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Marketers have traditionally gotten great results from outbound marketing. They sleep, eat, and brush their teeth to get corporate messages across to people in creative ways.

Today, though, they’re turning their backs on it. The growing majority of marketers react scornfully at the mention of outbound. The term has gained an unflattering connection to Interruption Marketing, which Wikipedia calls “a pejorative term that refers to promoting a product through continued advertising, promotions, public relations and sales.”

Outbound tactics are now vilified. Many believe that outbound marketing alone s responsible for the 2000+ messages we are bombarded with on a daily basis.

Inbound marketing is the new marketing darling. Even the words associated with inbound drum up positive connotations, don’t they? Organic, engagement, permission-based, valued content, etc.

But, is inbound marketing really saving us from “traditional” outbound? Is it making advertising less intrusive? Are marketers suddenly altruistic information-sharers?

I don’t think so.

The Devaluation of Content

At the end of the day companies still need to sell their products and services.

Do you remember the first case study that was e-mailed to you? Compare that sentiment – your eager mind ready to devour its contents – to the case study you received last week, and the one yesterday, and probably the one this morning… The former stream of outbound marketing messages has now been replaced with an overwhelming flood of thinly veiled “content.”

As inbound marketing matures the value of content decreases and innovative perception disappears.

And, let’s face it, the talented salesman, the convincing voice on the other end of the phone, the winning ad with the arresting headline, the e-mail with the subject line customized to your needs, and the memorable television ad during the Superbowl still play roles in the selling process.

Don’t get me wrong. I’m a big fan (and user) of inbound marketing. It forces organizations to move up and meet customers at their level. And an informed customer is a better customer. However, I believe inbound marketing is being oversold to the detriment of business results. It can be an effective tactic, but rarely should be the only tactic.

(By the way, you know something has been oversold when everybody is doing the same thing.)

We’re hearing from demand gen marketers that email response rates are down in general but that inbound marketing alone is not bringing in enough leads for funnel generation.

The webinar we recently did with Netprospex speaks about how organizations can do better with their inbound email marketing tactics through intelligent segmenting, better messaging, and achieving higher conversion rates for landing pages with targeted, high-conversion landing pages.

Enjoy!

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Just as your choice of advertising medium can communicate and reinforce your advertising message, so do the choices in your communication design and content give cues to your Value Proposition.

Your Value Proposition is the full set of perceived costs and benefits of your products, services and calls-to-action. There’s a reason it is the central component of our conversion optimization framework, the LIFT Model.

Ralph Waldo Emerson said, “Who you are speaks so loudly, I can’t hear what you’re saying.”

Are your customer touchpoints reinforcing or detracting from your intended Value Proposition?

Consider for a moment the effect of trust and credibility in the unfortunate case of Steve’s Detailing in Manhattan, New York. As a “detailing” shop, you may assume that “attention to detail” is an important part of their value proposition. Do you think they instill confidence in their attention to detail when their sign is misspelled, “Detaling”?

Just like for Steve, what you say can be less important than how you say it.

Everything counts. Your prospects are looking for clues in every area of your business to either make a decision whether to buy or reinforce their decision post-purchase.

How do you reinforce your value proposition?

Share your stories below.

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It looks easy, but could you do just as well on the court or the track? Is it really that simple?

No matter what the sport, winning athletes spend countless hours preparing to succeed. They run hundreds of miles to prepare for a sprint that takes less than a minute to complete. They hit thousands of balls to perfect that one flawless swing.

So what does optimizing their game have to do with WiderFunnel?

Still think you can make do with DIY CRO?

A lot of people think Conversion Optimization is easy too. Change a picture, move a button, add some copy.

The reality is, it takes dedicated work; honing skills most people never see. What our clients do see (& what we love to present to them) are winning tests that look obvious. But just as top athletes make it look easy on game day, it’s the end result of a dedication to optimization and continuous improvement. The trick of any art is to make it look easy.

Each Word Can Be Priceless

Words. Politicians use them to exercise power. Poets can reduce us to tears with them. Two words can cut like a knife or lift us to astonishing heights. And they allow us to motivate people.

Words are magical:

Apple: “Think Different”
Nike: “Just Do It”
YouTube: “Broadcast Yourself.”
Perez Hilton: “Celebrity Juice. Not from concentrate.”

How much are these few words worth?
Would you pay for the results by word count, or by their effect?

What if your conversion strategist could find a new headline that repositions your value proposition in your prospect’s mind? What effect would that have on your conversion rate and revenue? Would it give you marketing insights that pivot your marketing strategy and even your business?

Now you see what I mean when I say that Conversion Optimization has been undersold!

At WiderFunnel, we have to communicate a message and sell the best way possible. Often that means using the least number of words, required actions & (definitely) user distress – and that takes deep understanding, polished skills & thousands of hours of testing experience.

Every (Short) Story Has A Moral

The moral here? Don’t undervalue your marketing optimization strategy. It should be a core part of your business strategy and marketing insights, NOT a tactical afterthought!

Where does conversion optimization fit into your marketing?

Is it generating marketing insights for you, on life support or somewhere in between?

Or How WiderFunnel’s Kaizen Method of Conversion Testing gets winning results from any experiment

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Webinar Recording Available now – Free

Watch: 7 Critical Steps to Winning Conversion Optimization Tests

Followers of WiderFunnel already know about our Kaizen Method™ for continuous website improvement. This month we’re hosting a webinar where we’ll reveal its greatest strengths.

In our example case study we’ll look at how we successfully applied the step-by-step testing process to Outrigger Hotels & Resorts’ landing page and achieved a 60% lift in online travel bookings!

We’ll take a closer look at the 7-step conversion optimization process and show you how you can use it for maximum benefit, turning even ‘losing’ or inconclusive tests into winners. Once you grasp the power of this process, you’ll be able to run experiments more confidently, and consistently get winning results!

Watch the 7-Step Conversion Optimization Webinar Now >>

Webinar Details:

If you’re like many we talk to, you’re hesitant to experiment with a page on your own – there are the underlying, nagging uncertainties – will the test truly have a positive impact on your bottom line? Will it be enough to justify the time & effort spent? What if the test doesn’t work?

Applying our proprietary Kaizen Method, we’ve literally never tested a website we couldn’t improve. 100% of our retainer clients have had successful conversion rate lift!

Originally presented as a webinar, this recording will show you why even the (often under-appreciated) “losing” result in an experiment is still vital to your bottom line because of what it reveals about your customer’s behaviour. Imagine the value of uncovering how your customer thinks online – what motivates them & what turns them away. How would this change your message?

When you factor in the visitor behaviour insights from Kaizen’s Strategic Analysis step, every test becomes a winner… and that’s one of the Method’s real strengths. We developed this method, we know it inside & out, and deploy it with precision on a daily basis.

If you do take the leap and launch an experiment, are you confident knowing where to begin? How do you determine what to test, why, and especially in what order?

WiderFunnel’s 7-Step Method gives you the power to understand where to start & why; guiding you through the steps needed to maximize your test results. In this webinar, you’ll learn how to glean invaluable data from all the experiments you conduct & develop a rock-solid conversion testing process.

What you’ll take away from this webinar recording:

• How you can test and optimize landing pages with zero risk
• How our winning optimization experiment’s are planned and executed
• How Outrigger achieved a 60% Resort Booking Lift using our Kaizen Method
• The 7-step conversion optimization process examined in detail

Webinar Presenter:

Chris Goward – Co-Founder & CEO, WiderFunnel
Chris will share his conversion rate optimization insights and best practices to dramatically improve lead generation and e-commerce sales. He’s led past presentations with clients such as eBay, SAP, Google, Electronic Arts and more, as well as entrepreneurs and online business owners looking to improve their bottom line.

Watch the 7 Step Conversion Optimization recording >>

P.S.: Did you know we now provide unbiased paid search audits to help you improve your paid search performance? You’ll find out more in this webinar as well.

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But now we’ve been given a little messaging control with the Timeline layout released a few days ago.

The new layout has gotten mixed reviews, but so does every Facebook redesign. Some people don’t like change and the veracity of the protest only underscores how important Facebook has become in their lives.

I think the timeline layout is genius. I also think it was stolen copied!

One of my favorite Facebook competitors, Path, originated the timeline layout and I thought their approach gave them a fighting chance in the social scene. Unfortunately, now that Facebook has copied it, Path’s Unique Value Proposition is serious undermined.

But I digress.

What’s good about the timeline layout?

• It organizes social information based on the most important social factor: Recency.
• Apps (formerly tabs) are given more prominence.
• You have messaging control above the fold. We know the importance of the page fold. Content appearing above the fold gets significantly more attention and actions than below.

So, how can we use this new timeline layout?

Here are a few tips to get started:

Tip 1: Create customized cover and profile images that complement each other.

Here are the dimensions of the new cover images:

We created ours for WiderFunnel’s Facebook page using Adobe Fireworks. It can help to create them in one image and then export each part. To save you some time, here are Facebook cover templates you can download:

• Adobe Fireworks layered .png version
• Adobe Photoshop layered .psd version

Tip 2: Customize your app icons

My apps originally had these bland default icons:

Boring!

We can now customize them to be more relevant and interesting. I found out how with some difficulty. Here’s the step-by-step to customize your app icons:

Step 1: Click “Manage > Edit Page”

Step 2: Click “Apps” in the left column of your Edit page

Step 3: On the tab you want to customize, click “Edit Settings”

Step 4: Beside Custom Tab Image, click “Change”

Step 5: Strangely, you may be redirected to another page, where you have to click “Change” again to finally upload a new image. The image you upload should be 111px x 74px.

Tip 3: Highlight large images by starring them

Photos get the highest engagement of all Facebook posts. If you’ve got great imagery, clicking the star button will expand it to take the full screen width.

Tip 4: Pin important posts

You can make keep important posts at the top of your timeline for 7 days by pinning them. You can also re-pin them again after 7 days if they’re still important.

Did you know you can optimize your Facebook tabs for conversions?

Yes, we do that!

We have optimized Facebook apps, pages and calls-to-action for more conversions with significant revenue improvements to show for it.

Contact us to find out how.

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Conversion Optimization has been undersold.

We have the ability to use conversion optimization to gain marketing insights with scientific certainty, yet many in the industry still use landing page optimization like it is only good for eking out marginal conversion rate improvements.

This is tragic.

Those of us who test most understand the power of all the beautiful traffic you have arriving on your website daily. Not only are these prospective customers looking for an opportunity to buy from you; they’re also willing to (unknowingly) tell you which messages and experiences are most effective for them.

Think about the far-reaching effect of testing your value proposition messaging

By running an ongoing series of controlled tests of messaging approaches, you can gain statistically significant learning about what moves your customers to action.

That learning can lead to dramatic lifts in leads, sales and revenue. But, far beyond that, the insights can lead to even greater changes in the marketing and business strategy.

The Conversion Optimization industry is evolving. We are no longer just tweaking and tuning button design and headline colors.

Will you join us in our quest for continuous improvement by becoming a Strategic Marketing Optimization professional? Will you be an advocate for data-driven organizational improvement?

Here’s what we believe:

Feel free to embed this, using this code:

<a href="http://www.widerfunnel.com/conversion-rate-optimization/the-strategic-marketing-optimization-manifesto"><img src="http://www.widerfunnel.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/03/marketing-optimization-manifesto-narrow.png" alt="Marketing Optimization Manifesto infographic" title="Marketing Optimization Manifesto" width="490" height="1336" /></a><br />By <a href="http://www.widerfunnel.com/">WiderFunnel Marketing Optimization</a>

Or download the printable pdf version of the marketing optimization manifesto.

Here’s the text:

The Strategic Marketing Optimization Manifesto

We listen to our gut, then test what it says.
We gather marketing research, then test it.
We create best practices, then test them.
We listen to opinions, then test them.
We hear the advice of experts, then test it.

We believe in art and science.
We believe in creativity and discipline.
We believe in intuition and evidence.
We believe in continuous improvement.

We aim for marketing insights.
We aim to improve business results.
We test because it works.

Scientific testing is our crucible for decision-making.

Come with me as we push the boundaries of conversion optimization toward strategic marketing optimization.

Are you with us? Add a comment below!

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During the discussion, which was organized by Paul Mosenson of Focus.com, the audience was encouraged to give real-time feedback to the panelists, letting us know whether they thought we were being interesting or not. It certainly added to the excitement and stress, but definitely kept us on the task of delivering value!

But the point of this post isn’t the interesting discussion format.

The experience reminded me that you probably have similar questions about conversion optimization. So, I’d like to answer some of the most interesting questions raised.

Here’s the question that was ranked most popular in the discussion:

What are the key design elements in landing pages that contribute to increased conversions?

And here’s my answer:

Continuous improvement vs. tips and tricks for Conversion Rate Optimization

The one strategy that’s by far more important than tips and tricks for improving conversion rates is having a structured approach to continuous improvement. A recent study by eConsultancy showed that “Companies with a structured approach to conversion are twice as likely to have seen a large increase in sales.” Looking at conversion rate optimization as a short-term project to tweak design elements isn’t going to give you big improvements. As with anything, having a strategy and working your way through it systematically will maximize your returns.

Use a Conversion Optimization Framework for Heuristic Analysis

If you think in terms of the LIFT Model that we use to analyze landing pages, the design of the page must maximize Clarity, Relevance and Urgency of the Value Proposition communication, while minimizing the Distraction and Anxiety. Use this approach to do a quick review of your landing page to give you some direction on the design elements you should tackle first.

The top two conversion design components? Eyeflow and Calls-to-Action!

If I had to recommend design changes that will likely give you more bang for your buck, I’d tell you to look at your eyeflow and call-to-action design. There are usually some pretty obvious opportunities for improvement in those areas: competing and/or hard to find CTA’s, unclear information hierarchy, clutter & distration, etc.

In reality, eyeflow design is the result of the interaction of all design elements working in harmony, towards a specific purpose. The wireframe or content layout, imagery, colours, stylistic treatments, visual elements, interaction design are all factors that influence the eyeflow. A skilled conversion strategist will plan the visual stimulus to effectively guide the visitor’s eye through the important messaging points and ultimately to the call to action.

If you’re interested in the entire 45-min discussion, you can listen to the Improving Landing Page Conversion Rates roundtable discussion here

Also, don’t miss the upcoming live webinar on March 21, 2012: “How to Get an 18% Lift in Sales in Competitive E-commerce Industries“

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They knew conversion rate optimization was the way to do it.

Here’s the thought process: improving their landing page conversion rate would produce more revenue, permanently and consistently, than buying more advertising. Optimization is really a cunning two-pronged strategy – increased revenues gained through higher conversion rates free up more funds for marketing campaigns, starting a positive feedback cycle & overwhelming opponents – critical in highly competitive situations.

N3V Games engaged WiderFunnel to analyze their pages and design a conversion optimization testing plan to increase their sales. We designed four ‘challenger’ pages to test against N3V’s original “control” page. Using this “champion-challenger” approach, our team ran a controlled experiment.

We uncovered 17 conversion inhibitors, and N3V Games significantly improved their web sales using the WiderFunnel LIFT™ model. At the end of this experiment, N3V was able to increase their e-commerce sales conversion rate by 18%, and see a healthy 270% ROI – all by optimizing just one crucial landing page.

Plus, we gained marketing insights that you can use on your own landing pages.

Want to know how we did it?

Watch & apply the principles on your website:
The recorded webinar with Tony Hilliam of N3V Games and Chris Goward of WiderFunnel is now posted here >>

More about what you’ll take away from the webinar:
• How you, in a competitive industry, can test and optimize critical landing pages with zero risk
• How N3V’s winning optimization experiment was planned and executed
• How to get comparable results on your website using the WiderFunnel LIFT™ Model
• How to gain ongoing sales improvements using a 7-step conversion optimization process

Webinar Presenters:

Tony Hilliam
Tony Hilliam is President, Founder & Chief Executive Officer of N3V Games in Australia. N3V has been in business since 1995 and is a high-flying video game development company. Their first major game won ‘Strategy Game of the Year’ in 1997. N3V Games is producing the 5th version of “Trainz Railroad Simulator,” which has sold more than a million units world-wide since its release in 2001.  www.auran.com

Chris Goward – Co-Founder & CEO, WiderFunnel
Chris will share his conversion rate optimization insights and best practices to dramatically improve lead generation and e-commerce sales. He’s led past presentations with clients such as eBay, SAP, Google, Electronic Arts and more, as well as entrepreneurs and online business owners looking to improve their bottom line.

The N3V Games webinar recording from last week How to Get an 18% Lift in Sales in Competitive E-commerce Industries is posted here

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We’re curious to hear about the conversion optimization challenges you face in your organization today.

Would you take 30-seconds to answer this one-question survey? You’ll be able to compare your results with your colleagues immediately.

What are your biggest Conversion Optimization Challenges?

Do you face other challenges that aren’t on the list? Please add your comment below!

And, you should join the WiderFunnel blog-to-email so you don’t miss the results.

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Learning doesn’t have to be boring. WiderFunnel has just launched a new (free!) online game for marketers to allow you and your colleagues to test your conversion optimization skills. You by guessing on the results of real landing page experiments.

To play the game you view a series of actual website experiments, including the page variations that were tested. For each experiment, you can choose which variation you believe converted the most visitors to leads or customers in each experiment.

Whether your answer is right or wrong, you can download the entire case studies to find out why the winning variations performed better than the others.

Even though conversion rate optimization is serious business and drives huge revenue improvements for our clients, it’s a lot of fun to us, and we hope it is for you too!

Take 4 Minutes to Try It Now