Blogs about marketing from Pew Pew Laser Blog

Don't Start Your Own Web Site.

Do you have a homemade or craft item that you'd like to sell online? Are you thinking of setting up your own website to sell it? Don't. Odds are, it'll about as effective as arranging your wares on a card table on the sidewalk outside your home.

Go where the shoppers are. Use, say, Etsy. Or eBay if you must. Sell your stuff where people are already looking to buy something similar. This is akin to setting up a booth at Saturday Market. (Or in front of San Francisco's Ferry Building, or Seattle's Pike Place Market.)

HGTV as Real Estate Market Indicator.

I often leave HGTV on the TV while I'm cleaning the kitchen. For a network that's supposed to be about homes and gardens, I've never seen a show about landscaping. In fact, all of the shows I see on HGTV are about housing and the real estate market. In fact, I've noticed that HGTV can be a broad indicator of the real estate market.

About two years ago, while the real estate market was just starting to crash, nearly every show on HGTV was about buying (or selling) a house. The real estate agent helps folks find their dream houses. "Flip That House". Three properties are shown, and the couple picks one. Someone buys their very first home.

But nowadays, there are several new shows on HGTV, and house-flipping shows are nowhere to be seen. An agent takes folks to find their dream rental / apartment. There are a couple of different shows about why a house has been on the market for so long. There's even another show about remodeling homes to add rental space - so that the homeowners can get a little help with their mortgage payments.

I shall feel that the real estate market is truly back on the rise when I see the boom-time programming of old back on HGTV.

Outliers.

I finished Outliers this week. It was excellent; incredibly enlightening. Gladwell illustrates the keys to success - both luck (opportunity) and preparation (hard work) - so clearly that I feel as if I've been given the keys to the universe.

Should you read Outliers? Everyone should read it. (Well, not everyone. I will allow that Mr. Gladwell and those who have enough money and happiness for the rest of their lives might not get a whole lot out of it.) But the rest of you should ask yourselves these questions. Do you want to know how the system of success functions? Read Outliers. Are you a professional educator? Read Outliers. Do you want to know how to train your kids for success? Read Outliers.

Do you get my drift here? Read Outliers.

MAXIM.

You may remember that I was distressed when Electronic Gaming Monthly stopped publishing in January. The publishers have finally sent me a new magazine to fulfill my EGM subscription: MAXIM.

MAXIM?!? The issue I received features an "article" identifying America's Sexiest Beaches. It's thinly veiled smut. Mouth-breathing morons. I sent the publishers a letter stating that I do not wish to receive MAXIM, and requesting a check for the remainder of my paid subscription. Perhaps I will spend it it on a good magazine - such as Cook's Illustrated or Mental Floss.

I've identified what infuriates me (and others) so much about receiving MAXIM as a replacement for EGM. The publisher (Dennis Publishing, owned by Hearst) used the most naively simple demographic group in choosing a new magazine for EGM subscribers: males, age 18-30. I'd been a subscriber for nearly 10 years; surely the publisher would have learned a little more about me during such a long relationship. But they invested no time in researching the market segment that subscribed to EGM. The print publishing industry clearly has a lot to learn - expressed interest is a much more effective segment identifier than the barely considered guess that the publisher made.

Consider the significant portion of children who subscribed to EGM. MAXIM may not be rated R, but it is certainly not PG. Consider the many female gamers. In fact, I would suspect that EGM had a larger-than-average female subscriber base compared to other gaming magazines. One of the reasons that I was a loyal EGM reader was that they rarely wasted space on top-heavy "hot chicks" or comic-book style fantasy gaming pictures. I was highly irritated by all of the "page babes" that littered the pages of the one other gaming magazine I read once.

Good news, though. It appears that EGM will be reborn. (Official Press Release, Article on 1up.com) You can bet I'll subscribe to that as soon as I can.

What I'd Test.

I've been imagining doing some optimization testing on Woot's new design. This is a bit of an intellectual exercise, and a bit of show-and-tell for designing a web page optimization test.

All tested elements should run concurrently, and for at least a week. Woot's conversion rate is probably highly dependent on what's for sale that day. If a test were run where the display of the elements were non-random (one element per day, for example), the results would be so heavily influenced by the desirability of the item for sale that the element's actual influence on conversion would be impossible to suss out. The site is highly dynamic, but even the dynamic elements can be tested using style changes and JavaScript.

I'd measure the results of 2 different actions - signing up a new user and purchasing the item. There's a good chance that the test elements would influence these events quite differently.

Above is a screen shot with an overlay of the elements I'd test for optimization. (Click for a full size screen shot) For each of these test elements, I'd test the original versus a new idea:

1. I'd try different colors on this Call to Action button. In subsequent tests, I'd test the language of the button.
2. I'd like to try a different treatment on this quick production information box. Creative styling (like what I've drawn, only good) that highlights the Call to Action button might prove effective.
3. Hiding the Discussions box as a test element will tell us whether visitors are being distracted from converting.
4. This smaller headline might prevent people from seeing the rest of content that would be more convincing.
5. Same for the larger headline.
6. I'd test hiding this advertisement box. Once it's influence on conversion rates is identified, we can look at the ROI of the advertising revenue to see if it's worth keeping the ad.
7. Lastly, I'd try moving this more straightforward and detailed description of the product near the top of the page.

All in all, that's 7 different elements to test. If we test only 2 versions of the Call to Action Button, we can do it in 8 experiments (the unique number of pages displayed) using a fractional factorial array. If Woot's traffic volume and conversion rate support 16 experiments, we can test 4 versions of the Call to Action button, as well as more versions of the other test elements, or a few completely new test elements.