ethical Shoe Company

The Business: Beckett Simonon sells handcrafted leather shoes online with a focus on ethical manufacturing and sustainability. Like many direct-to-consumer brands, they needed to improve their paid acquisition effectiveness while maintaining their premium positioning.

The Challenge: Despite having quality products and strong brand values, their conversion rates weren't meeting expectations. They suspected their product pages weren't effectively communicating their unique value proposition to visitors arriving from paid ads.

The Test: Rather than redesigning entire pages, they decided to test adding a storytelling panel that highlighted their sustainability practices and craftsmanship process. This wasn't just marketing copy - it was authentic content about their ethical business practices and the skilled artisans who create each pair of shoes.

The Results: This seemingly simple addition resulted in a 5% increase in sales conversion rate with an annualized ROI of 237%. The test proved that their target customers genuinely cared about the story behind the products and were willing to pay premium prices when they understood the value.

Key Lesson: Don't underestimate the power of storytelling in e-commerce. Values-based messaging can significantly impact purchase decisions, especially for premium products. Sometimes adding context is more powerful than removing friction.

Case Study 2: Zalora - Conversion Rate AB Testing for a Fashion E-commerce Platform

The Business: Zalora operates as a central e-commerce platform specializing in fashion across Asian markets. With millions of visitors and thousands of products, even minor improvements in conversion rates translate to substantial revenue increases.

The Challenge: Their analytics revealed that many users were adding items to their cart but abandoning the checkout process. Customer service data suggested that shoppers were unaware of key benefits, such as free returns and delivery options, creating uncertainty at the crucial moment of purchase.

The Test: They redesigned product pages to display trust signals and guarantees prominently. They tested three variations:

• Control: Standard product page with minimal policy visibility
• Variation 1: Prominently displayed free return policy and delivery information with clear visual hierarchy
• Variation 2: Alternative layout placing policy information in different locations

The Results: Variation 1 achieved a 12.3% increase in checkout rate. The improvement stemmed from better CTA button uniformity and the strategic placement of trust signals where users needed reassurance the most.

Key Lesson: Hidden value propositions are missed opportunities. Trust signals, such as free returns, guarantees, and delivery information, should be visible exactly when customers need that reassurance to move forward in the buying process.

Case Study 3: PriceCharting - Landing Page Split Testing for a Video Game Pricing Tracker Site

The Business: PriceCharting provides current and historic pricing data for video games, helping collectors and gamers make informed buying and selling decisions. They monetize through premium features and detailed reports.

The Challenge: While they had good traffic to product pages, click-through rates on their primary call-to-action weren't meeting expectations. Users seemed interested in the content but weren't taking the desired action.

The Test: They tested a simple change to their CTA button text:

• Version A: "Download"
• Version B: "Price Guide"

The Results: This minor text change led to a staggering 620.9% increase in click-throughs. The new copy is better aligned with user intent and clarifies exactly what value they'd receive.

Key Lesson: Sometimes the most minor changes yield the most significant results. Word choice matters enormously in calls-to-action. "Price Guide" felt more valuable and specific than the generic "Download," better matching what users actually wanted.

Case Study 4: Ubisoft - Sales Page Conversion Testing for a "For Honor" Buy Now Page

The Business: Ubisoft, the gaming giant, was optimizing the purchase page for its "For Honor" video game. Even large companies benefit from systematic testing to improve conversion rates.

The Challenge: Their "Buy Now" page had a complex buying process that required significant scrolling and multiple decisions. Analytics revealed that users were dropping off at various points in the process.

The Test: They completely overhauled the page to simplify the buying process:

• Reduced up-and-down scrolling requirements
• Streamlined decision points
• Simplified the entire purchase flow
• Made key information immediately visible

The Results: Conversions increased from 38% to 50% (a 32% relative improvement), and overall lead generation increased by 12%. The simplified experience removed friction that was preventing purchases.

Key Lesson: Complex buying processes cost sales. When in doubt, simplify. Every additional click, scroll, or decision point is an opportunity for users to abandon the process.

Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs) About A/B Testing

How much traffic do I need to start A/B testing?

Ideally, you'll want a minimum of 1,000 monthly visitors to the page you want to test, though 5,000+ provides more reliable results and faster conclusions for your split testing. Focus on your highest-traffic pages first to get meaningful data quickly from your conversion testing.

If your website traffic is low, start with email A/B testing. You can achieve statistically significant results with email lists as small as 1,000 subscribers when testing elements such as subject lines or send times.

How long should I run an A/B test?

Run split tests for a minimum of 1-2 weeks to account for weekly patterns in user behavior, but continue until you reach statistical significance. Most successful A/B tests run 2-6 weeks, depending on traffic volume.

The key is patience with your conversion testing. 80% of businesses stop A/B tests too early, leading to false conclusions. Use the free calculators mentioned in this guide to determine the right duration for your specific split testing situation.

What if my A/B test shows no significant difference?

Don't be surprised, this happens in about 86% of split tests - it's completely normal! Use it as a valuable learning experience: either your hypothesis was incorrect, or the change wasn't impactful enough to matter to users in your conversion testing.

Document your A/B testing findings and proceed on to test something else. "Failed" split tests often provide the most valuable insights about what doesn't matter to your customers, helping you focus future conversion testing efforts on more impactful changes.

How much should I budget for A/B testing tools?

Many website builders include split testing features in plans you're already paying for. Check your current platform first before buying additional A/B testing tools.

If you need standalone conversion testing tools, budget $300-1,000/month depending on your traffic volume. Also factor in 5-10 hours of staff time monthly for A/B test management and analysis.

Can I run A/B tests on low-traffic pages?

Start with email A/B testing, social media testing, or ad copy testing if website traffic is low. These channels can provide quicker results with smaller audiences for your conversion testing.

For A/B testing on your website, focus on your highest-traffic pages first. You can also increase traffic to specific pages through targeted advertising campaigns to reach the minimum sample sizes needed for split testing.

Document your findings and move on to testing something else. "Failed" tests often provide the most valuable insights about what doesn't matter to your customers, helping you focus future efforts on more impactful changes.

Can I do email A/B Split Testing?

Absolutely, in fact, email AB split testing is a great idea, especially if you don't have a lot of day-to-day traffic to your site. 

Another advantage of email testing is that you typically receive answers in days, if not hours, which is something most sites cannot do with webpage testing strategies due to low traffic volumes.

With email conversion testing, you can measure elements such as subject lines, calls to action, copy length, image inclusion, specific image testing, CTA buttons, tone, and copy, among others.

Contact your email service provider to determine what options they offer for email A/B split testing. Alternatively, you can conduct the test yourself by randomly splitting your list into parts and sending different versions of the email to each part.

Ready to Start A/B Testing? Get Expert Guidance

A/B testing transforms guesswork into growth, but getting started with split testing can feel overwhelming. The difference between successful conversion testing and wasted effort often comes down to having a proper strategy and executing it effectively.

Want personalized guidance for your specific business?

Book a free 45-minute A/B testing strategy consultation where we'll:

• Audit your current tools and identify built-in split testing capabilities
• Review your highest-impact A/B testing opportunities
• Define your needs, whether it’s initial setup and training, complete done-for-you implementation, or something in between
• Determine how our team of professional marketers can help you improve your conversion rates and profitability through split testing

What is a Testimonial?

A testimonial is a statement from a real customer describing their experience with your product or service.

Simple definition. But in practice, testimonials come in three forms: written quotes, video recordings, and case studies. They're sometimes called reviews (on Google, Amazon, or Yelp), success stories, or endorsements.

Whatever you call them, they do the same job: they let your happy customers do the selling for you.

Imagine how your life would be different if you had

Dozens Or Even Hundreds of Amazing Testimonials You Could Use To Market Your Business?

If you don’t, this article will solve your problem because…

You Need a System to Ask For, Gather, and Catalog Customer Testimonials, Reviews, and Case Studies!

Customer testimonials, also known in other industries as reviews or case studies, are a powerful way to build trust and increase sales.

Testimonials and Reviews Increase Sales

In just a moment, I’m going to show you how to ask for testimonials (and get them,) but first, I want to show you just two pieces of data among hundreds I’ve collected about testimonials:

What Makes a Strong Testimonial?

Most testimonials are weak. "I loved it!" tells a prospect exactly nothing.

The testimonials that actually drive sales follow a specific pattern. They name the before (what the customer's situation was like), the turning point ("and then I found..."), and the after (what actually changed). Specific numbers make them hit harder. "I saved three hours a week" beats "it saved me time" every single time.

A real name, job title, and photo make it believable. A vague first name and no photo? Prospects assume you made it up.

That's why the template in Step 2 of your testimonial generator is so important. It's the difference between "I loved the course!" and a 200-word story that closes sales for you.

Asking For Reviews and Testimonials

So we can agree that testimonials are a good thing, but…

The problem with asking for testimonials and reviews is that most people, myself included, are reluctant to ask for them. It’s part of our cultural upbringing - even if well deserved, asking someone for a compliment is looked down upon in most societies.

So, even though most of us consistently delight our customers, most of us don’t have testimonials available to use in our marketing.

Ironically, our reluctance to ask for testimonials is different from the willingness of a happy customer to give one. 71% of customers will leave a review for a business if asked. (Search Engine Land)

So, since most customers are willing to provide a testimonial or a review, the only challenge we have is to find a way to get past our natural reluctance to ask for them in a way that consistently, automatically, generates testimonials for our business. 

Beware: FTC Rules About Testimonials Should Never Be Ignored

One thing worth knowing before you build your system: The FTC (the Federal Trade Commission in the U.S.) has strict rules about testimonials, and the consequences of disobeying them are incredibly punitive.

(In other words, you need to know, understand, and abide by their rules, or else...)

• You can ask customers to share their experience, but you can't tell them what to say.
• You can't pay for a positive review without disclosing it.
• And testimonials need to reflect results customers can typically expect, not exceptional outliers without a clear disclosure.

The template in Step 2 below keeps you compliant because it guides the format, not the content. If you want the full rules, read these FTC endorsement guidelines.

How To Get More Testimonials

What if there was an easy way to solve this problem once and for all?

The solution to this problem is for you to have a system to request, gather, and catalog testimonials so they are always available when needed.

That kind of system is called a testimonial generator.

What is a Testimonial Generator?

A testimonial generator is a system designed to ask for testimonials in a non-embarrassing way. Then to gather, store, categorize, and catalog the resulting testimonials, so they are always available when needed.

Here is a simple, step-by-step process I recommend you create so you will have your own testimonial generator to permanently eliminate the problem of needing more or high-quality enough testimonials to market your business.

And, by the way, even if you’re just getting started and haven’t offered your course, product, or service yet, I suggest you create your testimonial generator right now, so you can begin gathering testimonials with your very first customer.

The entire process takes about a day to complete. I suggest you create yours this weekend.

How to Create a Testimonial Generator

1. Write a series of three to five testimonial/review request emails.

These emails can be short and straightforward. They can be as easy as “Did you like [product name?]  Click here to share your feedback.

The first email specifically asks for a testimonial.

A second one asks for a testimonial or feedback.

And a third one just asks for feedback.

That way, even those who had a frustration will feel open to sharing it with you (and negative feedback can be just as valuable for your business as positive, giving you a chance to fix your problems and improve your product/company.)

Email Templates to Ask for a Testimonial

Here's what those emails can look like:

Email 1 (direct ask):

Subject: Did [Product Name] help you?

Hey [First Name],

Quick question: has [Product Name] made a difference for you?

If it has, I'd love to hear about it. Would you take 3 minutes and share your experience here? [LINK]

Your story could help someone who's on the fence make the right call.

Thanks,
[Your Name]

Email 2 (softer):

Subject: I need your honest feedback

Hey [First Name],

I'm always looking for ways to make [Product Name] better.

Would you take a minute and share what worked for you, and anything that could be improved? [LINK]

There are no wrong answers. I read every response personally.

[Your Name]

Keep the third email even simpler, just asking for "any feedback at all." Some of your best testimonials will come from that third send.

2. Create a page that teaches people how to give a good testimonial

And that provides a customer testimonial template

We do this because most people, though they may have loved your product and want to tell the world about how great it is, could be better at creating testimonials that you can use to increase sales.

The easy solution is to create a short set of instructions that trains them on how to give a compelling testimonial.

Note, this is a customer testimonial template showing them what type of information would be best - not instructions on what to say. That would be unethical.

Here’s a sample of a customer testimonial template:

You’ll want to customize that message to your specific product or situation.

It also helps to provide a couple of examples on that page that people can use as models for their testimonials.

3. Put this series of email messages into an email autoresponder

And schedule them to go out at the “right time” for your product

What’s the right time? It all depends on your product and your customer’s experiences with it. 

If you’re selling a course, you may want to schedule these to go out close to the end of your program, so they will have consumed most of it and already started to see the transformations in their life.

If it’s a physical product, I suggest these start a few days after they have received your product and have had a chance to use it.

The key here is to build this as an automatic series of emails triggered by their purchase that automatically delivers these requests starting x days later.

That way, you never have to think about it. Once set up, you don’t have to do anything to trigger the process, so you won’t procrastinate or rationalize it because you’re uncomfortable asking for feedback.

4. Provide a simple video testimonial tool

That makes it easy for them to give you a video testimonial

There are many tools that are explicitly designed to make it easy for people to record and submit video testimonials. 

Since most everyone will be seeing your testimonial generator emails on their cellphone (allowing for easy video recording) or a computer with a built-in webcam, these tools work incredibly well. Using tools that simplify the process of recording a testimonial will significantly increase not only the number of testimonials you’ll get, but result in your receiving more video testimonials. (This is great because video testimonials are the most effective sales-generating format for testimonials.)

Simply google “automatically gather testimonials” to see a list of these tools. Many of them also offer the ability to store, categorize, and catalog the resulting testimonials.

5. Create a system for thanking and rewarding those who give you feedback or a testimonial

Always be sure to say thank you!

Not only is it polite to thank someone who goes to the effort to do a favor for you, but this is also just good business because a simple thank you will go a long way towards causing them to be repeat customers for you.

Some recommend creating yet another automated thank-you email. 

You need to do more than that. 

Personally, I recommend:

(“Hi Ashley, this is [your name]. I wanted to personally thank you for saying such nice things about _____. (or for providing feedback about _____ if their comments discussed improvements you needed to make.)

Then continue to talk to them for a few moments.

These services will then send your video to that person’s email, with a nice animated gif in that email and a link to click to watch the whole thing.

They will also give you tracking information, so you can see whether they watched your video or not. (If your results are like mine, don’t be surprised to see many people watching your video more than once!)

Whatever you do, and however you choose to do it, I recommend finding a way to say thank you. Gratitude is good, and it goes a long way in developing lasting relationships with people.

Now, you probably think you’re done - LOL.

6. Good testimonial generators need a system that stores, categorizes, and catalogs the testimonials you receive

So you can use them effectively

Having a cataloging system is also important because if you’re doing a good job, you will be getting testimonials in lots of other places outside of your testimonial generator system, like Facebook, comments in your course portal, emails, etc. 

You need a way to:

Depending on the number of testimonials you’re getting, this system can be as simple as creating a folder in a Google Drive to store them and a Google Doc or Sheet to catalog them. You could build a database if you’re getting hundreds of them.

Hint: I recommend you transcribe all video and audio testimonials you receive and any screenshots you capture and put those words into your cataloging system. Having everything in searchable text format makes it far more accessible and less time-consuming when you want to use them later.

Yes, this all takes work, but I strongly recommend you do it as you receive them rather than wait until when you need to use them. Time is always tighter as you prepare to launch or relaunch a product.

Another hint: once you’ve set up your cataloging system, the cataloging process can be 100% outsourced.

7. Go deeper with your best testimonials and reviews

Take the best testimonials to the next step by turning them into case study interviews

A case study can be as simple as a recorded zoom conversation or as fancy as putting a videographer on a plane to visit them at home and create a cinematic-style piece of art you can feature in many places in your marketing.

When you find potential stories like this, make sure you call them out in your cataloging process and take the next step with plenty of time to gather what you need before your next launch.

This entire process can be invaluable for your business, resulting in more sales, repeat customers, and positioning you as one of the best players in your market.

And the most significant advantage is that you can create it all in less than a day.

I strongly recommend you do!

“Just go do this stuff!”

More Training On Gathering And Using Testimonials

What is the 9 Word Email

Here's how it works. It's very, very simple. The subject line of that email is their name. So the entirety of the subject line is Don or Mary or whatever their name actually is. Then the body copy of that email is a simple question. Are you still looking for ______?

That's it. Nothing else. No name, no logo, no button to click. No anything.

Their name, a simple question. Are you still looking for blank? And you send it.

Watch this Video to Learn all About the 9 Word Email

9 Word Email Examples

Let me give you several examples of the 9 word email in use.

The subject line is their name, then the body could be:

• Are you still looking at growing your blog traffic?
• Are you still looking to get rid of your stress?
• Are you still looking to have your house painted?
• Are you still considering buying a new car?

Notice it can be like different versions of those words.

Why the 9 Word Email Works

First off, this is a very personal message. It's personal because you would never send this to somebody unless they had expressed to you an interest in something.

If they have opted in to get a report about improving email deliverability, then you can follow the standard email marketing practice of giving them a series of emails helping them to get their emails delivered into the inboxes of the recipients.

Then three months later, you can send them a nine-word email that says, are you still looking to improve your email deliverability?

Some people will respond with a no. The emails you’ve sent have done the job.

But others will still be looking. And you can use the conversation that originates from this email to sell them your course, your DFY services, coaching, consulting, etc.

It Works Because it’s Simple

And here's the thing that I love about this. People tend to respond to simple, direct questions that are targeted right at their needs.

The beautiful thing is there's, there's nothing here that says, click here to do something. So what do they do? They hit reply and they talk to you.

The 9-word email starts a personal conversation that conversation with the people who are still looking to have their problems solved. That conversation turns into a stronger relationship, which makes it easier for you to eventually make a sale.

Improved Deliverability

And by the way, this significantly improves your email deliverability because they've responded to you and Gmails and Hotmails and Comcasts of the world (the ESPs - Email Service Providers) say, “Oh, clearly they wanted to talk to this person because they responded to their email.”

So, your deliverability score improves as a result!

Variations on the 9 Word Email

Let me throw out two variations. These, by the way, come from an email, that Dean Jackson recently sent out. Giving full credit where it's due -  this whole thing is his idea. I don't take any credit. I'm just being the reporter here.

Variation 1: “Would you like to get started on?”

For example, “would you like to get started on getting your book done?”

This variation is even stronger when you put a time on it. For example: “would you like to get started on getting your book done in the next month?”

Or, “would you like to get started on getting your book written in the next six months?”

Whatever the timeframe you put into your question, it works because people have oftentimes been working on their book for a long time. It's maybe been a dream of theirs for 23 years. So “would you like to get started on getting this done in the next month?” can be very compelling.

Variation 2: “Would you like to join us now?”

This question needs a sentence before it to put it into context.

For example: “I'm putting together a small group of people to discuss how to make our Facebook ads better. Would you like to join us?”

That's it. No button, no buy now, no anything that's like that. Would you like to join us? with that context sentence before it.

Keys to Success in Using the 9 Word Email

1. Their need must be real

First is the the need you’re asking about in your question has to be a real need that you know they have.

You will better results if you don’t just send out a generic question to your email list. For example “are you still looking to grow your business online?” won’t perform nearly as well as a more specific question, like “are you still looking to get more people to attend your webinars?”

You know they’ve had that question in the past because they opted in to get a report on that specific subject. The only question is if they still have that need and how badly it’s bothering them. It's a real, specific, need, not a generic one like build your business online.

2. Just follow the formula

Secondly, just ask the question. This is the one thing that I and everybody else does. We all feel like “I should be doing something else here.” Shouldn't I put a button that they click or something like that?

No, just ask the question.

Nothing else. Not even your name.

So they'll click reply and just respond to you.

2. Engage, don’t sell

The purpose of this email is to engage or re-engage, not to outright sell them. That sell comes later on in the conversation, but in this email you're only trying to start the relationship back up again, or improve it.

3. Use their name

Next use their name – it’s such an unusual subject line that it invites opens.

This is another reason, by the way, why it's important to collect names when people opt in. Don't just collect peoples’ email address, get their name too.

4. Don’t send this to your whole list

You probably don't want to send this out to your email list of 200,000 highly engaged people because you're going to get swamped.

You've got to give them some kind of personal answer when they do that and you need to do it quickly, or the whole building the relationship part of this strategy goes up in smoke.

How to Answer When they Reply to your 9 Word Email

Sometimes people respond to your nine-word email with the word yes. Great. So then what do you send them?

I’ve found the best reply is “Do you want to talk about it?”

Remember, the whole purpose of this strategy is to build a relationship by starting or continuing a conversation.

So you don’t immediately say, “great, check out this video.” That's not what a normal human being does.

And it's not go over here to my calendar link and click to talk about it. Again, normal humans both don’t have calendly links and they wouldn’t reply with one.

No, a real human being would probably say something like, you want to talk about it?

If they answer yes, now you make it easier for them to talk with you by giving them your calendly link. “Here's my calendly link. Let's talk.”

If, on the other hand, they answer, no, they’re telling you their not yet open to a conversation, so that’s a good time for you to say “here's a video that might help you,” or “that will give you some hints on how to do that.”

Try the 9 Word Email Yourself

This strategy is incredibly powerful. (Thanks, Dean, for sharing it with us!)

I strongly encourage you to experiment and figure out ways to use the nine word email in your marketing strategy.

It starts a conversation that can turn into amazing things on the backend.

Have you tried this? What's your thoughts about this? Let me know in the comments. This is Don Crowther saying, just go do this stuff.

Watch These Videos to Help Improve Your Email Marketing

And, over the years, I’ve discovered 14 keys that, if you follow them, will enable you to avoid most of those issues, so you can grow a more profitable business, in a fraction of the time, and with minimal issues.

Here they are, 14 keys for creating a highly profitable online business quickly and easily, from scratch. (Yes, you get a special bonus: 4 more keys than I discussed in the video above!)

1. Choose a high-margin online business

That has a high probability of success and profits

Many of the online business opportunities that are talked about the most either have a low probability of success or tend to be high-cost/low-profit businesses. Though it is possible you may be able to make them succeed, (and some people have,) it’s usually best to start with a business where you’re much more likely to succeed.

Given those parameters (high probability of success, high-profit business) I recommend that you avoid the following business models unless you have specific skills or circumstances that would give you a competitive advantage:

Instead, focus on businesses with high margins and high probabilities of success, like:

2. Start with two things, and two things only: 

Figuring out what you’re going to sell (and who you’re going to sell it to,) and building your email list

Despite what everyone else does and what many teach, when you’re just getting started in your business you don’t have to set up a business entity, get a business license, create a logo, build a fancy website, figure out your branding, purchase a full technology suite, acquire office space, decide on what courses to take, etc.

You can, and should ignore all of those for now. Trust me, we’ll do them all later. But first, you have to figure out what you’re going to sell, who you’re going to sell it to, and start the process of developing your email list of those people, because list-building takes time and is the most valuable asset you’ll have in your business once you’ve got it started.

3. Carve out time, preferably every day, as “work time” on your online business

The more, the better

There are two important parts to this step. The first is to carve out time every day and keep that appointment with yourself (and your future.) Well-used time is what turns your dream into a business.

The second is to make that block of hours “work time,” time when you’re actually working on the things that have to be done to create and sell products for your business. It’s important to note that work time does not include studying or taking courses because those things are not actually business-building activities. Though those things are important, they need to happen outside of your work time blocks. If you don’t do that, those tasks will expand to fill your work time blocks, and weeks later you will have nothing concrete that will actually build your business.

Work time activities may include:

Notice how all of the above are action-oriented. You are doing the things that build your business, not getting caught in the time-sucking process of learning, thinking about, researching, comparing, and trying to choose the ideal process for the long term.

4. Put a date on your calendar when you’re going to launch your new business

Probably 3-5 months from now, longer if you’re doing this as a side gig around an existing job 

Then commit to doing whatever you have to do to meet that date.

5. Focus on building your list 

Create your product later

That’s the most important thing right now. If you’re creating a course, you can do that later. You have to get the marketing right, or everything else is useless.

6. Preserve cash

Spend as little as possible so you can pour money into your business

Do everything you can to preserve cash while you’re building your business, so you can increase the amount you put into marketing and delay the time before you have to get a job or outside funding, like:

Personal cash-preserving steps:

You can have all those things later, right now you’re building a business!

From a business side, preserve cash by:

7. Avoid butterflies and other distractions

Choose your business model then refuse to chase other business ideas that fly by and tempt you 

Put your foot down, say to yourself and the world “this is what I’m doing and nothing else is going to tempt me.” Unsubscribe from lists, avoid ads, and recognize there is no such thing as getting rich quickly! Real business takes work and dedication.

8. Be willing to advertise your online business

It’s the fastest route to success

I realize that there is a constant battle between preserving cash and spending it on advertising. But of all possible expenses, advertising (and outsourcing certain tasks) is the one that has the highest probability of turning cash spent into profit in your pocket.

Of course, be wise. Test. Build in spending limits, so you don’t get surprised. And don’t advertise to build your brand, that can come later. Right now, 100% of ad spend needs to be devoted to either building your list or actually selling your product.

9. DIY wherever possible

You probably can't afford to outsource when you're just getting started, especially marketing services

You don’t need to hire most things out. A few searches, and watching a video or two can teach you enough to do most of the things you need to get started in business. You don’t need to hire someone to set up an email autoresponder, create a landing page, create a sales page, create a video, set up a shopping cart, and so many other things.

Even if you’re not comfortable with technology, a few hours of watching videos on how to do these things, pausing the video while you do them yourself, can give you not only the satisfaction of accomplishment but a skill that enables you to do it yourself in the future. A few minutes/hours learning now will literally save you tens of thousands over time.

Outsource these simple things when you’ve got the revenue to afford it.

Plus, be aware of hiring people and agencies to do many of the strategic and marketing tasks in your business. I constantly talk to people who have wasted hundreds of thousands on branding services, PR agencies, fractional CMOs/COOs, marketing consultants, web designers, etc.

Many, if not most, of those services don’t give you positive ROI, especially when you’re just getting started.

10. You don’t need a fancy, expensive website 

You only need a few key marketing and sales pages

Most people who pay tens of thousands to create them end up throwing them away when they discover they weren’t created properly.

All you need to get started are a landing page to build your list, a page that makes your offer, a sales page, thank you pages, and your legal pages (privacy policy and terms of use.) You don’t even need a home page when you’re just getting started - make your landing page the first page people see when they come to your website.

11. Commit yourself

Make a decision to be all in - waffling creates failure

When you have a job, you commit yourself to working for that boss at a certain time and place and for a certain number of hours each week.

Your business needs to be the same. 

Tell yourself and the world “this is who I am, this is what I’m doing, at this time every day. And, this is more important than other things I could be doing.”

Time and money freedom will come later. Hustle now, so you can get those freedoms later. 

12. Find and model a person

Someone who has done it, who is actually doing it, to follow and get advice from 

Make sure that person is actually doing what they’re teaching you, not just making their money selling courses and coaching on how to do them.

And, I recommend you focus on just one person. Following multiple people invariably results in conflicting advice and trying to make choices when you’re uninformed.

13. Ruthlessly eliminate time-wasters in your life

Growing an online business takes time and focus, you can't afford distractions

Whether it’s reading social media, Netflix, eating out, going to the bar with friends, or whatever, most of us have a habit, pastime, or personal indulgence that eats up several hours every day in activities that, let’s just say, are “less productive” than they could be.

I’m not saying you should never relax. Re-creation (not recreation) is absolutely essential to personal health and productivity.

What I am saying is that you know, deep down in your heart, the activities you could sacrifice to build a business.

Why not just do that?

14. Don’t think you’re the exception

Don't believe these these rules don't apply to you!

As you read the above, my guess is you’ve had a couple of times when you’ve said, “I hear you, Don, and can see how this could be a problem for most people, but me, I’m an exception, so I’m going to ignore this one and do it my way.”

Trust me, that, right there, is a big piece of the problem.

Everyone feels like they’re an exception. So they don’t follow the advice, and their business never gets off the ground.

You don’t want that to happen to you, right?

So there they are - 14 keys to creating a powerful profitable online business this year.

Are you going to do them?

What are you going to create? Let me know in the comments!

And, “just go do this stuff!”

Want More Ways To Build Your Business? Watch These Videos!

Google Forms - A Free Survey Tool

There are a number of great tools out there that enable you to send out surveys to your audience, to find out facts and get to know where they are and their attitudes about certain things. Many of them are paid and are wonderful, but one of my favorites is a free tool called Google Forms. 

Creating a survey using Google Forms has many advantages over many of the other survey tools out there. 

First, it’s literally totally free. While some of the other tools out there claim to give you a free option, they usually limit you can do (limiting the functions or the number of results you can get), and/or they use those free surveys to promote their tool. So, the thank you page from your survey will oftentimes be a page promoting their service.

To me, there’s just something wrong with that. It doesn’t fit the experience I want my audience to have when they take one of my surveys.

Google Form Surveys don’t do either one of those things. They don’t have a paid version, so there is no upsell, and you choose the words that appear after your survey is completed.

Of course, Google Form surveys do have disadvantages too, primarily around design. But surveys aren’t designed to be designy :), and I’ve found that surveys built with Google Forms do a great job of fulfilling about 95% of the survey needs of the average small business.

Step-by-step Tutorial: How To Create A Google Forms Survey

Probably the easiest way to get a vision of how Google Surveys can work for you is to see a demonstration of how a form is built and used in real life. 

Here’s a demo tutorial video that walks you through the process of building a very typical survey - a survey to find out what someone’s needs are before you create a course or program:

I know not everyone wants to watch videos to learn, and some of you watch it and still want step-by-step written instructions, so I’m going to give you a tutorial that will describe how to do it, step-by-step, in text and images for you here (in a lot more detail than was included in the video.)

Logging In And Creating A New Google Form

Start by going to drive.google.com.  LINK

You may have to log in with your Google account, which is the same as your gmail login, or the login you use to log into any other Google service. 

Once you’re there, click on the New button in the top left corner

In the dropdown box that pops up, click on the Google Forms button (you may have to click on the word More to see it.)

That will bring up a new blank Google Form. 

Basically your job from here on out is to answer the questions on the screen, which will build your survey for you.

Adding A Title And Description For Your Survey

The first step is to give your questionnaire a title. Click on the words Untitled form (in both places, at the top of the page and in the form design section) and write the title of your survey.

Technically, they don’t have to be the same. Whatever you write in that top bar will only be seen by you, so you can put other information into it to help you to find it later, like “Raising Aardvarks As Pets Customer Needs Survey,” for example.

Next we’ll want to describe your survey to the person who is taking it. This is marketing copy to encourage them to complete your survey. 

I like to write a chatty, conversational explanation of why I’m asking these questions so they understand what is going on. Type your explanation into the blank labeled Form description below the survey’s title.

Note: if you are offering some kind of incentive for completing the survey (a gift card, a free training or report, etc.) this is the place to mention it.

Down below the title and description box, you’ll see a spot for you to start entering the questions you want to ask.

Adding Your First Question: The Paragraph Answer Type

Let’s add in our first question. To do so, simply click on Untitled Question and type your question there.

As soon as you click in that field, a number of other options open up that you can select.

Notice the section that says Paragraph. Google’s programmers are using artificial intelligence to figure out that in this case that question can probably best answered by giving the user the ability to write several lines of text. That’s exactly what we need.

If they guessed wrong you can always click the down arrow to the right of the word Paragraph which will show you a number of different options. 

I’ll discuss each of these options later on. 

Notice also that Google gives you the option to select whether this answer is required or not. Right now I have it set as not required. Whether you choose to require an answer or not is up to you, but be aware that if you click the button for this question to be required, they can’t complete the survey unless they answer that question. Frankly, though I’d love to have everyone answer every question I ever give them, I usually don’t mark any question as required that’s not absolutely, well, required. Required fields tend to reduce response rate and I’d rather have some information from more people than all the info from a much smaller group of people.

There are a number of other things you can do, like adding images to your question, but let’s create a simple survey first, then loop back to those later.

To finalize that question, for now, you just click the + to the right of the question you just asked. If you can’t see it, drag your browser window out so it’s wider, and it will appear.

Clicking that + removes the formatting options for the question you just completed and shows that question the way your user will see it.

If you change your mind before publishing your survey, and want to format it differently, simply click anywhere on that question and it will revert back to editing mode.

Clicking on the + also brings up another blank question box below the first. Here I’ve entered a second question, which Google recognized should also have a Paragraph answer format.

Multiple Choice And Checkboxes Questions In Google Forms Surveys

Perfect, that’s exactly what I want. Now let’s click the + beside the second question to generate a new blank third question. Let’s get adventurous here and try a different kind of question:

This time I’d like to give them a multiple-choice question like we used to get in tests in school. 

But, I do have a choice I have to make: do I want them to give me just one answer (choose the Multiple choice option,) or do I want them to be able to choose several answers (choose the Checkboxes option/)

In this case Google has seen that I used the words “Click all that apply” so assumed I want to get answers in Checkbox format. “Checkboxes” means the respondent can click more than one answer.

If I just wanted to know the single biggest reason, I would remove the words Click all that apply from the question, then click the down arrow to the right of the word Checkboxes and choose Multiple choice. 

(Geeky tip: whenever you look at a form on the web, you can immediately tell whether you can select more than one option by the shape of the selection box in front of that choice. If they’re square, you can select multiple options; if they’re round, you can only select one. That’s how you can immediately tell whether you chose what you want in this survey, and this knowledge is going to make you dangerous in filling out other peoples’ forms! )

Now let’s start giving them options to choose from as they answer. Click on the first answer (which right now says Option 1) and write the first answer choice.

That’s a very important factor everyone should consider when adopting their aardvark. Those aardvark mills are evil and pernicious and you should avoid giving them business at all costs!

Notice how the next line down says Add option or add “Other”? Simply click there to add your next answer option. I’ve filled out several below.

Here’s a side note (I can’t resist teaching on multiple levels.) When you create your survey to gather information about your course, sometimes it’s a good idea to demonstrate to the people who will take your survey that there are some things they don’t yet know about the subject. That can spur buying interest in your future product, and help them realize you know things that are important for them as they pursue that transformation in their life. For example, you may not know that aardvarks are ant connoisseurs, nor that they have sharp claws…

Now, see the blue words add “Other” as the last question? It’s usually a good idea, in a list like this, to give them the option to add their own contribution to the list, as it’s highly unlikely that you’ve perfected the art of mass mind-reading and have given a complete list of every option that may be concerning them. Simply click the blue words, and it will make Other the last option on the list with a place for them to write their own reason why.

Adding Linear Scale (Likert Scale) Questions In Google Forms Surveys

Alright. Click the + to go on to the next question. In this one, I’d like to figure out their level of interest in the subject matter. We do this by using what in survey language is a Likert Scale, or in Google’s terms, a Linear scale, where people indicate where they sit on a scale from 1 to some other number. 

This time, when I input the question, Google wasn’t smart enough to figure out what I meant, so I had to choose the Linear scale answer type. Choosing that gives me the option to indicate what numbers I want (from 1 to 5) and the words to label each end of that scale.

Even though the Label for 1 and your last number are optional, I strongly suggest you put in a word to indicate whether 1 is good or bad (you can never assume that people think the same way you do.) In this case, I’m going to write Nope and Absolutely.

I’m going to give you an advanced survey tip here. If you leave the default number as 5, that gives someone to select a 3, meaning that they’re right in the middle. Many survey professionals don’t like that option. We’d rather know whether the people who are in the middle are more inclined to one end of the scale or the other. So, by choosing an even number (I like 6) for the top number, they have to either choose a 3, which is closer to the bottom, or a 4, which is closer to the top. There is no purely middle ground.

So, here’s how I filled out this question’s options:

And, jumping ahead (I’ll show you how to preview your survey in a minute), here’s how that question will look when someone is filling out the form:

Notice that there’s no middle ground here - they’ve got to take at least a little bit of a stand, giving us valuable information as a result. (This is one of my pet peeves, by the way - any time I see a Likert (Linear) scale that has an odd number, I shake my head at the valuable piece of information that survey designer had at their fingertip, but didn’t capitalize on…)

Getting Peoples' Email Address In Google Forms Surveys

Now for the last question: I’d really like to get the email addresses of the people who, after taking this survey, are interested in knowing more about this product. So, here’s one way to do that:

There are several things to note here.

Adding A Text Section In Google Forms Surveys

The questions are done, but I still want to end my survey by saying thanks. So, this time, instead of clicking the + I’ll click the two T’s to add a text section. 

That gives me this:

I just want to say Thanks, Don, on two separate lines. I’ve discovered that if I write Thanks in the Untitled Title line, and Don in the second, the two lines will be sized differently, so I just put them both in the description line like this:

But we have to do something with the Untitled Title, or it will show up with the words Untitled Title in our final survey. So just click on that line and type a space. It will replace the word Untitled Title with Title:

And it will show up without the word Title in your survey.

Congratulations! You’ve just completed your first Google Survey!

You could publish it as is. Or, there are some other options we can play with.

How To Format A Google Survey

Now that you’ve got your survey designed, it’s time to add some design elements to make it more attractive.

To do that, go back up to the top bar of your survey and click the icon that looks like a painter’s palette, that will show the words Customize theme when you hover over it.

This will give you a number of basic options you can use.

Let’s start with the first one on that list, the Header. You don’t have to have a graphical header, but if you’d like to add some more personality to your Google forms survey, click Choose Image. This brings up a number of header image options. You can choose one from the first page or select any of the subgroups down the left side. If I were to choose the book with the pages turned into a heart, clicking on it would bring up an Insert bar across the bottom, so I’d click Insert.

That puts the image at the top of my survey, and changes the Theme Colors to match that survey look.

Don’t like it once you’ve seen it in your survey? Just click the Image uploaded button under header and you’ll go back to the page to choose more options. On that page you also have the option to customize further by uploading your own picture or by choosing a photo from those you’ve already uploaded to Google Drive. 

When you choose one of the images (I’ll choose the chocolate chip cookie graphic, I prefer that over snow in Wisconsin on April 21st, sheesh), it brings up the cookie image with a rectangle showing the part of the picture you can select (remember, this is just a header, so it’s going to be wide and short). 

You can drag that box up and down with your cursor to select the best possible image for your survey, then click Done at the bottom. (No, you can’t make it taller, like more of a square, that’s just one of the disadvantages of using a free tool.)

But hey, this is a survey about aardvarks, so as much as I love cookies, let’s upload an aardvark picture (click upload then drag in a file, or browse to and select one of your images) then drag the cropping box until it’s where you want it to be. Then click done at the bottom.

And look at that - our cute cuddly aardvark is highlighted at the top of our survey and Google even matched the colors from that picture as the theme colors for the survey.

If you don’t like the colors, Google chose for you, you can always click the + under Theme Color to choose your own colors and choose different background color intensities by clicking the paint pallet Customize Theme icon again. 

You may also want to experiment with the Font Styles, but I think all the options other than basic are just plain unattractive, so I don’t know why you would want to…

See what I mean?

Previewing Your Google Survey

Now that you’ve got everything designed the way you want it, it’s time to check out our work! Click the eyeball icon at the top of your form, and let’s see what it looks like!

Or if that icon’s not visible (because your screen is too narrow), you can click the three vertical dots and choose it from the list that pops up.

There it is! I think it looks good. But if you want to edit further, all you have to do is click on the pencil icon in the bottom right corner which will return you to the edit screen.

We’re about ready to publish our survey, but there’s one more step you need to take before doing so. Don’t forget to do this, because if those settings aren’t right, your survey doesn’t work. 

Adjusting Settings On Google Surveys

Click the gear icon in the top bar (or the 3 vertical dots and click it in the list) to access your settings.

On the screen that pops up, you will probably find that the box for “Restrict to users in [Your Company] and its trusted organizations” is checked. You almost definitely want to uncheck that box (Hey Google, why in the world is that defaulted to checked?) If you don’t, then almost anyone who tries to take your survey will receive an error message. (Speaking from experience… )

You may want to Limit to 1 response, though choosing that option will force people to be logged into Google to fill out your form.

Going back up to the top of that form, I recommend you do NOT check Collect emails, because that will force people to put in their email address to take the survey, which will significantly reduce your response rate.

The other two questions are up to you - the last one can be fun if you want people to be able to see what everyone else answered after they take their survey.

Now let’s go up to the top and click Presentation.

On this screen you can choose to show a progress bar across the top of your survey (which is a good idea if you have a long survey that goes across several pages, where people start wondering how much more of this will they have to do before they’re done.)

You can shuffle question order - probably not a good idea in the types of questionnaires you’ll most likely be using. Most of us will likely want the questions to be in the order you wrote them.

And for some reason “Show link to submit another response” is probably checked by default. I recommend you uncheck that, as it invites them to submit the survey again - probably not what you want to happen as people take your survey.

Finally, the Confirmation message allows you to customize what you want the thank you message to say when they’re done taking the survey. I wish wish wish they would give us the option to put a link here, so that someone would go to a page you created, but right now all we can do is put in a bit of text (hey Google!) I like to make it a little more friendly than Google’s default Your response has been recorded.

Make sure you click Save!

There’s also the option to do your survey as a Quiz. In the digital marketing world we view a quiz quite differently than Google is intending here. They’re thinking of a quiz as one that you would do in a school setting, with grading, correct answers, etc., so it’s probably not as useful to us for marketing purposes (though it may be great in a course to check that they’re understanding the information you’re giving them!)

OK, we’re done with the settings.

Just checking, did you uncheck the box on the General tab that restricts your survey to users in your organization? I suggest you double check that before clicking off this screen to avoid problems when you publish it to the world.

And don’t forget to hit Save!

How To Send A Google Survey To Your Audience

Now it’s time to send your Google Forms Survey out to the world! Start by clicking the Send button at the top of your screen

Or it may show up as a paper airplane icon if your screen is narrower. (Hey Google! What’s with this UX?)

This pops up a screen giving you ways to distribute your form to the world.

The simplest way is to send out an email, or share it on social media, so that’s the first option. Just click on To and start typing the email addresses of the people you want to send it out to, and they’ll fill in there.

Of course, that works if you want to send your form out to a very small number of people. If you want to send it out to all 26,143 people on your email list, you’ll want to click the link icon.

This gives you a very long, very ugly link that you can copy and paste into an email to send out to your audience. If you want a slightly less long/ugly link you can click the Shorten URL box.

Now it’s a less-intimidating 35 characters long, yet still ugly URL. 

You also have the option to embed your Google Survey on your website. Doing so comes with some disadvantages, though. Click here to see the step-by-step instructions and a discussion of those disadvantages.

Two other things before we go on. First, a reminder that I recommend you don’t click the Collect emails because that will significantly reduce your conversion rate.

Second, it’s also nice to have Facebook and Twitter icons on this page - simply click each of them, that service will load up in your browser, and you’ll be able to directly post your survey there.

Finally, just a reminder that you can link to either the long or shorter version of the URL from your website, or paste it onto other social media platforms to increase your survey’s reach. Just make sure that the audience to your website or that social media site are the same as the ones you want to take your survey.

Embedding A Google Survey In WordPress

It is possible to embed Google Surveys and other Google forms into your WordPress pages. This has the advantage of making it appear that your survey is part of your site and it lets you have a page with a simple URL on your domain name. (https://yourswebsite.com/aardvarksurvey for example

Let me show you how to do it, then explain the main disadvantage that may cause you to have second thoughts about doing so.

Start by logging into your WordPress site and choosing to add a new page.

Replace the Add Title line with the title for your page

Click where it says Start writing or type / to choose a block then choose the + on the right side.

In the Search block type the word Custom then choose the Custom HTML option

That brings up a block to write HTML. 

Don’t panic, you don’t have to know HTML to do what needs to be done. All we’re going to do is to grab some code from our form and paste it here!

To get that code, go back to the Google survey you’ve been created, click the send button or paper airplane icon, then click the <> icon to get the Embed HTML screen.

This gives you a line of code which will embed the form with the width and height you specified, in this case 640 x 1622.

Copy that code (click the copy button) then open up the tab with your WordPress page editing screen on it. Paste that line of code into the Write HTML box. Then go ahead and click publish and it’s done!

Here’s what the final result looks like. You can see the results yourself, and fill out the survey to see how it all works here.

Your google survey is now showing up on your site, with your URL (in this case https://doncrowther.com/raising-aardvarks-as-pets-survey ) - notice that URL is not nearly as ugly as the one you get from Google. 

And here’s what the thank you page looks like once I complete the survey:

Why You May Not Want To Embed A Google Survey

Embedding Google Surveys sounds like a great idea, but there are issues associated with the process.

1. The form itself is not responsive, which means that it doesn’t automatically resize based on the size of someone’s screen. If you go back to the page where you got the URL to embed into the WordPress form, you’ll notice that it contained a width and height on that page.

That’s what makes the survey be all crunched up to the side if you view that webpage on a desktop computer and what creates the scroll bar that appears beside it.

The reason for this narrow width is mobile traffic. Since a huge percentage of all web traffic is on mobile devices, we have to allow for pages to be viewed on mobile. You could put in a wider page to make your form look good on the desktop, but then a mobile user would have to scroll back and forth to read it. That’s not good.

At this point in time Google has not invested in making their embedded forms responsive. Their native forms are responsive (if you are using a URL you got from the link tab on the send form page, those forms work just fine on any size device - see what I mean here.) But as of this writing, embedded forms don’t offer that functionality.

2. You lose some of the other formatting Notice that the background colors and the header have disappeared.
3. For some reason WordPress currently has a bug that doesn’t accept the title you input on the page. Hopefully that will get fixed soon.

Should you embed your google survey onto your WordPress web site?

It’s up to you. If you’re ok with how it looks, go ahead and go for it! If not, and you want the better looking design, go ahead and link to the URL Google provides, and let them take the survey on that page. You probably won’t lose a lot in the process.Judge for yourself. Here’s that form embedded on my site and here it is on Google’s URL 

Now that our survey is complete and out there in the world, let’s look at how you see the answers people give when they take your survey.

How To Get Google Survey Results

Results from your Google Forms Survey are incredibly easy to get and analyze. You do it from the same page you used to create your survey.

Simply go back to your survey in Google Drive and the number of results you have received will show up beside the word Responses in the top bar. In this case, I have 3.

Clicking on responses initially gives you the results in Summary format, showing the individual responses you received to the open ended questions (the ones where you selected Paragraph or Short Answer as the question format) or as graphs for those that were closed-ended questions (Checkbox, Multiple Choice or Linear Scale answer types) like this:

You can also see the results broken out by question by clicking on the Question tab, or the results for each person who took the survey by clicking on the Individual tab (this individual view can be useful when you get a large number of responses and want to look at how a certain person completed the survey.)

There are a couple of other cool aspects to the Responses view. First, you can select to have the survey responses automatically populated on a Google Sheet spreadsheet by clicking the green Sheets button at the top right

Then choosing whether you want them on a new spreadsheet or added to an existing one.

The results look like this

This allows you to do lots of other things with the data, by using the spreadsheet functions to graph the data, create pivot tables, filtering the results (so you can see just the people who gave certain answers, etc.,) sharing the spreadsheet with others, etc. 

Frankly, I use spreadsheets as my primary data analysis tool about 80% of the time.  

You can also click the 3 vertical dots next to the Sheets logo on your Responses page

To choose other options, including:

I normally set up to receive email notifications of responses (if this is a survey that’s not going to get hundreds of responses) and set a response destination (a spreadsheet where all the data is automatically added.)

And there’s a toggle button below the Sheets logo that allows you to turn on and off your survey, which is useful when you need to turn off your data gathering so you can do your final data analysis without more data changing your numbers.

Wow, that’s a lot of power for a free tool! That’s why it’s one of my day-to-day workhorses in my business.

Other Features Of Google Forms Surveys

I’ve just given you an overview of the tool, but there are lots of other features you should be aware of.

For example, if you click the 3 vertical dots on the top bar, 

you get a number of other options:

First, it includes any top bar navigation that is hidden because your browser is too narrow to reveal them.

But in addition there are a number of other features I like. For example: Make a copy (so I don’t have to redo work I’ve already done when I create another survey that has similar elements to one I’ve already created,) Move to folder (to keep things organized,) and Add collaborators (so I have colleagues give comments on the survey during its development.

Other Google Forms Survey Answer Types

In the demo section we focused on five basic question types: short answer, paragraph, multiple choice, checkboxes and linear scale. Now I’ll show you how and where to use the other question types. 

Dropdown

The Dropdown function enables you to give people answer options in a dropdown format. You create it just like a multiple-choice question by filling in each of the possible answers

But when the user gets to that question, they see a dropdown box instead of a list of answers:

Clicking on that box reveals those answer options.

 Note: when you use this answer type, they can only choose one answer.

This is not my favorite option, as not everyone understands the functionality of a dropdown box, and long lists don’t work well, especially on mobile devices. I rarely use it.

File Upload

The File upload option enables you to allow people to upload a file from their device in answer to a question. For example, you could allow them to upload a picture of themselves (or their aardvark), a video, a spreadsheet, or some other kind of document.

You should be very careful with this type of option, and we recommend that you only use it with a very small group of people who you totally trust, like your internal team. Realize that documents can contain viruses either innocently or maliciously placed and that when you open them, it can infect your computer and possibly your entire company’s systems (several of the recent ransomware and other cyber attacks have started with a simple opening of a file from someone else.) 

In short, I, and Google, generally don’t recommend using this question type, especially not with the general public. I trust my aunt with my life, but I’d be very nervous accepting a file from her…

Multiple Choice Grid

The multiple choice grid enables you to collect large amounts of information in a small space, assuming that the answer options for each question are the same, and that people can only choose one answer per line, like this:

You create that kind of grid by selecting the Multiple choice grid answer option and filling out the question, and what will appear in the rows and the columns.

This is also not one of my favorite answer types primarily because it quickly builds questionnaire fatigue, causing people not to complete their questionnaire. If you have a number of questions that can fit this format, you may want to consider doing a separate survey focused on these type of questions, so you don’t hurt your completion rate on your main survey.

Checkbox Grid

The checkbox grid is similar to the Multiple choice grid except people can choose multiple selections per row. For example:

As you can see, the data you can collect from this type of question can be very valuable, yet can quickly become obtrusive (increasing people’s likelihood of lying) and fatiguring (increasing their probability of not completing the survey. So be careful.

Here’s what that question looks like in the editing process (choose the Checkbox grid options then tell it your question and what should appear in the rows and the columns:)

Ability To Add Images In Questions

Most of the answer types in Google Form Surveys allow you to upload images to support your question. 

Simply click the image icon next to the question 

Or on on answer options:

Where you’ll have multiple different options to upload and use images. 

When would you use images in your survey? Here are some ideas:

Asking a question where the answers are all images, and they choose between them (example: which book cover do you prefer?)

Asking a question where an image can make it clear what the question is really dealing with (example: this is an aardvark, which is different than an anteater)

Adding design elements to your survey.

I hope this demo and training document has been valuable. Let’s conclude by answering some frequently asked questions.

Frequently Asked Questions

Are Google Surveys free?

This gets a wee bit tricky because Google has been somewhat sloppy in their naming conventions. 

What I’ve shown you in this document, using Google Forms to create surveys is totally free.

Google has another function, called Google Surveys, where you create surveys that Google shows to groups of people to give you quick answers to your questions. Those surveys are not free. 

If as you start creating your survey, the form looks like this, you’re going to end up paying for the survey results:

They’re not bad, just not free.

How Do I Send A Google Form As A Survey?

We showed the step-by-step process for sending out a link to your survey here. 

You can also click the three vertical dots in the main navigation bar

 And click the Get pre-filled link option

Then copy the URL from the page that pops up and you can share that with others for them to complete your survey

Can I Send A Google Form To Someone Without Email?

Yes, you can send the link to your survey to them through a social media message, texting and messenger services, or even link to it directly from your web page. Simply paste the link to the survey and they should be able to access it.

Do People Have To Be Logged Into A Google Account To Complete A Survey?

No, they don’t have to be, as long as your settings don’t contain anything that requires them to log in. 

To check that, from your survey edit function, click on the gear icon

On the form that pops up, as long as none of the boxes on the general tab are selected, they should be able to complete the survey without having to be logged into Google.

What Is The Advantage Of An Online Survey?

The biggest advantages of an online survey include:

1. Cost - online surveys can be completed at a small fraction of the cost of running a survey using “normal practices” like mail, phone surveys, etc.
2. Speed - if you’ve got a large online audience (people on your email list, a significant social media following, etc.) you can start getting data in minutes, and get enough data to make decisions in days as opposed to months for “normal” surveys
3. Targetability - in some cases you can only give certain, very specific people, access to your survey. For example, if you run an online store, and want to survey people who bought a certain product to see how satisfied they were with that particular product, you can simply email your survey to people who bought that product. Try doing that with a product sold at Wal*Mart using a mailed survey - it would probably cost you months and tens of thousands of dollars to find the right people
4. Analysis - Online surveys are usually designed to gather the data in a format that can be easily tracked, measured and compared, without taking the extra steps that “normal” survey tools require (hand-coding of data, etc.)
5. Ease Of Use - for both the researcher and the respondent. They simply open the survey on their phone or computer, fill it out, and they’re done in minutes
6. Honest Responses - It’s a fact of life that people regularly lie when responding to surveys. But online surveys give an air of anonymity, which tends to increase the honesty of the answers you receive.

What Are The Risks Of Using Online Surveys?

While online surveys are generally advantageous, there are some aspects you should consider as you prepare and use online surveys.

1. Leading questions: be sure to ask questions in a way that doesn’t influence people’s answers. For example, I purposely violated that rule in this document several times for humorous purposes, like when I asked the question “How likely are you to get a soft, cuddly, loving baby aardvark as a pet in the next year?” Better would have been “How likely are you to get an aardvark as a pet in the next year?” Soft, cuddly, loving… those are words that influence peoples’ answers.
2. Insufficient data to make decisions: statistically, the larger the number of results you get, the more likely you are to get answers you can rely on as being accurate and projectible to the world as a whole. There are people who make their living using complicated formulas to calculate that number, but as a rule of thumb, unless almost everyone is giving you the same answer, you need about 300 respondents to any survey question to be able to assume you have a reliable, projectible answer.
3. Bad targeting: Your survey needs to be answered by people who are representative of the population you want to test. For example: if you’re a professor it may be easier for you to get your college students to answer a questionnaire, but if the audience you want to get information about is people approaching retirement age, that data is not a reliable indicator of how your real audience will act.
4. Correlation does not equal causation: Just because you watered your lawn and it started to rain doesn’t mean that watering your lawn causes rainstorms. Learning to separate those two concepts will help you in your life and business.
5. Some things are almost impossible to test using a questionnaire: if you ask someone whether they’d rather pay $19 or $49 for a given product, what do you think they’re going to say? That type of question can really only be answered in a real-world testing situation where two groups of people see the same marketing, with the only difference being price, and see which group’s purchases would actually make you the most money.

I hope you have found this demo and training valuable and useful. 

Conclusion

Google form surveys are great tools for man small businesses because they are truly free, quick and easy to create, simple to distribute, easy for people to take, and easy to analyze. 

In my personal experience, they will “do the job” for 90%+ of the survey needs of most small businesses. Therefore they’re high on my recommendation list.

What has been your experience with Google Form Surveys? Have you used them in your business? Taken them? 

Let me know your thoughts and experiences in the comments section!

This is Don Crowther saying, just go do this stuff!

Let's start with the why part: most people believe the reason you are trying to get people to opt-in to your email list is so that you can send them emails. But more important than sending them emails is for them to open and read those emails and do what you ask them to do in them.

I know that sounds totally obvious, but sometimes we have to state the obvious in order to understand the key principles behind what we’re doing.

Key Principle: It’s Vital To Train Your Audience to Open And Take Action On Your Emails

Anything you do that causes people to be distracted from opening and reading the emails you send is hurting your list-building process.

Let's say you promised them a free download in exchange for opting in. The logical thing is to  give them a link on the thank you page to download that free report. From a usability standpoint, that makes sense. But, this is one of those times when other considerations need to take priority above usability.

Consider what happens when you give them the ability to download your opt-in incentive directly from your thank you page.

You've just eliminated their need to read that first email you sent them. So, most of the time, they won’t.

And, since what was in that first email is the reason they opted in in the first place, there are many who will never open any email you send them in the future. They’ll never see the amazing information you send them after that first email. 

Basically, by putting a download link on the thank you page, you are training them to not open your emails and setting up your future emails to go directly to their promotions and spam tabs. 

And, you’re telling the Gmails of the world that your emails aren’t going to be read by those you send them to, so they’ll start routing them directly to the spam box, if they deliver them at all.

And, there’s one more subtle thing that happens. You turn your first interaction with them from a relationship-building opportunity into a transaction. People don’t continue to interact with transactional partners. They engage, form friendships with, and eventually buy, from people with whom they have developed relationships. 

The last thing you want to do is to turn that initial interaction into a transaction!

What You Should Do Instead To Endure List Building Success

You need to do exactly the opposite - train them from the very beginning to open and engage with your emails.

The key to doing this is what you give them and the language you use on your thank you page. 

I recommend that you:

You can do that with language like, "Thank you, the [thing that you asked for] is going to be in your email in 10 to 15 minutes. In the meantime, let me share something else with you." And then you give them an additional piece of amazing information, that's consistent with what they signed up to receive, but doesn't replace it.

For example, if you got them to opt-in to learn the best foods to feed a pet aardvark, on the thank you page you may want to say something like, "Thank you, your free report on the best foods to feed your aardvark is going to be in your email in 10-15 minutes. While you’re waiting, there’s something else that's really important to understand about feeding your aardvark, which is what time of day to feed them. Because aardvarks don’t eat at the same time humans do, feeding them at traditional human mealtimes can actually make them sick. The best times to  feed them are at..."

By doing this you’re giving them great information they need to know, that’s very interesting for somebody who wants to have a pet aardvark. Plus, that information makes getting the report that’s in their email even more desirable, so they’ll be even more likely to open it, click to download the report, and start the habit of reading and interacting with you through email.

This incremental communication (I like to think of it as over-delivering,) can be short or long, and can be delivered in text form, or better yet, as a video.

It’s also important here to note that this is not an offer to buy something from you. Though some find success in making an offer on their thank you page, I really like to communicate to them right out of the gate that I care about their success, so I’m giving them even more than I promised, for free, as we get our relationship started.

Key Principles

Remember:

The whole reason you're doing this is to train them to open and read your emails and do what you ask them to do there.

Anything that detracts from that process will hurt your ability to market and sell to them using email forever. So please don't make that mistake.

Don't give them what you promise them on the thank you page.

They have to go to their email to get it.

What are your thoughts about this? What's your experience with it? Do you have this mistake happening on your website right now? How long before you get that problem fixed? Let me know your thoughts in the chat.

This is Don Crowther saying, just go do this stuff.

I recently read an interesting article called A Public University Bachelor's Degree For $9,000? They're Not Kidding.

It struck my interest because most college degrees cost way more than $9,000.

Successful People In Action

Here an excerpt from that article:

I want you to put yourself in the position of this school President.

Your provost has just walked in and he says, “I want us to cut our price by two thirds to get a bachelor's degree.”

What are the first words out of your mouth?

Back to the article.

The article then goes on to describe the things they had to do and the changes they had to implement to make this happen. How they did it is fascinating, but let’s not miss the key point here. Let’s go back to this statement in the article: 

That statement is a great example of one of the differences between normal people and people who make things happen.

Your Initial Reaction Is Key

Let's look at the differences between what two different types of people say/think when they encounter with a new idea:

How Can We Do This?

This “how can we do this” is an incredibly powerful question. I’m far from perfect, but I strive to make this the default question that comes out of my mouth when ideas come my way.

But this question doesn’t have to just apply to ideas. I literally ask this all the time in other situations. 

Like when I have to call up my internet provider to report that my Internet is slow. Once they had the audacity to offer me an appointment in six days. My reply: “how can we make this happen faster?”

Unfortunately, the person on the other end is bound by rules. So, when I ask that question, most of the time their answer is “we can't.”

So I say, “let me ask that question again. How can we make this happen?” After 3 or 4 times through that question, sometimes new opportunities reveal themselves. In this case I was able to pay a fee to get somebody to come over to fix my internet now, as opposed to six days from now. 

Or, sometimes they can come by and put in a temporary fix right now before they fix everything later on. 

I remember a time when I was working for a big corporation. A competitor had just made a huge change that was costing us about a million dollars in lost sales every week. There were some in our management who saw the situation as unwinnable and wanted to throw in the towel and remove our product from the market. 

My team worked like heroes and had developed two possible solutions. We needed to figure out which was better and needed a market research test to guide the decision.

The problem is that studies like these traditionally take time, most of which is spent waiting in line behind all the other big companies who have also got their tests in the field, because there are a limited number of trustworthy market research providers out there. 

My market researcher told me it couldn’t be done and refused to even ask. Wrong answer. 

So, I picked up the phone and started calling research companies. Each time, after hearing it was impossible to run this test in the next 10 days, I asked the question “how can we make this happen.” 

“I’ve already told you, it can’t.”

“Let me reword the question, if you knew that I was willing to go outside of the normal procedures and possibly even pay a premium to make this happen, how could we make this happen? For example, could you pay people overtime, bring in extra staff, rent a some extra space for a week, etc. to make this happen?”

“Oh. I hadn’t thought of that. Let me get back to you.” 

(It’s interesting how often things are impossible simply because someone thoughts are so boxed in that they haven’t yet thought about the answers to the question “how could I make this possible?”)

Long story short, we were able to cut 2 months out of the timetable for by paying about an extra $30,000 (yes, that’s lots of money, but nothing in comparison to the $8 million we probably would have lost during that time.) We got our answer, stopped the losses, and put a change into the market that saved the brand. 

Here’s another example that might be more directly applicable to your daily life.

Let's say there's a course you really, really want to take. But you look at your life and you say, there's no way that I have the time right now to do this. 

How about instead of believing it's not possible. You ask yourself “how could I make this happen? What would make this possible?”

Perhaps you've got to go to bed an hour later and get up an hour earlier so that you can make this possible. Or put yourself on a social media fast until it’s done. You could cut out your other leisure time activities for a couple of months. Or maybe you hire someone to be the taxi service for your kids’ school, games and lessons to give you an hour a day. Or, you still drive them, but spend the time you’re waiting for them to finish focusing on that course instead of Instagramming and watching YouTube on your phone.

I admit that it’s true: given your current life structure, it may not be possible. But that doesn't mean it's not possible to make it happen by changing the way your life is currently structured. 

That's a key distinction. Oftentimes the way things get done is not to work within the current system. It's to go around or develop a new system, which suddenly makes things possible.

NASA spent billions of dollars building fresh rockets for each launch. That was just the way things were done. And America was slowly exiting the business of sending humans into space.

Then along came Musk and Beezos, who refused to accept that the way things have always been done as the only way things can be done, created reusable rocket parts and have literally changed the world.

Here's another comparison:

How Can I Afford This?

I met a guy who really wanted to buy a $2,000 course. He saw his future on the other side of that course. He really wanted that future, but there's no way he could afford it. 

What did he do? He didn’t give up on his future. Instead, he borrowed the first month’s payment, then mowed lawns every Saturday for three months, which enabled him to bring in enough money to be able to pay the payment plan.

Yes, it was time consuming. Yes, he was a bit embarrassed to have to be out schlepping his services in the neighborhood. Yes, he would have rather used his Saturdays for his entire summer doing something more enjoyable. 

But...

He got his $2,000 program. 

And by the way, do you think that guy actually did the things that we taught him in that $2,000 program. Oh yeah. He definitely completed that program. 

And not only did he complete that program, the product that he created from that program made him tens of thousands of dollars and will continue to do so ever time he relaunches it for years to come.

Why? Because he didn't say “I can't afford it.” He asked, “how can I afford it?”

I've seen people drive Uber. I've seen people sell couches. I've seen people hold garage sales. I've seen people sell the fancy $3000 foam mattress they had in their guest bedroom and replace it with a cheap mattress with a $100 foam mattress topper so they could pay for a $2,000 program.

True. It's not possible, given where things are right now, but what could you change to make that happen?

Here’s another question: 

What If I Could Make This Happen?

I love this question because it gets you thinking about possibilities. It gets you thinking about what could change in your life as a result of making something impossible... possible. 

When you do that you start thinking about your big why, the reason you’re actually doing all of this... 

When you think about your big why, it’s considerably easier to figure out how to change your current reality to make it possible. Now your why is bigger than the what and all of a sudden amazing things start to happen.

So now there’s a public university offering a bachelor's degree for $9,000. Why? Because when the President was presented with the idea, he didn't say that's not possible. He said, "great. When can we start?"

It's the cheapest degree from a public university in the United States. And, they just graduated 111 people with that degree.

Finally, A Bonus Marketing Tip

Oh. And by the way, I have to share this. How did Southern Utah University do this? 

The first thing that they did was to send letters and emails out to all the people who had gone to their University in the past 10 years but who had dropped out and not finished their degree. 

Those letters basically said “here's this opportunity to complete your degree for just $9,000.” 

It worked. 69 of those 111 graduates came from that group of people. They were not able to complete their degree before, but they’ve done it now. And the vision of SUU’s provost and president will change some of their lives.

Do you have an audience who hasn't completed a dream yet who might be open to working with you again to achieve that dream?

All kinds of things start to happen when you start asking the question, “how can we make this happen?”

Normal people say it's not possible. People who accomplish things ask “what would make it possible.”

Obviously, I'm trying to encourage you (and me) to react to new ideas this way more often.

What do you think? Do you think you could change your default thought process? Do you think you could change the hardwired "it can't be done" in your brain?

Do you think, instead of closing those new ideas down, you could start opening them up?

Yes, not all new ideas are good ones. Most shouldn’t be pursued. But some of them, the impossible ones? They could change the world!

Do you think your life could be different if, instead of limiting your possibilities, you expanded them?

Let me know what you think in the comments. I'd love to hear them. Especially if you've tried this. I'd love to hear how it worked. 

This is Don Crowther saying, just go do this stuff.