I'm Angry. I'm Stubborn. And I Hate "Free" Traffic

by rimam1
7 replies
I hate dealing with free traffic. That's why I love copywriting and this forum in particular. I feel like I'm dealing with real "grown ups" who understand what it takes to run a real business... not people looking for ways to trick search engines or spam social media. Perry Marshall once said if you can't profitably go out and buy a customer, you don't have a real business. That's how I feel too.

I feel like I'm "3 feet from gold" and am convinced that if I focus on conversion rate optimization, I'll be where I want to be in my business.

SEO isn't something that I really want to focus on. I want to write for people, addressing their emotions and solving their problems... not some bot. On top of that, I feel like I don't have a "real" business if I can't just buy traffic.

Listbuilding is what everyone preaches, but for me, it has flopped. Only a 20% optin from cold traffic after testing various squeeze pages. Even then, the AR sequence didn't convert that well. I figure I should just figure out how to get my cold traffic to convert. Then I can have a buyers list that I can sell to over and over again.

Clickbank is great, but I'm not a big fan of relying on affiliates either. Plus, I don't have impression enough EPC's or conversion metrics to attract top affiliates (yet). Once I get that data I'd be happy to court affiliates, but I'll view sales from them as a bonus, not the lifeblood of my business.

I'd rather just figure out how to get a 1%-2% conversion rate on cold traffic My paid traffic efforts haven't yielded those kinds of conversions... yet.

I'm using Facebook ads, which are relatively cheap and targeted, but are an "interruption". I'm using Bing also which is great, but the clicks aren't as cheap.

But I'm becoming a serious student of conversion rate optimization and testing. I'm also finding that you don't need stellar copy if your targeting is accurate and you understand your customers. Obviously, this is the phase that I'm refining right now.

And yes, I am split-testing headlines, ad copy, and sales funnels (traffic to a presell page vs directly to the salespage).

I know for sure that ALL of my sales have occured when I send someone to a presell page first, rather than straight to my sales page.

Anyone know of a good conversion optimization specialist? Or anything I could be focusing on to get better results?

Thanks!
Raza
#angry #free #hate #stubborn #traffic
  • Profile picture of the author Mark Pescetti
    Originally Posted by rimam1 View Post

    Listbuilding is what everyone preaches, but for me, it has flopped. Only a 20% optin from cold traffic after testing various squeeze pages. Even then, the AR sequence didn't convert that well. I figure I should just figure out how to get my cold traffic to convert. Then I can have a buyers list that I can sell to over and over again.
    That's what I did when I started. I didn't have ANY kind of front end email capture. I sent everyone to my presell offer... or directly to my offer.

    I built up a list of thousands of buyers.

    Funny thing...

    I did most of it through SEO.

    Now, I definitely pay for traffic - so what took me two months to accomplish can happen literally overnight (with the right pay sources.)

    I don't know what niche you're in, but if you can position yourself with a great presell offer, like the Video Genesis guys did, build your list the way you want.

    I just started building a fresh list on my clickbank copywriter site and I haven't even bothered with an AR yet. Call me lazy. Call me stupid. But I prefer creating relationships with people who GET it.

    To each their own.

    Originally Posted by rimam1 View Post

    Clickbank is great, but I'm not a big fan of relying on affiliates either. Plus, I don't have impression enough EPC's or conversion metrics to attract top affiliates (yet). Once I get that data I'd be happy to court affiliates, but I'll view sales from them as a bonus, not the lifeblood of my business.
    Big mistake.

    Once you have proven, converting copy, go after a few top ("major league") affiliates and get them on it. You can build the worth of your business up WAY faster.

    I mean...

    WHY NOT at least create the possibility of attracting go-getter-type affiliates?

    Originally Posted by rimam1 View Post

    I'd rather just figure out how to get a 1%-2% conversion rate on cold traffic My paid traffic efforts haven't yielded those kinds of conversions... yet.

    I'm using Facebook ads, which are relatively cheap and targeted, but are an "interruption". I'm using Bing also which is great, but the clicks aren't as cheap.

    But I'm becoming a serious student of conversion rate optimization and testing. I'm also finding that you don't need stellar copy if your targeting is accurate and you understand your customers. Obviously, this is the phase that I'm refining right now.

    And yes, I am split-testing headlines, ad copy, and sales funnels (traffic to a presell page vs directly to the salespage).

    I know for sure that ALL of my sales have occured when I send someone to a presell page first, rather than straight to my sales page.

    Anyone know of a good conversion optimization specialist? Or anything I could be focusing on to get better results?

    Thanks!
    Raza
    Keep writing new copy and using/framing it in different ways. It may be a traffic thing. Or you might not have just the right copy to achieve your intended results.

    Mark
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    • Profile picture of the author Alex Cohen
      Originally Posted by Mark Pescetti View Post

      I prefer creating relationships with people who GET it.

      To each their own.
      Yup.

      The numbers resulting from direct selling (no relationship) are huge.

      Alex
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  • Profile picture of the author Alex Cohen
    Originally Posted by rimam1 View Post

    I know for sure that ALL of my sales have occured when I send someone to a presell page first, rather than straight to my sales page.

    Or anything I could be focusing on to get better results?
    You answered your own question. Preselling is the key.

    So get better at preselling.

    Paul Hancox has a course on preselling you might find helpful. He's a member of this forum, so you could PM him for details.

    Also, the successful CPA guys know how to presell, so you might consider contacting some of them for advice.

    Alex
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  • Profile picture of the author cjp214
    Still learning about this myself, but two particularly good resources that stand out are the blog "ConversionXL" and "Unbounce."

    Lots of well-researched, actionable articles you can implement and hopefully improve your conversion. Just keep tweaking and testing, and you will see improvements!

    Good luck,

    Corey
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    • Profile picture of the author ewenmack
      Raza, to get closer to your holy grail,
      test these buyer trigger points...

      2 things he hates
      2 things he loves
      1 thing that he has never found the answer to
      Emphasis on moving away from a hate
      Emphasis on moving to a love

      Test one big emphasis at a time
      using language they would use.

      Best,
      Ewen
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