How I Achieve a 30-50% Email Opt-In Rate from 'Cold' Traffic

by HanifQ

Posted: 11 years ago 20 replies

INTERNET MARKETING

Hey guys just thought I would sure a pretty ninja technique I used to achieve a 30-50% opt-in rate on my squeezepages in a Sports related niche...
(sorry, I can't give away the exact niche or my exact squeezepage, that would be marketing suicide since this niche makes me over $3K a month in profit)

Ok, here are the main principles I followed:

1) Make my squeezepage UGLY as sin. Literally, there was ONLY a headline, a sub-headline, and the opt-in box (below the opt-in box I have 1 more sentence reinforcing a benefit) There's NO images, no borders, nothing else on this page....only text and a simple opt-in box with an arrow!

2) But BEFORE the squeezepage, I sent traffic to a 'bridge' page that basically asked them very SPECIFICALLY what they're looking for. Let me use the IM niche as an example...

Lets say your squeezepage is about 'making money from blogging'. The bridge page, or the page you setup before sending traffic to your sqeezepage, might give the visitor one of these 2 options:

---
- Do you have an existing blog and are looking for ways to make money from it?

- You don't have a blog setup and would like to know how to get started?
---

Basically, my bridge page 'pre-qualified' the visitor and sent them to the appropriate 'ugly' squeezepage I setup. The headline on the squeezepage was made relevant to whatever option they chose.

The bridge page is also UGLY as sin...pretty much all text, very very plain.

Anyways, I found that by pre-qualifying the visitor and sending them to a squeezepage with a more targeted headline got me 30% and as high as 50% optins from COLD traffic...

The traffic was from Adwords, which I know a lot of you don't like. But look, in many niches Adwords traffic is cheaper than its ever been, because Google kicked out most of the affiliates and shady advertisers.

So yeah, the traffic was cold, it wasn't from a JV partner or a recommendation from any site or blog. It was straight up search traffic from Adwords.

The main lessons:

- Extremely simple squeezepages convert better than fancy ones, atleast in many niches.

- Try to get in the mind of your visitor and make them feel that you have a specific solution for them (this will pre-qualify your visitor).

Other expert list builders, please share your thoughts and strategies in this thread!

#3050% #achieve #cold #email #optin #rate #traffic

JasonBennet 11 years ago

I agree with you that simple looking squeeze page has been converting better for me than those fancy squeeze page after my testing. I think it is important to have relevant marketing messages that so that it will be have conversion on the squeeze page. But is interesting to test your method on cold traffic.

Thanks for sharing
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- HanifQ 11 years ago
  
  No problem Jason, thanks for stopping by!
  
  I like to call my strategy 'hyper-relevance', where you have multiple squeezepages setup that are completely indentical, with just a few words changed in the headline...and you funnel traffic to the most relevant squeezepage for them.
  
  Works really well in my testing, and I tested like a freak!
  
  Thanks
  
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  After my first 2 years of losing over 10K in internet marketing SCAMS, I am now a 6+ year IM veteran with lots of experience building Niche Sites, Ecomm Stores & running PPC campaigns. I've made most of my money through Affiliate Marketing, Adsense & Infoproducts. I promise to provide lots of FREE VALUE from all my experience over the past decade!
  
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tpw

11 years ago

I am curious the CTR rate on your "bridge page"?

That gives us a better impression of your actual costs to convert visitors into subscribers.

Thanks
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HanifQ

11 years ago

Originally Posted by tpw

I am curious the CTR rate on your "bridge page"?

That gives us a better impression of your actual costs to convert visitors into subscribers.

Now there's a sharp question from a real marketer!

The CTR on the bridgepage is about 80%. Again, the ugly, simple style makes the high CTRs possible. Infact, when Google allowed Amazon affiliates, I used to have really ugly bridgepages linking to Amazon products and achieve super high CTRs as well (and make a killing in commissions, until they slapped the hell out of it).

I also have an exitpopup on my squeezepage. Adwords doesn't allow exitpopups on the main page that you link to from your ad, but they don't care if its on the 'Tier 2' page. The exit popup helped me improve my results by showing a one-time offer.

[ 2 ] Thanks
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ajbarnes777 11 years ago

Nice idea.

I've actually been thinking about making a bridge page in the form of a questionairre/quiz and then mentioning at the bottom, "to get your test results and a free copy of X ebook (which would obviously be related to the quiz/questionairre), enter in your email address to continue".

Here's an example of what I'm talking about. I think it's genius!
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PerformanceMan

11 years ago

Originally Posted by HanifQ

Is this WordPress? What exit popup script are you using?

Thanks

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joaquin112 11 years ago

So you're getting 30-50% optin rate in your squeeze page, but how much traffic are you losing in the bridge page?
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talfighel 11 years ago

Originally Posted by HanifQ

(sorry, I can't give away the exact niche or my exact squeezepage, that would be marketing suicide since this niche makes me over $3K a month in profit)

That is a good idea.

If you would give it away here then you can be assured that many would copy it and then you would have a lot more competition.

Good thinking and very smart man.
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sogeshirts 11 years ago

Joaquin he said above he is getting a CTR of 80 percent on the bridge page. This is a pretty smart method HanifQ. Thanks for the share.
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joaquin112 11 years ago

Right, I missed that. It does seem like something worth testing.
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xxxJamesxxx 11 years ago

Good idea. I've actually heard and seen this method in action and I can see how it can laser-target your prospects and convert 'em at a higher percentage.

Just gotta pull me finger now and actually do it!

James Scholes
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- HanifQ 11 years ago
  
  Hey guys, yeah I get about a 80% CTR due to the very, very simple bridgepage that focuses completely on the text links and no other distractions...The text links take the user to the appropriate squeezepage and the only graphics I use on the page are simple little arrows to draw attention to the links.
  
  I'm using ExitSplash as the exit popup.
  
  A couple of quick things I'd like to point out:
  
  - Its EXTREMELY important to test the language on your bridgepage. In other words, when you're trying to hyper-segment your visitor, you have to make sure that it resonates with them. You can dramatically improve CTRs by testing these simple text links.
  
  - Its EXTREMELY important to test the headlines on your squeezepage. Again, what is the most powerful benefit for the user? Its best to stick to one, maximum of 2 benefits. Longer headlines, atleast for opt-ins, don't seem to work as well.
  
  Lastly, I just want to mention that not all of my squeezepages achieve this high of an opt-in percentage...but a good percentage of them do.
  
  Either way, on the LOW end I can still do 20-25% using this strategy, which is VERY GOOD for cold traffic (non-referral, non-recommended).
  
  Cold traffic, as most of you are probably aware, typically results in a 10-15% opt-in rate, even if its targeted (unless you're in a really non-competitive niche where people aren't actively building lists, or you happen to be the first-mover on a trending topic).
  
  However, by pre-qualifying and segmenting my visitor a bit, I'm able to do pretty well even on the low end as far as opt-in rates go.
  
  All the best to everyone!
  
  Thanks
  
  1 reply
  
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  After my first 2 years of losing over 10K in internet marketing SCAMS, I am now a 6+ year IM veteran with lots of experience building Niche Sites, Ecomm Stores & running PPC campaigns. I've made most of my money through Affiliate Marketing, Adsense & Infoproducts. I promise to provide lots of FREE VALUE from all my experience over the past decade!
  
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  HanifQ 11 years ago
  
  Oh another quick pointer...
  
  I tested the living crap out of my Adwords ads...I came up with every benefit I could possibly think of, reference a list of as many power words as I could (free, secret, dominate, etc)....
  
  And then I tested the various benefits with the various power words until I hit the jackpot, literally (consistent 5-10%+ CTRs on adwords ads that drove my per click cost down to 10-15cents, which is really good for Search traffic).
  
  The biggest secret, I put SPECIFICITY in the headline (using specific numbers such as 7,9, 13, etc).
  
  Specificity + Compelling Benefit + Power Words resulted in a some awesome CTRs on Adwords ads...
  
  But here's the weird thing, some 'numbers' worked better than others, and some power words worked better than others, so you gotta test in your market hardcore.
  
  Thanks
  
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  After my first 2 years of losing over 10K in internet marketing SCAMS, I am now a 6+ year IM veteran with lots of experience building Niche Sites, Ecomm Stores & running PPC campaigns. I've made most of my money through Affiliate Marketing, Adsense & Infoproducts. I promise to provide lots of FREE VALUE from all my experience over the past decade!
  
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  JHandy 11 years ago
  
  So basically you set up a pre-sell page or a prequalify page. That's pretty neat and should absolutely do the job for you. If they don't like what you have on your "bridge" page, then why would they move forward. So in essence, you "warmed up" your traffic. Nice one!
  
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  HanifQ 11 years ago
  
  And to tell you the truth, I didn't even really presell...all I did was 'get more specific' in asking them what they're looking for. So basically made the offer more relevant to them.
  
  Thanks
  
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  After my first 2 years of losing over 10K in internet marketing SCAMS, I am now a 6+ year IM veteran with lots of experience building Niche Sites, Ecomm Stores & running PPC campaigns. I've made most of my money through Affiliate Marketing, Adsense & Infoproducts. I promise to provide lots of FREE VALUE from all my experience over the past decade!
  
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WillR

11 years ago

So if you send 100 visitors to your bridge page, you are getting an 80% conversion rate. So 80 of those 100 visitors are clicking through to your squeeze page(s). Those squeeze pages are then getting a 30-50% conversion rate meaning 24-40 of those 80 people are opting in. So out of your initial 100 people you are basically get a 24-40% optin rate. That's not at all uncommon for sending people just straight to a squeeze page. I have squeeze pages that get 50%+ optin rate from cold traffic.

I'm not saying your method doesn't work. I am just saying make sure you test both ways of doing things and also remember that optin rate doesn't mean a whole lot really. It's the lifetime value of those leads that really counts. A page with a smaller optin rate can outsell a page with a huge optin rate any day of the week. It all depends on the quality of the leads not the quantity.

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HanifQ

11 years ago

Hi WillR, I tested sending traffic to my squeezepage directly, over a dozen different versions...

And in my market(sports related) I could never achieve over 15% or optin rate...

This method definitely improved my optin rates, so in your case or in other markets, it may have an even greater impact.

As for the quality of the leads, I think by pre-qualifying and preselling the leads, the quality does improve. But I do agree with you that in the long term the only metric that really matters is lifetime value of each lead.

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HanifQ

11 years ago

Originally Posted by Art of Marketing

Thanks for the OP and follow up HanifQ.

But now you have me really curious as to what aspects of your sports niche promo you were tweaking. I will make note of this on my fitness project.

You and WillR definitely remind us the importance of testing and paying attention to the numbers. Thanks Both.

-Art

I tried showing images of my free reports (nicely designed ones), with a nice header on the page, a border, all the good stuff...

And I tested headlines with sub-headlines, or just headlines stand alone...

No matter how fancy the page, the optin rate never climbed above 15%.

It was only after I moved to ugly that I saw a bump. And then when I moved to ugly with a bridgepage, the bump was significantly higher, EVEN after the traffic loss on the bridgepage.

In my particular market, I'm convinced that graphics and images actually take away from the main message. People just aren't looking for fancy in my market, and they don't care about appearances. Its all about the content.

I'm sure in other markets people may judge by appearances and what not, but I not in mine.

I've found that nothing works better than a headline and an optin box...thats it! Again, this may differ in other markets, but the one takeaway for EVERYONE in EVERY market is that the less overall information on your landing page, the better the results. Force your visitor to make a decision and make it fast, thats what works.

Thanks

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Bsperling 11 years ago

HanifQ - Totally agree with you that simpler you make your squeeze page the better conversation rate will be, this is after tests 2 different sites. As long as you have the relevant messages on the squeeze page.

Thanks for sharing your success
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MartinPlatt 11 years ago

Bridging pages work really well for anything that you're trying to 'sell'.

50% isn't too difficult to get to for opt-ins on a squeeze page anyway. I found that squeeze pages that look the same as everyone else's and have a lot of information on them do not convert well, but ones with nice graphics and a simple headline do. Ugly can also work too, but I didn't find it as good, stand alone.

I think it's about making the page stand out from the rest.
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How I Achieve a 30-50% Email Opt-In Rate from 'Cold' Traffic

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