The Conversion Scientist ARCHIVE™

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$4 Million for 35 Subscribers: Does Newsday’s Online Newspaper Have a Sales Conversion Problem?

March 20, 2010 on 10:59 pm | In ConversionCast | 1 Comment

Conversion analysis reveals some missed opportunities

The New York Observer paints a pretty stunning picture of one attempt to launch an online newspaper Web site. Was it to be expected, or is this an online sales conversion problem?

The article states that, after a $4 million overhaul and redesign, newsday.com, the online arm of the Long Island daily Newsday had attracted only 35 subscribers in three months.

Author John Koblin also writes that, since moving the site content behind a “pay wall,” traffic has dropped from 2.2 million monthly unique visits to 1.5 million in just three months. This may not be surprising, since there is little free content available from the online newspaper.

Does Content Want to be Free?

I don’t think so. The price people will pay for content is determined in part by:

1. The price placed on it – What do others think it is worth?

2. Relevance – Should I care about it?

3. Timeliness – Am I getting information when I need it?

4. Uniqueness – Can I get the same thing somewhere else for free?

If your content wants to be free, then you haven’t branded it with at least one of these aspects.

Newsday’s content should pass the test with flying colors.

1. Price: They’re pricing it at $5 a week.

2. Relevance: It is certainly relevant to residents of Long Island.

3. Timeliness: New stories every day and breaking news.

4. Uniqueness: How many online news sources are there for Long Island?

As you will see in my Website review of Newsday.com (see video) they didn’t make the case. To some extent the content – stories, videos and applications – should make the case by itself. However, the site has the same categories, layout and value proposition of many news sites.

So far, all Newsday.com has done is put a price on it’s content.

The proper way to charge for online content

What Newsday’s designers and developers failed to tell management is that newsday.com runs on computers, and computers can monitor the activities of those reading the online edition. This means you can test just about anything in the court of public opinion.

Instead of changing everything, newsday.com should have tested their way into the new business model.

Test the variety of business models to be available: micropayments, donation strategies, “pay for everyone” strategies, as well as the “pay wall” approach.

Test how much “free” content is needed to keep site traffic up.

Test how to present pricing.

Test the price points that will deliver subscribers.

Of course, a testing strategy doesn’t deliver a $4 million pay day to an agency and development team. There are few incentives for patience. If management didn’t think they had the time for a measured rollout before, they certainly don’t now.

Newsday.com Reacts

Blog BobBlitz.com posted a chart showing four possible layouts for the Newsday.com site. It appears that newsday.com is “enhancing its website” by “updating its color scheme.”

I don’t believe this is going to help.

It’s great that they are asking their readers what they think, but Newsday’s problems are elsewhere when you look at it through the eyes of a Conversion Scientist.

Here is my Key Page Review of Newsday.com. Watch to find out where I believe Newsday has gone worked to prevent subscribers from completing a transaction on their site.

Would you like a similar analysis of your site? Request a Conversion Sciences Key Page Review.

Science by Email

Ecommerce Marketing Strategy for Online Sales

March 13, 2010 on 1:03 pm | In Marketing Strategy | Comments Off

Are you a Whack-a-mole Company? You should be.

Every industry has them. Your company may be one of them. They are the whack-a-mole companies, sticking their virtual neck out, and striving to do things better, driving online sales with an evolving ecommerce marketing strategy.

And they often get whacked.

But the companies I’m talking about hunker down in their holes and plan their next chance to pop out again, with more force. It’s in their blood. The Internet is becoming the place they stage their emergence.

These whack-a-mole companies may sell products that range from the common to the mundane. Zappos was a whack-a-mole company. They started out in online sales of shoes. In ten years, Zappos outshone their competitors and sold an almost $1 billion business to Amazon.

The GoodLife Team is a whack-a-mole company in the very competitive real estate market. They are small by the standards of their peers, but like Zappos, I expect them to pop out of their hole with such force that they will leave the table altogether, flying free of the hammers that seek to drive them back.

Patience and Impatience

Whack-a-mole companies are both patient, and remarkably impatient. They are remarkably impatient to try new things. They aren’t careless. Successful whack-a-moles seek to find out what works and what doesn’t quickly.

Yet, they are patient in the long run. They know that they’re going to get whacked a few times, and they prepare for the blows. Theirs is a journey of learning and persistence.

I am drawn to these kind of companies. It is them that I find myself writing for.

Ecommerce Whack-a-moles

If you are a budding whack-a-mole in your industry and want to turn the Web into a powerful sales channel, find out how the highest-converting sites on the Web use ecommerce marketing strategy to maximize conversion rates and online sales. “Conversion” is the magic that makes you stronger than your competitors.

It gives you the force to fly free of your industry Whac-a-mole table by slashing your online sales costs.

Be free, my plastic mole friends!

Photo courtesy O Mighty Crisis Blog.

Science by Email

Why Landing Pages are Important for Dynamic Targeted Banner Advertising

March 3, 2010 on 4:42 pm | In Content that Converts | Comments Off

You wouldn’t play tennis without a racquet, would you?

The machine hurtled fuzzy green balls at me with a “fwoom, fwoom” sound every 10 seconds or so. I dodged most of them, but  occasionally got pegged in the chest, stomach, or some place worse.

“Fwoom, fwoom.” I was on the court. I was dressed in snazzy tennis gear worthy of Wimbledon. I had top-of-the-line footwear. I kept my feet moving.

I just didn’t have a racquet.

The only ball I was able to return across the net bounced off my head. Not only was I missing every shot, but I was experiencing bodily injury.

RANT WARNING – If you are already using landing pages for your targeted banner advertising, you can proceed to my article about landing pages for dynamic display ads on ClickZ. Everyone else, pay attention.

You don’t have to be a tennis pro to know that this is insanity. Yet thousands of businesses across the Web are using targeted banner advertising to drive traffic to their home page. Smart marketers with effective email campaigns are sending clicks to pages that don’t call the visitor to take action; to buy, call or download.

Landing Page?

Landing pages are pages that are specially designed to catch visitors, taking them directly to information that they are interested in, and asking them to become a prospect or a customer.

We can use a landing page anytime we know why someone clicked through to our site. If we know what they expect, it makes sense that we would create a page to specifically address their needs.

How do we know what the landing page should say?

We know exactly what a visitor is looking for when they click on an ad or link that we created because we wrote it. If we wrote the ad, and it caused them to click, wouldn’t you assume that the page they come to should address the offer made by the ad copy?

This shouldn’t even be a question in your mind (and for most of my readers it isn’t).

Pardon my exasperation

I don’t like to be rude, but can you imagine what my tennis instructor would have said if they’d seen me getting pummeled by a ball machine because I forgot my tennis racquet?

If you want to score points, you need to have all of the basic equipment. In the game of online advertising landing pages are basic equipment.

Your Home Page Won’t Do

The primary job of the home page is not to convert visitors into leads or sales. It’s job is to funnel buyers to pages that either provide information or call the visitor to take some action… or both.

Your home page has a lot of work to do, and as a result, it will probably contain the most links of any page on your site.

Paying for an ad that promises “Software that will improve your business,” and then asking them to sift through a page full of links (About Us, Contact, Our Products, Home, News, etc.) is conversion suicide.

Why not bring them to a page that says “Our software will improve your business, and here’s how.” Then explain why it is good for them and how it works. Then tell them how to get more information, or invite them to purchase.

Why Landing Pages are Important

1. Landing Pages will make you more successful by generating more leads, sales and business.

2. Landing Pages will make your visitors love you more. There is no better brand experience that finding what you’re looking for.

3. Landing Pages will cut the cost of your advertising by increasing your conversion rates. As the cost of generating new clients, you can put more into your advertising.

4. Landing Pages will keep me from ranting about landing pages

Technique and Practice Are Important

In tennis, how you swing your racquet will determine how many times you score. It is the same with landing pages.

How would you like to learn almost everything you need to know about landing pages in just two days?

The first ever Conversion Conference is happening May 4 and 5, and I can get you $100 off of the price of admission.

I know of no other opportunity to learn from the best conversion experts and Web site optimizers in the industry.

The Keynote is being given by Jakob Nielsen, the champion of fast and cheap ways of improving user interfaces.

Use the promo code CCW510 when you register for Conversion Conference 2010 to get your $100 discount. Early bird rates end April 10.

This is one of those shows that should pay for itself quickly. Think of it as tennis lessons with a profit.