Quiz Opt-ins: Because Your Prospect Always Wants To Know

Quiz Opt-ins: Because Your Prospect Always Wants To Know

by | Jun 8, 2018 | Email Marketing, Everyday, Online Marketing, Online Marketing Tech, Ontraport
Email opt-ins.  It’s a core component of the online marketing business.  But our audience is easily distracted.  How can you hold their attention and give them a real time result?

Tell them what they most want to know!

And make it a specialized answer to their situation.  Because, we all think we are a little special and unique.

This is where a quiz opt-in comes into play.  With a quiz opt-in you ask a very compelling question, such as this one I am asking of moms who want to work-from-home.  And after a sequence of questions with logic behind it, you give them a calculated result based on their answers.

I know this market has clicked around to a countless websites looking for that answer.   But what’s right for ME to work from home?   This quiz walks through key criteria that help me know which is the best recommended path for this mom based on their skillset, their income goals and their available time (and some other secret ingredients I find help me discern best when I’m having a face to face conversation.)

Dare I say this is almost as effective as a face to face convo to get them the right resources if you quiz is designed properly?

Now, some businesses have used this quiz builders to make very viral posts on their facebook pages.  Do you remember “Which Disney Princess are you?”   Right.  You know you clicked on that bad boy in a moment of boredom / mindless curiosity.   See how attractive a quiz can be?

I’ve been wanting to build a quiz for awhile but hesitated because of the complexity behind it using just my website and email automation system (and I’m a software engineer by schooling!).   When I had a chance to try this tool by Interact, it was a no-brainer.  And this entire quiz (which is more complicated than I think most would try on a first attempt) took me only 90 minutes to create.

Here are some behind the scenes of what the builder looks like:

QUIZ EDITOR & QUESTION SETUP:

Super easy to configure this step including photos for each question if you’d like (and I recommend….more emotional connection to keep the quiz taker clicking thru)

 

BRANCHING LOGIC EDITOR

Whoa nelly!  That’s crazy Lori!  Yep, a little techy here but you can hire a nerdgirl like me because this doesn’t scare me and it took about 1 / 1000th the amount of time other quiz builder logic would have.

 

RESULTS REPORTING

I was super impressed with the level of detail here.  and too often we get excited building something and forget to look close enough at the math of what’s working and not working.  (or we don’t build in the right links to track it appropriately).  This is done for you.  Nicely at that.

Notice I’ve barely sent any traffic to this quiz funnel yet but because I can see in great detail what these prospects answered, when I personally reached out to them, I had way better conversations and could be more helpful than ever.

EMBEDDING AND SHARING

All-the-options.  This thing has some legs on it.  Because if you build a good quiz, you want it to show up everywhere.

 

 

My View On The Benefits of This tool:

  • The most affordable quiz builder on the market
  • Easy integration to my email automation solution (in this case Ontraport) including tags and directing a contact to a specific sequence
  • The branding component allowed me to make this match my brand with just a few clicks
  • Built in stock photos saved much time pulling from other sites
  • Highly flexible in the logic area in quizzes “if / then” kinds of logic

Challenges I Found With this Tool:

  • Mapping out the path through your quiz can get way crazy in that builder if you have a number of different results and variables
    • SOLUTION:  Keep it simpler.  Your audience will handle that better as well.
  • It’s another monthly tool investment.  But…with the right strategy one that totally pays off.

My Recommendation

The right quiz design can help you convert higher quality leads and the tool more than pays for itself.  So know your market, and ask the question they most want answered, then get that quiz in front of enough people and it has more than paid for itself.

Are you one of my clients?

Let’s talk about where quiz opt-ins fit into your strategy on our next call.   If you want to test drive the Interact Quiz Builder, click here.

Do you want a free email marketing strategy session?

Become a new Ontraport user with my partner link, and a new Interact user, with this partner link, and we can design out your first quiz funnel, with full integration to Ontraport in 1 hour. I’m a huge fan of Ontraport due to it’s all-in-one feature set and ability to grow with your business.  From landing pages, to online sales, to email automation and even affiliate systems, it has it all.  Coupled with this easy to use quiz builder….your toolset is nearly complete. (Learn more about my favorite online marketing tools here.)

Are you a Virtual Professional who wants to learn this for your clients?

Join us in the How She Quits Collective where we cover all the latest and greatest online marketing topics and, how to be the best Virtual Professionals on the market.  You’ll want to test drive Interact for yourself, with this partner link please.
Help! My Monthly Email Costs Are Out Of Control!

Help! My Monthly Email Costs Are Out Of Control!

by | Dec 8, 2016 | Email Marketing, Everyday, Lori Mercer, Ontraport, Uncategorized

If you are crushing it in the online marketing space, it’s likely that you have a big list and have learned that big = more expensive for many of the tools you need to use.

Welcome to the big leagues!  You’ve made it!  Now act like it kiddo.

(This article is an ever developing analysis as tool features are added and the race to be the best in the online marketing tools space is fast and furious.  I’m seriously impressed with how many great tools are out there.  So expect this to be an active and updated article as we watch the race.)

Currently the email marketing tool niche has so many players you can probably name 3 right now I’ve never heard of.  Awesome.  Because that means there is a big need and competition refines each other with better results for YOU and ME, the business owners.

One of the first hurdles I’ve seen those who have grown their list to 10k+ come upon are the costs of these email tools.

Suddenly over Black Friday weekend, you’ve got a big explosion and you’re hit with multiple $99 charges for email sends.

Or you launch this amazing free challenge and add 14,000 subscribers in 5 days (no income yet, just subscribers) and it bounces you up a tier in pricing +$300 / a month.

The cost of these tools can easily reach $1000 / month when you are sending 100,000 or more emails.

Hopefully if you are at this level of business you are making five figures a month minimum and can absorb the costs like it’s nothing.   Still, the wealthiest people I know watch their dollars closely and know they can optimize this spend.

Here are 5 tips to optimize your contact size and email send volume to maximize the value of your email marketing tool costs

Tip 1:  Scrub your list and reduce the size

But I worked so hard for all those followers!   Yes.  Yes you did.  Let it go, Elsa.   The person who subscribed 2 years ago may have moved on in life and no longer needs your product.   Perhaps you even have duplicate contacts.  The same person with different email addresses or old emails that constantly bounce.

Tip 2:  Segment your list by most engaged

Create a group / tag / list of contacts within your tool that are the most engaged and send your campaigns primarily to them as opposed to the full list.

“Most engaged” could mean:

  • Have opened at least one email in the past 60 days
  • Have clicked any link in the past 3 months
  • Have opened / clicked key emails / links in your bread and butter automated email funnels
  • Have purchased a product from you in the past 6 months

Tip 3:  Segment by Asking Your List What They Want

You could ask by subject matter that pertains to your topic.

Example:  If your topic is cooking related, ask if they are a beginnger, intermediate or advanced chef.  Or if they prefer chicken or beef.  Or if they are cooking for 1, 2 or 6.

Or ask them what medium they prefer to receive content from you.

Would they prefer a facebook click through instead of another email?    Segment based on where they came from.   And….set some facebook retargeting to reach those who are all over facebook.   If you can reduce your email tool costs by $300 / month, take that dollar amount and apply it to Facebook ads, marketing the same content, to the segment of your list who primarily comes to you through facebook.

Ask them if they would mind if you moved to a twice a month instead of weekly send.

You could also segment automatically based on their actions.   Product purchaser.  Blog reader.  Facebook skimmer.

Tip 4:  Simplify.  Reduce funnels, products, opt-ins and programs

Eliminate your lowest performing funnel / opt-in or product.  Now if it’s the lowest performing it may not reduce your email send volume by a lot but I’ve had a peek into some of your all’s cluttered up email marketing closets and chances are you’ve got some skeletons hanging around out there that need to go away.

Is there an ugly opt-in and ebook you made 2 years ago before we had all these fancy nancy tools?  Ditch it (or temporarily shut it down and put it on the “to be updated” project list.)

Is there a product that brings you more stress and less dollars?  Eliminate it.

You know the 80/20 rule.  80% of the results comes from 20% of the __________.   Apply this in whatever way makes sense for your market.

(And listen to this tough love….if you are thinking “but I have 27 digital products and all of them sell something!”   Trust me on this simplification thing.  What you focus on thrives.  There’s no way you can market 27 digital products unless you have a big team and have segmented your team into specialization areas.   No ones brain works well on 27 different topics AND it’s probably harder for your ideal client to find what they need as well.)

Tip 5:  Analyze Email Send Frequency and Top Opens / Engagement times and topics to reduce the number of emails you are sending

What time of day / week / month are your emails getting the most opens?   Eliminate the low openers and focus in on the hot times.

Do you have a 10 part drip campaign but emails 5 and 7 barely get opens?  Re-evaluate that message and eliminate or consolidate.

There is no “right answer” here so if you feel constrained, by all the “send emails on Tuesdays at 6 am EST” messages you see online, do a fact check on your metrics.   The question is what works for YOUR audience.   If you are targeting moms of little kids, an 8 pm email send could be perfectly timed right at the top of their inbox when they sit down for the evening and a little “me time”.

So, there are a lot of possible actions there.   I know what that means.  You’re overwhelmed and don’t know where to start.

Look at YOUR data.  And pick 2 low hanging fruits to get started.

If this is not in your bag of tricks, outsource it.

Fudge. I think I need a new email tool.

Did reading this make you realize you may be overspending?

Don’t want to dig through all the latest tools / options / feature comparisons?

Are you in the big leagues but haven’t yet stepped up to the big kid table with your tool?

Here’s a spreadsheet we keep updated with tools we feel are worthy of being on your radar and meet needs across the spectrum of online businesses.

It’s free.   (Send us your thoughts if you’d like us to add more criteria or tools for analysis!)

VIEW MY REAL TIME EMAIL TOOL ANALYSIS
How Do I Choose the Right Tech Solutions for My Membership Site?

How Do I Choose the Right Tech Solutions for My Membership Site?

by | Oct 7, 2016 | Everyday, Membership Sites, Ontraport

You’re a solopreneur or small business, not a tech guru.  But you’ve probably fought your way to this point with a lot of self-learning (pulling your hair out), a couple contractors who left you nervous, alone and waiting for a return message and hope and a prayer.

Your email opt-in might be singing along and you might even have an ebook for sale on your website.

But membership.  This is a whole new ball game complicated by the wide variety of apples, oranges (clearly different from apples but still a fruit), tangerines (not the same thing as an orange right but so close!) and pineapples (has the word apple but nowhere in the ballpark).

First I want to tell you this…..don’t spend a dime on technology and worrying about this until you know your market, know your product is a fit and have good list building going on.    Be sure you have surveyed your audience, including about pricing and services they’d pay for, and know you can earn back your first months expenses with your initial sign up offer.   This can get expensive fast and depending on which tech guru you talk to, can begin to cost in the tens of thousands of dollars.

What I like to recommend is starting with the right sized services for your market size and growth plans.

These decisions must be made carefully because changing your membership platform is not simple.   For example, once you get your members on a system with recurring charges, if you wanted to change to another membership system, you’d need to get everyone to re-subscribe again. Whoa!!!  Yes that’s a big hurdle.  Plus move all their data and access over to the new system and lose history of activity.  Soooooo…… choose wisely!

I hope this short guide of the tools you need and recommendation for your level of business is helpful!

The General Membership Setup

This overview is for someone who’s been doing online marketing for a season, has a decent sized list and engagement, is likely already making $3-10k per month online and is wanting to add a membership product line.

Read through this for an overview and if you are more of a beginner or more advanced, check out the next 2 segments.

Email Automation:

At this point you should have graduated away from MailChimp or ConstantContact to one of the more fully featured email automation systems with powerful rules engines such as Ontraport.  (If you aren’t there yet, here’s one of my favorite free list building programs.)

Website + Theme:

Hopefully you are already on WordPress.  There are themes that are highly optimized for more advanced membership sites where you want a forum, user profiles, etc.  It may be slightly advanced still at this level depending on your product price point.   Try to avoid changing themes if possible as it adds a lot to your project timeline and cost.   If you are feeling this membership product is going to be a mainstay in your business and you want a new brand and look and feel, start a new website with it’s own membership domain and a theme designed for membership sites.

Sales Page:

If you are using Ontraport, definitely create an Ontrapage sales page.  It so nicely tracks and integrates with all of your customers activity.  Every action they take is tracked in their contact record and you can automate abandoned cart follow up and more.

If you are not using Ontraport, there are many 3rd party sales page tools.  You must check that they include support for your member email automation and integration to your membership site.  Otherwise you will be watching for transactions and manually adding them to your membership system as well as manually checking for their payment failures and renewals.

Shopping Cart:

There is a lot of hype right now about SamCart and for good reason.  Any optimization on getting someone to click thru and buy is a good thing.  However it’s another $99 / month and another technology to integrate.  Consider the time and cost factor before adding it on.

Ontraport has an integrated shopping cart that automatically manages subscriptions, renewals and credit card failures.  Stripe is the payment system behind it which is super easy to setup with reasonable processing fees.

Membership Management:

What is this?   You need a tool to manage your list of paid, up to date customers, their logins and what materials they get access to on your WordPress website.    These are WordPress plug ins.   If you are on my favorite all in one path of using Ontraport, there is a simple plug in called Pilot Press which integrates seamlessly.

Pilot Press is not the most fully featured membership plug in but Ontraport integration really gets the job done well.   As a comparison, other tools like WishList Member include more advanced membership features which you would manage via Ontraport instead of Pilot Press.   My strong preference for Ontraport is to have one single dashboard to watch all of your customers interactions.  Their opt ins, email opens, sales transactions and membership activity.   Using a tool like WishList, you will go one place for membership activity, another place for email delivery and another place for sales transaction.

If I had to start today, I would look strongly at AccessAlly and it’s partner ProgressAlly due to their phenomenal user interface options, ease of use to set up a gorgeous course content and tag level integration to Ontraport.   (This comment bleeds into the next topic – Course Content).

Or……..you don’t put this on your WordPress site at all and use a completely cloud solution like Kajabi.

Course Content:

This exists on your WordPress site and means “how do you display member content to your members?”    At a basic level you can simply create pages of content and set them to the proper member level.   Some themes have template pages for video pages or 6 week courses with a video / content page each week and a nice navigation built in.   Optimize Press is a theme that has been nice for this.

The newest favorite on the market is definitely AccessAlly with ProgressAlly which add “gamification” in ways that increase engagement with your audience, show progress trackers, badges earned and integrate directly to your email automation systems like Ontraport.

Cost Estimate to Build:  $0 DIY – $2500

You can totally DIY this if you want to spend the time.   Or hire a “done for you consultant” who can setup some or all of these components including things you may not be thinking of…. abandoned cart email sequences, reminder sequences for credit card expiration dates, etc.

Ongoing Monthly Cost:  $300 – $600

This the level of the online marketing game where it moves from hobby to business as the ongoing monthly costs begin to creep up.  But for good reason.  You are now using very scalable and advanced data management tools for your small business….which growing mountains of data!

For the more advanced online business owner

You’ve been there, done that, already have a team and are here to make some strategic decisions about technology and then get that project kicked off.

I first did a membership program analysis in 2012 when I implemented a BuddyPress website using S2Member and Aweber and Authorize.net.  It worked.  It was clunky and had many check in points but I’m still bearing many scars from those years.  Technology has come so far.   In 2015, I did a new assessment of membership systems with one of my biggest pain points being ease of use for my customer support team to be able to assist with things such as upgrades, cancellations and lost passwords and access.

That’s when I landed on Ontraport.   Yes Infusionsoft can do all of these same things as well, very nicely, but Ontraport’s user interface was much simpler and more intuitive for my team to navigate.   Their addition of OntraMail and Ontrapages has allowed my admins to create gorgeous emails and pages from templates without the time and hassle of adding a designer.

This is why I’m a raving fan (and implementer of this system for many).   So this recommendation leans heavily towards the value of the all in one Ontraport solution, with just a couple “best of breed” choices where it makes a big difference for your clients.

Email Automation:

Everything is in Ontraport.  Your opt-in funnels, member email sequences and all the logic for follow up emails, including knowing when was the last time they logged into your membership site to send them a nudge to get back in there as well as tagging their personal preferences to further personalizing their email content delivery.

Website + Theme:

Recommendation is to build your membership site into it’s own domain and website.   This allows much flexibility, releases the burden off of your main blog / opt in site and allows for great expansion (or the ability to sell off a product) in the future.   Even though it’s multiple sites, they can be branded in a way that feels very seamless to the user.

Sales Page:

Everything in Ontraport.  You’ll probably even get good enough at whipping together a sales page on your own if you’d like!  Often I’ll do template pages allowing my clients to copy and tweak them for a special audience or offer.

Shopping Cart:

If you are at this level, and already closely watching your analytics and tweaking with A/B testing and tight copy changes, SamCart could be a good add on but not necessary.

Ontraport has an integrated shopping cart with easy to add upsells and cross-sells.

Membership Management:

Ontraport with Pilot Press is very simple and effective.  For more bells and whistles that also help with more course content management, I’m really liking AccessAlly and ProgressAlly as mentioned in the previous section.   Note…..this feels a bit “girly and fun” to me when I visit their website.  Trust me when I say your branding can make this as tough guy, professional or glitter covered as you’d like.   Yeah for good design!

Course Content:

This should be top notch at your level of the game.  Great usability makes a huge difference in getting people to access your content and how they feel about the quality of your product.  Every link working.  Intuitive ways to find the course overview, modules and where they left off.  Quizzes and engagement.

If you want to do an online forum, this is the level to introduce it.   There are many opinions and options on this topic in the world laden with Facebook Group addiction.  Don’t get stuck on this point.  If you really want it, pick an additional add on, with nice integration to your theme and membership module to offer forums on your website.   (Note that a 3rd party cloud forum may require a separate login for your users which isn’t ideal)

I’m still cheering for AccessAlly with ProgressAlly as my tool of choice in this space with integration to Ontraport.

Cost Estimate to Build:  Don’t DIY This $2000 – $10,000

Lots of logic here, many pages, designs and email sequences to write.  Hire a professional and use good project management practices to keep it all organized and on track..

Ongoing Monthly Cost:  $300 – $1000

This will very totally depending on the size of your list and number of emails you are sending.   If you want to keep your tech guru on retainer, expect another $600-1200 / month.

Measuring ROI

At this level of cost, you should be closely monitoring your metrics.   It could get complicated with so much data and so many sources.  Consider a dashboard reporting tool in addition.

Don’t Fear.  There is a Beginner Path Still Packed With Customer Value

The value of your membership program is in your content.   You just don’t want the technology to get in the way.  If you are just starting out and totally overwhelmed, this path is for you.   

It doesn’t list every last detail, nor all the options.  It’s an overview.

Email Automation:

At this level you can still get by with a tool like MailChimp or ConstantContact   (If you’re still list building, here’s one of my favorite free list building programs.)   If your list is big and this is your moment to step up the game, consider an intro level to to one of the more fully featured email automation systems with powerful rules engines such as Ontraport.  Plenty of room to grow!

Website + Theme:

Hopefully you are already on WordPress.  If not, nows the time to make the leap.   To keep things simple, consider that you could deliver an entire membership program via email and not worry about member plug ins or website updates.  Simple huh?

Sales Page:

This is one area not to skimp because it’s an important first impression and where conversions happen.   But don’t get hung up on the tool  The copy and the design are what’s most key.  There are a lot of free sales page plug ins for WordPress if you want to start there.

If you are using Ontraport, definitely create an Ontrapage sales page.

Shopping Cart:

You could start with a paypal button on your website 🙂  Just saying it could be that simple!   I’m not a huge fan of paypal for those moving big sums of money (I’ve been one of those people who’s had their paypal account frozen for 3 months before due to a big sales cycle!)   But for this level of starting out, you’re safe.  Call them just to be sure.

Membership Management:

Keep it uber simple with an email content only delivery system.   Go completely cloud based (but pay monthly fees) or just do a simple Ontraport / Pilot Press solution.   Take a recommendation from a trusted development guru (like you’re reading here) instead of taking a chance reading reviews on a random plug in.  You should definitely have a tech resource in your back pocket who has used the membership plug in you choose because you will have questions.   This is one area to NOT DIY and pay someone to setup for you.

Course Content:

Keep it simple at this level.   The hard part will be deciding because there are so many players in this market.  Again, pick a solution for whom you know a trusted developer.

The newest favorite on the market is definitely AccessAlly with ProgressAlly which add “gamification” in ways that increase engagement with your audience, show progress trackers, badges earned and integrate directly to your email automation systems like Ontraport.

Cost Estimate to Build:  $0 DIY – $1000

You can totally DIY this if you want to spend the time.   Or hire a “done for you consultant” who can setup some or all of these components including things you may not be thinking of…. abandoned cart email sequences, reminder sequences for credit card expiration dates, etc.

Ongoing Monthly Cost:  $100 – $300

You may still be operating at the hobby level but at these costs, consider if it’s really worthy of business mode.   Membership sites are such a good product but a little heavier to manage and operate.  So consider a simple, low key solution at this stage of the game.