Categories
Conversion Split Testing Traffic & Conversion

For split-testing geeks only…

My friend Jim Stone is the creator of the premier multi-variate split testing tool, the Split Test Accelerator.

Among all of the good marketing friends I have, Jim dives deepest into the science of split testing.

For example, he just wrote an article about something new, called “untethered split testing”.

It’s a technique for increasing your conversions far beyond what you would normally be able to do either with simple split testing, or even multi-variate split testing.

Interested?

Go read Jim’s split testing blog here.

To Your Success,

–Mark Widawer

p.s. If you want to make your web page perform better, go get Jim’s free 3-step split testing starter kit here.

Categories
Traffic & Conversion

80/20 Principle — How do you spend YOUR time?

Have you ever really thought about how you spend your time during the day? I do…just about every day. In fact, it’s been bugging me recently.

I’ve been wondering why I am so darn busy every day, yet not seeming to get as much done as I’d like to, and as much as I used to. I’m wondering if you’re feeling the same way.

Sometimes, the answers to the big questions of life are tough. This one turned out to be easy, though.

At the recommendation (actually, constant prodding) by friend and mentor

Categories
Blogging Business Building Traffic & Conversion

John Chow $40,000 Blogging Video and Cheat Sheet

I stubled across a tweet by Jason Moffatt this past weekend, where he wrote about a video he saw by John Chow, about how John makes $40,000 a month from his blog.

Let’s do a little math.

That’s $40,000 a month, times 12 months in a year. That comes to just under a Half Million dollars a year.

Going the other way, that’s about $1,333 a day.

Now, if John was working an eight-hour day, I’d say that was a pretty darn good living he was making: about $166/hour. It turns out, though, that John doesn’t work 8 hours a day.

He actually set out with a goal of earning just $3,000 a month by working 2 hours a day.

And it turns out that he STILL works just 2 hours a day. So that’s about $666 per hour.

Thanks, John for making the video and sharing what you know. And thanks to Jason for turning me on to John.

Here’s the nearly hour-long video, in its entirety, for you to watch. Below the video is my Cheat Sheet set of notes that I took while watching the video.

Categories
Blogging Traffic & Conversion

Socrates Theme

If you’re a regular reader of my blog, then you probably notice that the look of TrafficAndConversion.com has changed. And what you’ll also probably notice is that it will change a few more times soon, too.

That’s because I’ve just installed the Socrates Theme, created by my friend Joel Comm, with help from his Director of Ideas, Dan Nickerson.

I won’t write too much about the theme here, but I did write about Socrates before, back in April 2010 when Version 1 was released. They released Socrates version 2.0 a few months later.

But the reason I installed it today was that the Socrates Theme gives me almost unlimited flexibility in how I set up my blog. I can pick two or three columns with the click of a button, I can choose any of dozens of headers, an infinite number of colors, and several other layout options.

Plus, you can easily insert

Categories
Blogging Marketing Seminars Traffic & Conversion webinars

WordPress Plugins That Rock!

A couple weeks ago, I told you about a brand new WordPress theme that is designed for marketers who want to monetize their blogs the “point-and-click” easy way without having to be a designer or spend money on expensive dsigners to make the blog look like you wanted it to.

I just got word that this evening (in about 2 hours), Stu McLaren and Tracy Childers are doing a free webinar on “Plugins That Rock”.

What Stu and Tracy mean is that these are plugins that will help you build a blog that can be the hub of an online membership site.

Online membership sites allow you to bulid a *real* online business, one that you can count month after month. If you’ve ever wondered how you can truly monetize your blog by converting it into a membership site, this webinar will be invaluable to you.

Click here for the WordPress Plugins Webinar

Note: The webinar is ALREADY overbooked, so be sure to connect to the call at least 10 minutes early to make sure you get a spot. GoToWebinar doesn’t limit how many people register for a webinar, but it does limit how many people attend. That’s why you need to get there early.

And no, that’s not a gimmick.

I’ll be on the call. If you’re looking for a way to monetize your site, I hope you are on the call, too.

To Your Success,

–Mark

Categories
Traffic & Conversion

John Carlton Copywriting Questions Answered

In the middle of preparing for the launch of his Simple Writing System, a few days ago, John Carlton agreed to answer some questions for my readers about copywriting.

John is a master copywriter, and the most ripped-off copywriter in the world. That’s because his copy sells.

John and I just got together yesterday for our talk, and he answered most of the questions that were asked. Your copywriting answers are on this video. I also took notes during the call, which you’ll see on the video, and you can download the notes file as well as the MP3 audio file, just below the video.

Then, grab your spot in John’s Simple Writing System course. It’s a space-limited course because it’s not just a copywriting course, but a full mentoring program with real live, professional assistance that leaves you writing copy that writes easier, and sells faster.

And, if you use my affiliate link to sign up for the Simple Writing System, I’ll give you my new split testing course, Free. You’ll also get a free one-hour split-testing consultation with me so you can discover the difference between good headlines and insanely great headlines. Plus, as you’ll hear on the call, you’ll also be invited to a special Q&A call with me and John.

Here’s the video you’ve been waiting for…

Categories
Conversion Marketing Seminars Traffic & Conversion webinars

One little trick that leads to a $2mm breakout year

With some skills, the difference between “just getting by” and “outrageous success” is about 10,000 hours of perfecting your art.

That’s true of Olympic-level sports, creating great art, and brain surgery, among other skills.

There are other things people do, where the difference between “just getting by” and “outrageous success” can be as simple as just one simple trick.

Internet marketing is often like that.

You can discover great success by finally “getting it” about writing a headline.You can discover how to multiply your conversion rates just by learning how to split test. And you can save yourself from a string of failures by learning how to pick a niche the right way.

Well it turns out that you can also make a huge difference in your bottom line by learning one little trick about “closing the sale.”
If you are an information marketer, I recommend you get on this free teleseminar. It’s about how to make more money speaking, running teleseminars, and running webinars…and then closing the sale.

http://budurl.com/w7k6

And it’s mostly about one little trick that helped a young woman named Lisa Sasevich, an information marketer a lot like you, have a breakout year last year, shooting from revenues of a few hundred thousand dollars to over two million dollars.

I met Lisa last month at a mastermind meeting of some of the top internet marketers, and she showed me that what she knew was for real.

She’s holding a webinar, where she wants to share with you the “little trick” she discovered, and a bunch of others, too. The trick, by the way is exactly the opposite of what you’ve probably been taught about “speaking to sell”, in any form.

There’s more I could tell you, but it’d be better if Lisa did that herself. Join her this Wednesday, at 2pm PST, 5pm EST.

You can register here.

http://budurl.com/w7k6

I’ll be on the call, too. Lisa’s pretty darn smart.

To Your Success,

–Mark Widawer

P.S. Lisa is very much a “how to” kind of instructor, so bring a pencil and paper, or open up MS Word, when you join the call this Wednesday.

Oh, one last thing…Lisa’s not paying me a penny to tell you about her call. I really do think you should attend if you make your money (or want to make your money) with teleseminars, webinars, or speaking from the stage. I am an affiliate of Lisa’s though, and so if you do enroll in any of her courses, I will be compensated as her affiliate. And here’s another tip for you…if you’re an information marketer, and NOT marketing other people’s information along with your own, you should be. More about that on another day.

For now, enroll in Lisa’s Teleseminar. You’re sure to learn something important.

http://budurl.com/w7k6

-M

Categories
Conversion Traffic & Conversion webinars

Free Website Optimization Webinar Today

One of the things that is easy to see among many of the websites that were sent into me for today’s free Website Optimization Webinar is that you become blind to things you’ve seen over and over again.

I bet that happens to you at home. Someone leaves a book on the countertop, and it sits there for a day, then a week, and eventually it becomes part of the furniture. You just don’t see it anymore. It’s a permanent fixture.

And you’re blind to it, even though to a visitor it might stand out like a sore thumb.

The same thing happens with websites.

You’ve got your website built in a certain way, based on a certain set of assumptions. Maybe you put something on your site one day for some reason…or re-designed it a certain way, and now that change seems like it’s always been there.

And it’s STILL there, even though to everyone else it may actually be sticking out like a sore thumb, hurting your sales.

One of the great benefits of a website review is that

Categories
Conversion Traffic & Conversion webinars

Strange Results from Website Conversion Survey

So just a couple of days ago, I invited you (and a few thousand other of my closest friends) to a website review webinar that I’m hosting this coming Friday.

Click: Website Review Webinar

As part of the registration process, I asked you a few questions, and the results so far have been pretty darn interesting, at least in a couple of areas.

I think the most fascinating thing is that 2/3 of the people who said that they don’t split test now, and NEVER PLAN TO SPLIT TEST, also say that website conversion is their number one problem.

That’s pretty fascinating, actually.

Split testing is a pretty easy thing to do, once you learn how. Yet people don’t take advantage of pretty much the biggest money-maker (or money-saver, depending on your current conversion rate) that’s available to them and their online business.

But here’s an even more fascinating thing.

CHECK THIS OUT: Of all the people who said that they do not plan to split test, do you know what

Categories
Conversion Traffic & Conversion webinars

Free Website Review Webinar — You’re Invited

Would you like to know why the traffic that gets to your website isn’t buying what you’ve got to sell?

If you silently thought “YES” to that question, then I think I understand you.

You must be wondering…

“I’ve got the best product in my niche. Yeah, it’s a lot of work to get people to my site, but once they are there, it should be OBVIOUS to them that they need this product! ARGH! WHY DON’T THEY BUY?!?!?”

I feel your pain.

And frankly, with all the focus on Traffic in the Internet Marketing community, I don’t think there’s enough energy spent on conversion. Traffic IS important, but without understanding “Why People Buy”, and then building your website accordingly, the traffic is totally pointless.

YOU’VE GOT TO KNOW THIS STUFF!

Well, I should say that “You’ve got to know this stuff IF you want