Marketer’s Mind Memo – Issue #39

He seized the opportunity to force me to do something he knew I would hate...

See: I'm a long-time fan of the UFC and mixed martial arts. My buddy Rich Schefren is as well. Only he's a Connor McGregor fan, I'm not. 

When speaking at our annual conference a couple of years ago, Rich presented a new software tool he was working on, then proposed something interesting to the entire audience. 

"I'll give everyone in attendance a free copy of the software... on one condition. Todd must wear a Connor McGregor t-shirt tonight at the afterparty. So, it's up to Todd whether you all get the software free or not."

Oh... that son of a...

Rich knew I would have no choice but to agree to wear the shirt. The crowd was now cheering for the free software. 

Of course, begrudgingly, I wore it.

Thankfully, though, McGregor lost the fight that night. So it... kind of... even'd things out for me. 

Yesterday, it was announced McGregor would be fighting Dustin Poirier at UFC 264 in July. (Let's go Poirier!)

Tickets go on sale today I believe. They're priced from $300 to $10,000 a pop. Far higher than typical. Even higher than an upcoming championship bout between two other popular fighters.

So, why are tickets for McGregor's fight so much more expensive?

Simple: Demand. A lot more people want to attend this fight than the others.

And, of course, the more people who want to attend, the higher the ticket prices will go. 

This is the same thing we see with traffic platforms -- the more demand there is from advertisers, the higher the cost of traffic.

In both cases, the marketplace determines the cost; it's based on their demand. 

Higher volume of people who want to go to a UFC event, higher ticket price. Higher volume of advertisers competing for an audience, higher traffic price.

And, every traffic platform which produces good results for advertisers will see greater and greater demand. And, as said, that greater demand will lead to higher and higher traffic prices.

So why am I sharing this with you?

Simple: To make sure you realize the natural direction of traffic costs. And so you can be prepared. 

On quality platforms, traffic costs will continue to rise. It's the nature of the beast. 

To be prepared for this, you want to work on increasing your Average Order Value (i.e. average amount of money spent with you per transaction). 

You also want to work on increasing your overall Lifetime Customer Value (i.e. the average amount of money a customer/client spends with you over the life of their patronage). 

The more a buyer spends with you the day they first buy from you... and... the more they spend with over the next several weeks and months, the more you can afford to invest in traffic to get new buyers.

This is how you put yourself in a position to continue to drive traffic... even as traffic costs rise. 

This is what smart entrepreneurs do. 

With that, let's get to this week's goodies...

MY FAVS THIS WEEK

• 30 of the Best Book Covers of the Year (So Far)
  
  I'm a bibliophile; I love books. Physical books especially. And I appreciate a good cover. I also believe there's marketing value in seeing what covers pop.
  
  Here's a compilation of unique and interesting covers you can use to stimulate thinking about your own marketing creative (i.e. ad images).  
  
  Of course, if you use any kind of ecover images in your marketing to represent your products or bundles, this is a great resource for some fresh ideas. 
  
  
• The 36 Questions That Lead to Love
  
  Can intimacy between strangers be accelerated with nothing more than questions? Several studies suggest the answer is yes when having them ask each other a specific series of personal questions.
  
  “One key pattern associated with the development of a close relationship among peers is sustained, escalating, reciprocal, personal self-disclosure.” 
  
  
• 100m Posts Analyzed: What You Need To Write The Best Headlines
  
  This is a fantastic article. Probably the most comprehensive I've seen on this topic. 
  
  While I wouldn't accept everything shared as gospel, I certainly would use what's shared in this article as ideas for testing. 

ODDITY FROM MY LIBRARY

Rated the #1 marketing book of 2017 by Mashable, They Ask You Answer is even more applicable today.

At its core it's a content marketing book. But, it presents a simple mindset and method for communicating with your marketplace in a way which positions you as a trusted "advisor" while delivering utility. 

As is pretty obvious from the title, the method is grounded in answering your market's most common and pressing questions -- a way of delivering real-world value while demonstrating your expertise.

I like it. A lot. 

As I see it: They Ask You Answer is a playbook you can follow to truly help your marketplace, become a valuable resource, position your brand as an authority, and lead prospects to see why your company is the one to do business with and buy from.  

At a bare minimum, the book will give you many more ideas for content you can share with your marketplace as prospects move along the buyer journey. 

WHAT I'M TELLIN' MY TEAM

This week on our internal Team Marketing Training...

I showed the guys a simple framework for "steering the prospect's choice".

Let me explain.

I've been talking to the team a lot lately about softening our copy. Not having it be as aggressive or feeling as manipulative. 

Not only does that style of copy not represent me, it doesn't perform well in more sophisticated markets. 

"Softening", in this context, means leading the prospect to the conclusions and beliefs we want them to have, rather than pushing those beliefs on them. 

Part of softening is not doing or saying anything in our copy which can make prospects feel as if they're no longer in control. As if we've taken control away from them.

We don't want prospects to feel as if we're attempting to force our offer on them as the only option. We want to lead prospects to see our offer... on their own... as the smartest option. 

To do this, you want to be able to talk about the different options your prospects have. But, do it in a way which steers your prospects to view your offer (i.e. your option) as the clear winner.

This week on our Team Marketing Training I showed the guys the framework for this. 

When it's done correctly in a marketing campaign, you avoid coming off as pushy, you maintain positioning as an advisor, you deliver valuable education, and you lead prospects to want to buy. 

All while your prospects feel in control and as if they've come to the buying conclusion on their own, by their own power. 

TEAM TAKEAWAYS IN THREE BULLETS:

• Good marketing is good content; good content is good marketing. It's not an either/or. All content can and should lead prospects one step closer to the desired action.
  
  
• A known tactic is a blown tactic. If copy comes across as manipulative, prospects will feel we're trying to manipulate them. And if they feel we're trying to manipulate them, they'll resist, push back, and be far less likely to embrace our offer. Rightly so. 
  
  
• Leading someone to a conclusion is not the same as blatantly trying to get someone to accept our conclusion or position. The latter is apparent and creates resistance. Leading someone is about giving them the information they need to make the decision on their own. We want to do this in our marketing. And it needs to be done strategically. 

MY ADVICE

A question posted inside the E5 Nation Facebook Group...

Below is my response:

I don't have a minimum sales conversion rate...

Because sales conversion rate isn't what determines whether a campaign is financially viable or not.

When deploying a marketing campaign with paid traffic, the main metric I care about is the Cost Per Acquisition (CPA) to Average Order Value (AOV) Ratio (CPA:AOV). 

That tells you how much you invested to get a single buyer... and how much money a single buyer spent with you the day they became a buyer.

If, let's say, you invested $20 to get each new buyer (CPA), and each buyer spent an average of $30 with you the day they became a buyer (AOV), you'd recoup all your ad spend plus an extra $10 of profit per buyer.

In this example, why would you care what the sales conversion rate was?  

Even if it was 1%, that doesn't change anything. It's still a profitable campaign.

Yet, if you were investing $20 to get each new buyer (CPA), and each buyer only spent an average of $10 with you the day they became a buyer (AOV), you'd be negative.

If, in that instance you had a 10% sales conversion rate, would it change things? Would you celebrate? Would you feel you had a winner on your hands?

Likely not. 

Why? Because, even though you have a 10% sales conversion rate, you'd still be losing money every new customer transaction. 

Point is: Sales conversion rate doesn't determine whether a campaign is a winner or loser. No matter how high or low it may be.

You can't deposit sales conversion rate. It's only an optimization metric.

When using paid traffic, you want to use the CPA:AOV Ratio to determine how well a marketing campaign is performing. 

***
NOTE: If you're not in the E5 Nation Facebook Group with us yet, you're missing out on the opportunity to have me answer your questions. Not too mention, some killer content and live streams only shared inside the Group.

Go here and join us inside the E5 Nation Group (it's FREE!). 

ROCKSTAR RESOURCE

QuestionDB is a simple marketplace/content research tool.

It compiles a list of questions asked online about a topic or keyword. 

A quick search can help you understand: What problems people are dealing with, topics they care about, interests they have, and, of course, the commonly asked questions they have.

You can use QuestionDB to learn more about your marketplace. You can also use it to generate ideas for content (e.g. Youtube videos, blog articles, etc.). 

It's similar to the Answer The Public tool, with one exception. QuestionDB also includes links to the source site of where each question was posed.

So, QuestionDB allows for a bit of deeper research or investigation if you want to see how others may have answered a question.

PIC OF THE WEEK

I still have this mug. It's over fifteen years old. Could be closer to twenty. 

It's one of the first physical add-ons I got as a free bonus for purchasing a copywriting course. 

I love it. It reminds me of how fun little gifts can make for great bonuses. 

A couple of years after getting this, I had a custom mug created for one of my own offers. It was for chiropractors and was part of a $12K bundle. I was amazed at the bump in response we saw just by adding the mug as a freebie. 

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