-
Collect Emails Using SocialMedia.com
Posted on January 18th, 2009 13 commentsI have always found SocialMedia.com a hit and miss when it comes to converting traffic. Sometimes you can experience an amazing conversion rate and kill it for a week or two and then poof! Your conversion rate goes to shit and your down to 1-2%. There’s only one method that I have used where the conversion rate has remained fairly consistent at 15-20%; collecting emails for future deployments via an auto responder.
The cost varies but it usually comes out to about $1.50 to $2.00 for a double opt in. It tends to take 15 to 20 clicks to get someone to opt in and then check their email to confirm and become a double opt in.
I tend to see a better conversion when I send the people to a personal looking blog. Similar to the Laura’s weight loss; a plain personal blog with a small picture on the side and about me. I have found that if I throw a picture of an unassuming college aged male (males convert better than females in this instance.) and I explain how I have been able to get all sorts of free stuff, without giving to much information away (tease the audience). I also include pictures of some of the stuff I have gotten. I place the email subscribe form below my about me photo, in the middle of the copy above the fold, and at the bottom of the page. Be sure to explain that they need to check their email to confirm. Very Important, (can improve conversions by 3-5%) I set up an exit pop up script if they try and exit out or hit the back button. The pop up just asks for their email again and show a pic of the dude holding a Xbox. Another thing that I like to do is set up the comments section with an optin form.
Ad text and landing pages (personal blog) are your key to success with this model. The ad text should explain what they should expect from me offer wise. As Ruck would say, this is pre-qualifying your lead.
Example-
The landing page should explain in enough detail to interest them in opting in. Your copy should read like the story of a poor college kid who is thrilled to get a ton of free stuff. Also, I’ve done a lot of testing and your conversions from your initial mailings will be higher when you tell the people what’s expected of them in your ad copy. The trick is to design the front page (the lander) so that there are no out links. Remember were not dealing with Google so why give them more reasons to leave your site.
Once you have your ad and copy done you will need to structure the opt in process in such a way that you get maximum efficiency for your ad spend. How is this done? When they first opt in I set up the auto responder to forward them to another post within the same personal blog . This post explains to them the reason they must check their email to confirm that the info be sent to them. This should also be written in the college kids words as if he were telling his buddy. Here is where i have put a c form contact form, “Wordpress Plugin” that has a tell your friends feature. I then tell them to tell their friends about this amazing find and share the wealth!
What to send these people after you’ve got their email? The first email I write a small paragraph about the resources that I use to find my free stuff. What resource? Where do I send them? You send them to your blog! Not the personal blog but your “free blog site.” The email can explain how you stumbled upon this site from a friend referring you and that they should also refer their friends. Give them a link to the blog lander and your done. (More on this later.) No, not quite.
You still need to set up a free site. You can go the easy route and just post links manually but if you forget and it is not updated every few days you will lose these customers. I like going for broke and creating an entire new business model out of it. Manually updating product data feeds from affiliate networks such as Cj.com, Linkshare.com, Shareasale.com. As well as manual posts linking to free stuff and special deals. How would one set something like this up? Honestly, I can hack at code but as simple as this might be to some I had to send off for a coder for this. Try Wickedfire.com or Rentacoder.com for coders.
But before I get ahead of myself. Where do you send these people? The front page? No! As we all know most people need their hands held like its the first day at Kindergarten. Send them to a post within the blog that explains what the site is all about and link to a few of your best deals or free trails. Explain that the site has free stuff, discounts, and free trails. Also be sure to ask them to refer a friend and subscribe to the feed. Via method above ^^.
I have done well with sending them (within the post lander.) to some free trials, zip submits, email submits, etc. Just test it and see what works for you.
Follow up emails tend to have links to free stuff and deal posts from your blog. Sometimes I send off a blast telling the people about free stuff that gives me no immediate benefit, ex. Taco Bell giving away tacos from 2-6 today. Although I remind them to check out the free stuff blog and subscribe to the feed.
The personal blog concept isn’t anything new and neither is collecting emails before sending consumers to the offer. Although, I haven’t seen this applied to SocialMedia traffic. This model can be applied to tons of different offers; grants, diet, car insurance. Be creative and remain consistent throughout your promotion and you should do well.
“This post was made in response to Ad Hustler‘s post (link below) and parts were taken from a comment that I left.”
SocialMedia.com Test #15 – Finally A Winner
13 responses to “Collect Emails Using SocialMedia.com”
-
Joshua,
One of the most informative posts I’ve ever seen from an advertiser on SocialMedia.com! Kudos to you!
Sometimes it’s luck of the draw on the network to get traffic, since when a big brand comes along, they set it at higher delivery priority– thus, affiliates don’t get much traffic.
We were never able to get email/zip submits to work properly, largely because of poor traffic quality and scrubs by the advertiser.
-
Great post here. I have not yet used SocialMedia.com for opt ins but I am certainly going to try it. I’m planning on more case studies so maybe I’ll do one for opt ins. Thanks for putting this out there.
-
@Dennis Yu
Thanks Dennis I really appreciate the complement. True, I’ve tried straight zip/email submits in the past and would do well for a few weeks and then the conversion rate would drop fall below profitability. Currently, straight zip/email submits are not working for me at all on social media. The only way I’ve been promoting on social media recently is above.@Ad Hustler
Thank you very much. I always look forward to your case studies and I will be interested to see what you have in store for this.
-
Great article, I bookmarked your site. nice writing! This article will come in handy for sure when starting up some camapains on socialmedia.com
-
The pre-qualifying your lead tip was really useful to me. That will help me in the future I’m sure.
-
@Stanky Legg
I always try to qualify leads across all platforms by doing so I’ve been able to increase my conversion rates dramatically.
-
-
Whoa… this site is pretty awesome
your layout is really well designed, and your blogs are (judging from what i’ve read) very interesting. heehee… consider yourself favorited. 
-
Nice post, Josh.
I sure wish Facebook would allow you to collect emails. That would make for one killer source of dirt-cheap opt-ins! Maybe I should give SocialMedia.com a go though..
-
@Justin
Thank you very much.@ImagesAndWords
Thanks! I wish Facebook would let you do a lot of things. So far it’s the only site I’ve really had success with that you can advertise on Facebook apps with.
-
-
Jonah July 15th, 2009 at 21:49
I really like what im seeing here. Have you tried any other social media sites for this idea?
Grab The Feed
Find Me
Dennis Yu January 18th, 2009 at 21:11