Archive for the ‘Persuasion’ Category

How do you define an internet marketing campaign to be ethical? Have you ever thought about it? What standards do you adhere to? How do we hold our peers accountable?

These are some of the questions I asked myself this week after receiving an email from an internet marketing company. The email itself wasn’t offensive. It was what happened after I clicked on the email. Actually, it was what happened after I signed up for the FREE seminar that made my blood curdle.

The first email of the campaign was short, simple and enticing…

Debra,

Want a chance to win $30,000??

We’ve given away iPads, trips to Costa Rica, and all sorts of stuff.

Yes, I’m a bit CRAZY, but I guess you can say I’m in love with marketing.

To find out how you can win $30,000:

CLICK HERE!!!!

Of course, I’d love to win $30,000, who wouldn’t? So I click. The sales letter page then promises me the following:

three of the top marketing powerhouses from the Infusionsoft community (Ultimate Marketer: Bob Britton, SEO Expert: Grant James, and Internet Guru: Micah Mitchell) have now joined forces and developed the SINGLE MOST IMPORTANT thing a business owner needs to triple their sales and profits in 12 months or less,

The landing page goes on to claim:

“We have decided to host a special “FREE Sneak Peak, Live Event“  for the first 100 people to register.”

“you can attend WITHOUT shelling out your hard earned cash for a plane ticket, a hotel room or ANYTHING else,”

“YES! I Want To Be One Of Only 100 People To Attend This FREE Live Sneak Peek Event Into How Your Guys Systems Can Stuff An EXTRA $100,000+ Dollars This Year Into My Wallet! YES! I Also Want To Learn How I Can Win The $30,000 Cash”

Notice the use of the word free everywhere.

There was also a line that said this:

“having a one in 50 chance of winning $30,000”

If they are accepting 100 registrations, how do your odds become 1 in 50? There are no contest terms listed. No legalese at all anywhere.

Here’s the worst part…

Once you type in your name and email, they send you to a new page that says this…

“Your registration request for the “Infusion Elite Mastermind Sneak Peek Live Event” has been received, but before I can register you I first need you to pay a seat deposit of $97.”

“IMPORTANT!!: If you DO NOT pay the seat deposit, you WILL NOT receive a link for this event and you’re spot WILL NOT be reserved.”

And there is a video of the Infusionsoft Ultimate Marketing Award Winner (he makes this claim in the video) telling everyone why they need to pay $97 and they only get it back if they actually attend the event.

So they entice people with a $30,000 prize. They offer no terms and conditions regarding the contest rules. They play upon their relationship with Infusionsoft and their authority as the Ultimate Marketer of the Year. They tell you its free to join. Then after you sign up they say that you can’t complete the registration until you pay them $97.

I found this to be the type of campaign that gives internet marketers a slimy reputation. I found it to be borderline ethical and legal (deceptive advertising).

I now ask you, my readers,

What would you do?

Do you find this to be ethical?

Is this the type of role model we should be emulating?

Here’s a link if you want to check it out. PLEASE DO NOT GIVE THEM YOUR MONEY!

Have you ever tried to sell something to a customer online and wondered how to get them to buy more from you?

Here’s how…

The way you implement an upsell depends on the type of online selling you are doing. Here are 4 ways to get more sales now…

1. Script
2. Related Items
3. People who bought this also bought
4. Confirmation Page

So, when do you use these?

A phone script is used when you have a custom product or service and your customer usually places a phone call to get help making a selection or placing the order. When they place the order by phone, you want to have a script ready or you need to train your sales associate on what to offer. It can be a simple question like “Do you need a blouse to match that skirts?”

If you have an online shopping cart system with a catalog of products, you can implement the “related items feature”. What this does is once the customer selects a product either on the product detail page or in the shopping cart, the customer sees suggested or related items that complement the product they have chosen.

A similar feature is for the product detail page or the shopping cart itself to display a list that shows “people who bought this also bought”. Amazon.com was one of the pioneers of this upselling technique.

When you are selling from a squeeze page and there is no shopping cart, just an order form, you can still provide an upsell to the customer. Once the order is placed, you can direct that client to a new order confirmation page that confirms their order AND has an additional offer on it. Some systems allow you to create a funnel where you can offer a sequence of upsells and down-sells that changes based on the response of the individual customer.

These four techniques can be very effective at increasing your sales immediately. Once implemented, these techniques invoke the psychologically triggered behavior of commitment and consistency to increase your average order size.

Do you have any other techniques you like to use to upsell your customer?

When is the best time to sell your customer more?

The best time to get your customer to buy more is at the time of sale.

That’s right, offering your customer an immediate up-sell is going to get you better results than waiting until later. There’s a reason that an immediate up-sell is going to get your better results than one that is offered at a later time. The reason is rooted in psychology.

You see, there’s a behavior called “Commitment and consistency” that says that we as humans have an overwhelming need to behave consistently once we make a public commitment. So when we finally pull the trigger and make a purchase, we have this innate desire to behave consistently with that decision or commitment that we just made. So, when I decide to become a customer of yours, there’s an innate drive to stay a customer of yours. Therefore if you present me with an offer, I have a higher likelihood of buying more while I’m still feeling this commitment. This behavior drives us to purchase again.

Have you applied this to your business?

Have you seen the latest blockbuster movie Avatar? You know, the movie that is breaking all the sales records at the theater box-office? I saw it last weekend. It’s a prime example of the pillar of influence called social validation. This simply means that the more people that see the movie, the more we think that it is proof that the movie is good.

One form of social validation used in marketing is called “social proof”. You will see this in the form testimonials and case studies. When we see that someone else like us is using the product or service and is happy with it, we have a strong desire to join them. The more people participating, the stronger the desire to participate.

You will see marketers using social validation when they broadcast that an event has sold out (or is about to), or that they have surpassed their goals. You see, that means that more people liked what they are offering than even they expected and the implication is that you will like it too.

When you add in some validation from authority, you up the ante. You see, when people perceive someone as an authority figure, they have a higher tendency to do what that person says. Think “4 out of 5 doctors prefer”. That is an example of a marketer using the perception of authority to promote their product.

So, when you go to the movies this weekend to see Avatar, let me know if you liked it. Then let me know WHY you liked it. did you like it because it was a great story line? Did you like it because the graphics were amazing? Did you like it becauase everyone else did (social validation)? Or, did you like it because it got good reviews (authority)?