Marketing your public domain business is a heady task. Once you get your next marketing campaign up and running, how do you know if it’s working? The answer…testing and tracking your efforts. photo credit: Docshatt

Here’s how:

Split Testing. When you use split testing you isolate one particular aspect and test it. This is also called A/B testing. For example, you could test the color of your headline on your landing page. In this case you could have one landing page with a red headline and one landing page with a black headline. Via your normal traffic driving techniques like PPC or a direct response email campaign, you send some visitors to your standard web page and you send some visitors to your test page.

Multivariable testing is another option to test the effectiveness of a particular marketing tool and to optimize it for maximum effect. It is, however, a bit more complicated. The idea would be to test a combination of changes. For example you could change both the color of the headline along with the call to action and perhaps your call out boxes on your landing page.

You’d create several different landing pages, each with a few changes and then track the results. Multivariable testing is capable of testing several aspects of a web page it can take a long time to gather enough data to make accurate decisions, particularly if a website has low to medium traffic, which makes Split testing an easier and more effective tool for many public domain website.

There are a number of factors to test to make sure you’re getting the best results possible with your chosen marketing tool.

• Headline
• Offer
• Price
• Call to action
• Promise
• Color
• Font
• Key words
• Advertisements
• Email delivery times
• Email subject lines
• Email from lines
• Forms
• Pop ups

Tracking Your Public Domain Website

Tracking is the second step of testing however you can also use tracking data outside of any testing system. Tracking is simply using the data available to find out how your customers and prospects are responding to you, your business, and your marketing materials. For example, you can track how many people visit your landing page, where they go on your website, how long they stay there, and how many abandoned shopping carts you have in relation to total purchases.

Tracking data shows you exactly where your efforts are working and where they’re not. For example, if you offer a number of children’s story collections and you find that one particular product is left in the shopping cart again and again, you know that this particular product’s marketing needs some work or perhaps the product needs revision.

Online you can track:

• Click throughs
• Visits
• Views per page
• Opt ins/subscriptions
• Shopping cart abandonment
• Conversions
• Keywords

Many website hosts offer basic statistics and tracking data however you may also want to consider Google analytics and/or CRM software to track and manage your customer database which can be a valuable source of information. Once you know what’s going on deep within your business, you can make better business decisions for sustainable success.

Newsletters have long been a way for marketers both online and off to stay in touch with their customers. If your public domain business doesn’t have a newsletter you may be missing out on a valuable marketing tool. photo credit: pingnews.com

Newsletters build front of mind awareness. Received on a regular basis your company will stay familiar in your target’s mind. When they have a need, they will think of you instead of your competition. Also, a regularly scheduled newsletter has the potential to arrive in your prospect or customer’s inbox right when they’re ready to make a purchase.

Newsletters are also viral because they’re easily forwarded. They help you communicate regularly with your members and enable you to provide valuable information on a regular basis. You can use your newsletter to promote new products, forum discussions, case studies, success stories, special offers and more.

You can also encourage contribution by asking subscribers to write in questions for a column, or provide success stories or other information that they may feel is relevant to the site. Newsletters are also a showcase for your knowledge and a great place to offer expert interviews, columns and even affiliate products. Regular e-mail contact makes your members feel involved and helps build a sense of community. In the new age of internet marketing – it’s all about building a community of involved customers and prospects.

What should you include in your newsletter?

You can put almost anything in your newsletter however, here are a few ideas to get you started.

1. Mention the new content you have added to your blog that week. Give a brief summary of any posts to wet the reader’s appetite and leave them wanting to read the whole article.
2. Give an overview of any interesting discussions on your forum that week. Invite them to log in and join the discussion.
3. Talk about industry news.
4. Use your newsletter to promote any new products you are selling on your site that week, or any affiliate programs you are participating in.
5. Give a review of a product.
6. Share a case story.
7. Share a personal story.
8. Tell about upcoming events, promotions, or media attention.
9. Provide “How To” or “Tips” articles. People love to learn and “how to” and “tips” articles are easy to digest and add immediate benefit.
10. Surveys, quizzes and contests. A regular trivia contest, survey or even a quiz is a great way to get your readers involved and you can learn valuable information about your target audience.

Some tips for effective newsletters

• Don’t rely too much on graphics; many of your members’ e-mails will have graphics disabled on html e-mail by default. Make sure you use Alt tags if you do have graphics so your readers will know what the pictures should be.
• Include links directly to your site, preferably to different areas of the site in the relevant sections of the newsletter.
• Use tables for structure. This ensures your newsletter retains its format on most e-mail systems.
• Stick to the 80/20 rule. 80% content and 20% promotion. Too much promotional content will drive your audience away.

Newsletters are an effective marketing tool for a public domain business. They help you connect with your audience on a regular basis and they’re an effective promotion tool.

If you want help setting up your email newsletter on autopilot… my absolute favorite autoresponder service is AWeber.com. I’ve been using them for years and they just keep getting better at their job!.

Podcasting has taken off as a viable marketing tool.

What is podcasting you ask? The term is derived from a combination of the Apple iPod and the word “broadcast.” It is essentially an audio blog.

People can subscribe to your podcast and listen to it on their computer, iPod or even their cell phone.

photo credit: Micah Sittig

It combines the benefit of blogging which is easy access to regular posts via RSS with audio which means it can be listened to while driving, cleaning the kitchen, exercise, or even while you’re working.

Adding podcasting to your public domain marketing strategy is a wise initiative because:

1. Podcasts increase your market reach. Everyone has their own preference for obtaining, and retaining, content. Some prefer to read, others prefer to watch, and still others enjoy listening and retain information better when they hear it. When you podcast, you open up your market to a whole new audience.
2. Podcasts can improve sales and conversions. We buy from people we like. Podcasting gives you the ability to communicate your personality and thus the personality of your public domain business much easier than many other forms of content. The one-on-one communication provides the kind of personal touch many customers desire.
3. Podcasts provide a consistent message. It has been proven that regular communication with prospects improves buying frequency.
4. Builds a community. A regularly distributed podcast can strengthen your relationship with your buyers and help to build a community of your customers.
5. SEO. Podcasts can be tagged and optimized for the search engines just like any other online marketing tool. Additionally, podcasts provide valuable content which in turn builds customer loyalty and word of mouth marketing.
6. Added credibility. One of the best ways to get repeat purchases and loyal customers is to become the “expert” in your industry. Once you’re established as the place to go for expert information, your profits and traffic increase.
7. Bonus time! A podcast or an audio file can be used as a giveaway to build your opt-in list. Consider recording an interview with an industry expert or a seminar or workshop and offering the audio file as a free download. In return, you get their email address for future mailings.

Podcasting is a great, and easy, way to connect with your customers and prospects on a regular basis. Recording and distributing a podcast is also very cost effective. Audacity is a top notch open source recording program and uploading your podcast to iTunes is free and easy. Like blogging it may take some time to build an audience however in the long run it can be well worth the time and effort. Podcasting can significantly increase public domain profits.

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