#I used to average sub 100 let me celebrate

[unstoppable-fish]

846 dmg in a game I think I’m a Fuse main now. Them knuckle clusters are spicy

[bayoubluebirb]

Read This Before Buying A Bird!

There are some things to be considered before going to a pet store and buying that cute little conure or cockatiel in a cage, adopting a bird from a shelter, or homing a bird from a small independent breeder. Addressed questions: How much money are you willing to spend? Are you okay with the possibility of having a furniture-destructive animal in the house? How much space do you have? What is the climate and your neighborhood like? How long are you away from home per day? How much time can you commit?

How much money are you willing to spend on your pet per month?

- I probably spend about $50-$100 on my bird a month on average. On big trips to pick up perches, trees, or cages, it’s more along $200-$800.

- Birds are not cheap. They can range in price, but typically a healthy hand-reared budgie will cost anything from $50 to $100. My Peach Faced Lovebird was $140. I have a male Solomon Eclectus that was almost $2000. African Greys, Congo and Timneh, range $2500-$3500. Macaws range $2500-$23,000, etc.

- Cages are expensive! A good quality cage that is not full of harmful metals or paints, will cost between $200 and $5000. My SL Eclectus’ cage is pure acrylic and was almost $800. He will be getting a larger cage and that is $1500.

- Birds do need annual vet check ups, and they require exotic veterinarians specialized specifically in Birds. Because they need a special doctor, it also costs more. Co-pays are usually around $150-$400, and procedures and medications can be off the roof expensive.

- If you cannot afford to feed yourself, provide yourself with necessities and a couple wants, and are living comfortably, a bird is not the pet for you.

Are you okay with them possibly destroying a few beloved things in your home?

- Birds are often described as animals that take and don’t give back. They are natural foragers, and need stimulation to keep them entertained. Your parrot may chew at your door frames, your door itself, couch cushions, Leather materials, kitchen supplies, etc.

- Birds have extremely sensitive respiratory tracts, so if you aren’t willing to give up that lovely PFAS chemical we Environmentalists like to call The Devil We Know, AKA Teflon, then a bird is not for you.

- If you aren’t willing to trade in bleach, vinegar, non-stick, cleaning sprays and window cleaners, for something organic, trusted and approved by your avian vet, then a bird is not for you. It is much more expensive, but it would not only keep your bird safe, but also you safe!

How much space do you have in your home?

-Even if your bird’s wings are clipped, you need enough space for your bird to spread its wings and maneuver about.

-Birds talk a lot, so if you appreciate your quiet time, don’t get a bird if you live in close-quarters.

-Talk to your neighbors first before you buy a parrot if you live in an apartment or townhome. Yes. The birds will scream. Yes, your neighbors will hear it.

-If you want more than one bird, even if they’re the same specie, never house them in the same cage, even if it’s giant! Birds are NON DOMESTICATED animals, and it’s important we mimic their habits in the wild as to not frustrate them. Birds are animals that while in flocks, are incredibly spread out unless they’re mates or conversing. Birds are always alert, and are watching and listening. They need their space.

What is the climate like yearly?

-Where do you live and what is the temperature in each season?

-Do you get snow in the winter? Many people up north have birds, but it’s also more pricey to own a bird up north due to the extra expenses needed to keep the bird warm.

-How warm/cold do you keep the air on in your house?

-What species of bird are you considering? They come from all different habitats. The Peach Faced Lovebird, for example, is native to sub-desert regions like Namibia and Angola. Probably not a good idea to get a Peach Faced Lovebird if you keep your home below 19°C/66°F.

-Birds NEED vitamins (D3) they get from the sun, just like people! If your weather is consistently unable to provide these vitamins to your birds, you either need to purchase a UVB/UVA lamp, or you just should not get a bird.

What is your neighborhood like?

- Down in Florida, Texas, and many other states with high-demand parrot breeding and shops, there’s a lot of thievery. Make sure you live in a safe environment.

- If you live near chemical/manufacturing plants, or has an immediate family member that does, a bird is not for you.

- Birds are very sensitive to pollution. Please make sure your neighborhood is clean, because not only is it bad for the pets, but also the people!

- How noisy is the neighborhood? Do you live in New Orleans and pop big celebrations for Mardi Gras? Do you live in areas with lots of fireworks or loud noises? This can startle your bird. It can bring them stress!

- If you plan on flight training and/or bringing them outside on a harness, is your town/city very busy? Is there a lot of traffic? Are there birds of prey that live nearby? Hawks WILL and HAVE swooped down to snatch a parrot off of someone’s shoulder for a snack, and have even snatched them out of the sky while free-flying. Please be careful!

How long per day are you away at work/school?

- If you work a full time job and are a college student, you will not have time to take care of a bird and be able to grant your bird’s needs.

- How many hours a day do you work/are away from home? Parrots on average need AT LEAST six to seven hours a day out of their cage!

- Birds need attention, but not in the sense where you need to throw them a ball or cuddle with them. Being in the room with them out of the cage is even plenty to make them happy. They want you to be with them, but not on them!

How much time can you devote to your bird? How patient are you?

- Birds are a lifetime commitment. Depending on the species, your bird can live between 15 and 100 years. Do not adopt a bird unless you have accepted that this bird will be with you through everything. If you move, if you get married or divorced, if you have children, if you get other pets, etc.

- If you don’t think you’ll want the same bird for twenty+ years, do not get a bird. There are countless in avian shelters and sanctuaries right now, and it’s heartbreaking to see. If you wouldn’t sell your child because you got bored of them or were struggling to care for them, don’t sell your parrot.

- Parrots grow extremely attached to the people they’re used to being around, and in that case have many emotions similar to humans. They put trust in you, and rely on you, and love you. Rehoming them after multiple years of building that relationship can cause self-mutilating behaviors, depression, aggression, and even death from loneliness and feeling abandoned. If you cannot handle strong emotions and a deep attachment, a bird is not for you.

- Many parrots love to learn, and many are stubborn. They are extremely smart animals and among the most intelligent in the world, so keeping them stimulated with daily training is essential.

- Birds bite, and when they bite, it hurts... A LOT. I have been bitten until bleeding by an African Grey, I have been bitten by a previously abused Yellow-headed Amazon, I am constantly bitten by my Lovebird that I am trying to train to be less aggressive. Birds bite, and no, if you don’t understand why you aren’t allowed to scream “Ow!” when it happens, a bird is not the pet for you.

- Birds are not dogs, nor cats, nor horses. Negative reinforcement will only enable Negative behavior in your parrot! You must have the patience to, even when they bite you, praise them for it. You want them to know that biting doesn’t get a reaction out of you and that it won’t make you give them more or less attention. They will eventually learn this and try to find other ways of communicating with you.

- Birds do not bite to communicate by nature. You must take time to learn your bird’s body language. They will always give you at least FOUR warnings before they bite you hard. Please, learn to speak to your bird. They cannot learn English fluently like everyone else.

Please, let me know if I should do some more of these helpful pointers! By no means am I insinuating you should not get a bird, because I love hearing about people’s emotions and excitement toward them. They’re wonderful companions. I merely aim to inform people before they make a big lifetime decision like adding a feathered friend into their family!

[jaguarwong]

A rambling diatribe on retro-gaming elitism

There’s a lot to be annoyed about in the world today - obviously - especially with the various types of mess we’re all living with in every country in the world.

But a particular, and specific annoyance in the retrogaming hobby/lifestyle/environment/zeitgeist, is the hive-mind attitude from an increasing number of the most vocal (and seemingly most affluent) participants that this is, or should be, an extremely expensive hobby/lifestyle/etc/etc.

It’s impossible not to notice an underlying, deeply unpleasant, atmosphere of elitism in many of the communities I visit. An attitude of ‘you’re not doing it right’ directed at anyone who doesn’t have their Neo Geo AES hooked up to a 20” PVM via OSSC. (I have no idea if that example makes sense, nor do I care.)

This is the kind of arms-race attitude that fought to keep PC gaming an exclusive club for decades, and it has gradually seeped into retro gaming's language and ecosystem almost undetected.

The simple joy of rekindling one's nostalgia for Super Mario World, or re-experiencing the simple fun of games lost with the arcades, is being obfuscated by a collective need to quantify, update, and monetise every aspect of vintage computer entertainment.

It’s the kind of environment where you might expect the gateway drug of emulation to be met with the utmost scorn, but instead the self appointed guardians of retro (You can have that for your quiz team/band name, BTW) have positioned emulation behind a paywall of Retron 5s, Mega SGs, and (only the latest and most expensive) Everdrives. Any excited newcomer asking about the best controller to play retro games on their laptop is quickly overwhelmed with talks of latency, resolutions, and refresh rates.

If it wasn’t bad enough that forced exclusivity exists, it actually appears to be having it’s desired effect.

You can see it both in the way questions are asked and in the tone of the responses. You can see it in the photos of someones latest, expensive, haul and the other even more expensive stuff in the background - almost, but not quite, out of focus.

People don’t ask where they can find a cheap CRT, they ask if their $100 Trinitron is ‘good enough’. A joyous celebration of a bargain buy, or a long lost attic discovery, will be met with derision and disbelief, the underlying accusation that unless you can afford the inflated eBay prices for a barely average Sega Saturn game, then you aren’t worthy to own it.

Which brings me neatly to the event that triggered this rambling blog entry.

There was someone on a Discord server I’ve been frequenting who stated, blankly, without malice, that “all the good Saturn games are 100+ dollars”.

Why would they think this? Simply because it’s what the gatekeepers want them, you, and everyone else to think.

These are the people who, when a collective question is asked, wouldn’t dream of recommending any of the dozens of fantastic, better even, Saturn games you could buy for the price of Burning Rangers.

It’s this sub-group who don’t want you enjoying Sonic the Hedgehog for free when they’ve invested $200 in a Mega SG. The only way their post-purchase rationalisation can cope is by attacking the perceived difference in quality, by claiming they seek a ‘purer’ experience, and by attempting to undermine the simple pleasure of just playing old games by insinuating that someone with a secondhand NES Mini isn’t doing it right.

Now I just want to be clear that I’m not claiming to be some kind of saint who never judges anyone else's choices, nor am I saying that there aren’t benefits to some modern retro products, but the weaponised affluence I’m seeing increasingly around retro gaming communities is something else entirely.

Admission 1: I strongly believe that by downloading a thousand roms and picking one to play for five minutes before switching to another, then another, then another... your assessment of them will lack a psychological bond of choice, expectation, and - yes - sometimes investment that adds to the whole experience of a game.

But this is no less true of a pack of illegal roms than it is of someone with thousands in disposable income spending a tenth of that on a game they’ll probably never play.

Cost, value, and investment are relative terms. The kind of ‘bond’ I’m trying to describe between a player and a game can be gained through the investment of time, the effort of research, and the expectation of finding out for oneself if that game from your childhood holds up 20 years later.

Admission 2: I think games from the previous century should be played on a CRT television whenever possible. Pixels look better with real scanlines - it’s an incontrovertible fact - and the colour depth offered by that massive, humming monstrosity wedged into the corner is really something lost to the ages.

But it’s not a prerequisite of fun. And it’s especially not necessary to find the most expensive, most instagrammable, most egregiously hyped PVM to enjoy a game of Super Mariokart with your kids.

When I say: "I think these games should be played on a CRT", I mean ANY CRT. I’m typing this in a room with 6 of the things, two of them were free, and the whole collection has been compiled for the total cash investment of £26.

As someone born over 4 decades ago I’ll let you into a secret: The geometry has always been rubbish, the hum has always been loud, the picture has always flickered and no one ever cared about resolution or refresh rate or input lag when playing Tornado Low Level on their ZX Spectrum in 1984.

It’s entirely possible to argue a convincing case that you’ll get a more enjoyable retro experience from a wonky Bush portable TV than from any professional quality display equipment. And beyond that, if you can’t find a tube telly or don’t have room for one, use an LCD - it’s better than nothing, and the filters some emulators have these days are great.

It comes down this:

If you’re lucky enough, or have worked hard enough, to have the disposable income necessary to buy $400 RGB Scart cables and a professional monitor the size of a family car - and that’s genuinely what you want for your retro gaming experience - That’s cool. You don’t need anyone's approval or respect, you’re doing what you want to do the way you want to do it - and that’s a life lesson for everyone right there. But it’s your way, and nothing more than that.

This nonsense of idolising only the most expensive elements of this hobby has to change and we, the members of these communities, are the only people in a place to do that.

So the next time you see an excited new Dreamcast owner looking for game suggestions, mention the best ones first, not the most expensive.

When you come across a reddit picture of someone's game collection don’t immediately look for the over-priced ‘rare’ game they haven’t got, look for the ones you have in common and can have a conversation about.

And if you ever, ever, see someone being criticised for playing roms, or using composite cables, or playing on a flat screen TV, or any of that postering gibberish - step into that conversation and ask what games they love? What happy memories do they have? What is it about retro games brings them joy?

Because this is the real value of games.

They bring us experiences and memories to savour forever, they engage with us in a different way to that of films and music - and that difference should be cherished.

Games exist to bring us pleasure. Sometimes that pleasure is tinged with fear, and sometimes it’s truly dark and doesn’t feel like pleasure at all. Sometimes the pleasure comes from intellectual stimulation, sometimes from mindless entertainment.

But whatever form it takes, this pleasure, this… fun… cannot be tempered by technology, and it must never be attributed to any scale of monetary investment.

The simplicity of Retro Games is joyous, they are heartbreaking, they are brilliant and they must never be withheld from those who measure value in the size of their smile, by those who measure it in the size of their wallet.

You better get the aspect ratio right though, or I will hunt you down!

[junker-town]

Who won Hall of Fame Game week in the NFL?

Derick E. Hingle-USA TODAY Sports

Michael Thomas got a massive contract. Vic Fangio got a kidney stone. Tough call, tough call.

Winning in the NFL doesn’t just happen on the field. Victories large and small come in many different forms, ranging from nine-figure contract extensions to a few kind words said by an important figure.

While we’ve got a whole table to determine division-by-division standings and playoff odds, we often lose track of the more subtle victors each week. Rather than just running down a list of the Dolphins’ weekly opponents this fall, I decided to take a deeper look at the winners who transcend the box scores and spill glorious into the greater world as a whole.

Which is good, because this week’s, uh, limited slate of games didn’t tell the world much about the 2019 season other than which team, the Broncos or the Falcons, had the weaker fourth-string lineup. So who “won” the first, single-game week of this summer’s preseason?

First let’s start with who didn’t.

Not considered: the actual football at the Hall of Fame Game

Due to an internet outage, I missed the first two minutes of gameplay in Canton. Somehow this equated to TWO ENTIRE POSSESSIONS.

Through their first three drives, the Falcons had twice as many penalties (two) as net yards (one). Ten of the game’s first 12 drives ended in punts. Three of those punts were muffed. It took rookie quarterback Drew Lock four passes to get within three yards of his intended target downfield. Denver challenged a pass interference call seemingly just to be the answer to an obscure trivia question for years to come.

But hey, if you liked six-yard passes on third-and-9, THIS was the game for you.

the 2019 Hall of Fame Game's longest plays: 3. DEN RB Khalfani Muhammad, 31 yard run 2. ATL DE John Cominsky, 33 yard muffed punt recovery 1. DEN CB Linden Stephens, 43 yard pass interference penalty

— Christian D'Andrea (@TrainIsland) August 2, 2019

Kurt Benkert was the shining star of this wind-up car demolition derby, and he still threw for 5.4 yards per pass and left the game in the fourth quarter with a foot injury. He and Matt Schaub are currently dueling for the chance to start Atlanta’s meaningless Week 17 game after half the roster has been shunted to the injured list by conquest, pestilence, war, and death. Falcons fans will shake their heads and mournfully tell the world they “knew it would end this way.”

While we’re on the topic of premonitions Falcons fans can feel in their bones, Atlanta lost thanks to a tipped-ball touchdown on fourth down with under two minutes to play. This was the only vaguely exciting moment in football’s 2019 preseason debut.

Now, on to the winners ...

5. Resplendent old guys at the Hall of Fame Game

Tony Gonzalez is gonna look like this until he’s 80:

Tell me he wouldn’t still put up 60 catches if the Patriots or Cowboys called tomorrow.

Ed Reed would probably do all right too. He looks like he’s spent the past five seasons gearing up to fly a fighter jet against an alien invasion that will ultimately be foiled because their spaceships run on binary code.

@TwentyER pic.twitter.com/9Bd1jZ0Jqw

— Baltimore Ravens (@Ravens) August 2, 2019

Former WCW superstar Kevin Greene (and part-time pass rusher, I guess) also made the most of his camera time.

The guy’s 57 years old and still rocking an absolute Hercules mane. Bonus points for wearing a watch apparently made from the tie-down straps of a military cargo plane.

4. Nathan Peterman, whom everyone* likes

Everyone loves an underdog. As far as NFL quarterbacks go, there’s no bigger underdog than Peterman, the man who once threw five interceptions in a 14-pass stretch to kick off his first NFL start. Getting chased out of Buffalo for ineffectiveness is typically the kind of offense that precludes a player’s journey to a budding and ultimately fruitless spring football league.

Not the Peter Man.

No, the quarterback whose bedraggled play in western New York made us all fall in love and spawned the least-hype hype video ever made is getting a second chance in Oakland. And, like the guy he beat out for a roster spot last year, Jon Gruden has a preseason crush on him for some reason.

“I like these guys. This Nate Peterman is growing on me,” Gruden told reporters at training camp. “He’s athletic. I know he’s had some nightmare performances in the NFL, but when you watch the film you can see why. It’s not all his fault, but he’s got some talent, he’s got some athleticism, he’s got some experience. Here’s an opening day starter for the Buffalo Bills last year. I take that very serious. And he’s smart. He’s done a good job, he’s been consistent and I think he’s starting to get his confidence back and we all need that.”

Naturally, this news was well received by Raiders fans. From SB Nation’s Silver and Black Pride:

No, coach, no. This is the sort of thing that Mark Davis should roll up a newspaper and smack Jon Gruden on the nose for saying. I get that Peterman played for literally the Bills and that he looks the part, like how a successful quarterback should look, in shorts. But Peterman also has a record of 1-3 as a starter and a QB/INT ratio of 3/12. He was aggressively ‘meh’ in college at Pitt, where he was essentially a more boring version of Tyler Palko, and when he got to the pro ranks based entirely on his genetics and through no achievements of his own, he proved how overmatched he was and how his decision-making ability rivals that of the kid who climbed in the gorilla pen with Harambe. Nate Peterman is the sort of musclebound stiff Vince McMahon would try and fail to make a big star in the 1980s.

But the joke’s on you, Peterman haters. Gruden’s not the only guy who likes this scrappy young upstart.

Find yourself a teammate who supports you like @derekcarrqb supports Nathan Peterman. #HardKnocksNow pic.twitter.com/WaElOAE0fA

— NFL Films (@NFLFilms) July 31, 2019

Peterman’s just out here trying to do his best, man. Listen to Derek Carr and give him his shoe deal. Preferably something from Member’s Mark.

*citation needed

3. Derek Carr, who is not threatened in the least

He gets to be friends with Peterman! He’s gonna be neighbors with Gruden!

It’s true. As David Carr said, Derek Carr has bought a home in Las Vegas. When it’s complete and he finally moves in, his neighbor will be ... Jon Gruden. #Raiders

— Vic Tafur (@VicTafur) August 1, 2019

I hope he likes cookouts where the only food option is Hooters takeout.

2. Jordan Lasley, who proved himself worthy of the Raiders (while a Raven)

If you get released for punching teammates and celebrating too hard, you get to be on Hard Knocks. Sorry, that’s how the league works now.

Here, you can kind of see the ball Jordan Lasley threw into the nearby pond shortly after his fight with the DBs. pic.twitter.com/AQyrDw8509

— Jonas Shaffer (@jonas_shaffer) July 29, 2019

The Raiders claimed Lasley — a 2018 fifth-round pick with zero career NFL receptions — days after Baltimore released him for fighting cornerback Cyrus Jones and turning his fists on safety Bennett Jackson for having the audacity to prevent him from breaking his hands on Jones’ helmet.

First fight of Ravens camp: WR Jordan Lasley takes exception to CB Cyrus Jones going high in press coverage and the two exchange blows. S Bennett Jackson tries to break it up and Lasley swings at him. Jackson then tackles Lasley to ground.

— Jamison Hensley (@jamisonhensley) July 29, 2019

Now Gruden has two quarterbacks who are best friends and an entire roster that wants nothing more than to fight anything and everything in its path.

Oakland’s final day of camp should just be a 30-man over the top rope battle royale. Last five men standing get roster spots. Winner takes on Vontaze Burfict at Halloween Havoc.

1. Michael Thomas, who now has an opinion on the capital gains tax

Is Thomas the best wide receiver in the league? It’s debatable, but you can make a strong argument for it. The fourth-year wideout has excelled in New Orleans, catching 229 passes the past two years for 2,650 yards. More impressively, he did so despite drawing constant double-teams from opposing secondaries who saw fellow wideouts like Tommylee Lewis, Willie Snead, Tre’Quan Smith, and a hobbled 33-year-old Ted Ginn and giggled to themselves, “heh, no.”

Is Thomas the highest-paid wide receiver in the league? He is now. Rather than run even the slightest risk of losing Drew Brees’ favorite target to either a preseason holdout or 2020 free agency, the Saints made him the first pass catcher to garner a $100 million contract, inking him for five years with $61 million in guarantees. He’ll now be counted on to present a field-stretching menace who not only gives Brees the latitude to make video game throws downfield, but also creates a little extra space for Alvin Kamara to create havoc.

Most importantly for New Orleans, Thomas was the balm that soothed Brees’ late-season blisters. The veteran quarterback appeared worn out while falling off an early MVP run; after recording a 126.9 passer rating in his first 10 games, that number dropped to 91.5 in his final five. Thomas’ numbers fell off in that home stretch too, but he still averaged eight catches and 65 yards per game. If the combination of extra defensive pressure and a reduced Brees aren’t enough to drop him to sub-Pro Bowl levels, what will?

Thomas got a record-setting contract and more ammunition in his battle to be crowned the league’s best receiver. And he didn’t have to play in the Hall of Fame Game. He wins this week.

Special mention: NOT Vic Fangio’s urethra

Fangio’s first game (kinda) as an NFL head coach after breaking into the pro coaching ranks 35 years ago almost didn’t happen.

Broncos’ HC Vic Fangio, scheduled to make his HC debut tonight vs Atlanta in Hall-Of-Fane game, spent a good part of the day in a Cleveland hospital with a kidney stone, per source. Fangio has not passed it yet, but he is doing better and he will try to coach tonight.

— Adam Schefter (@AdamSchefter) August 1, 2019

That every Broncos sideline shot Thursday night wasn’t just a window into the depths of human suffering was the Hall of Fame Game’s biggest upset. Every second he stood upright was a victory over the mutiny taking place inside his own body. With pirate ships circling his kidneys, Fangio stood atop his deck, surveyed the landscape, and asked his first mate to bring him his red pants.

Not that the pain wasn’t evident at times, despite a stoic front.

Fangio, for the record, wore this expression for four straight hours. Did he do all this just to become the first NFL coach to challenge a pass interference call? Probably!

[brashspeak-blog]

The intersectionality of the hoodwinking of women; or, scones and tea won’t fix this and I’m raging.

*trigger warning: I use the word rape a lot in this, and directly reference a few of its associated brutalities. Please be kind to yourself, and don’t read this if you’re not up to it. You are more important than my rant.

 Also, just as a caveat, you need to put the jam on before the cream, you animals. 

 Women. We are 3D sacks of awe. Our laughter is the thing men fear the most, so...apparently we are that powerful. I mean, we’re most afraid that men will hurt us, but then, (spoiler alert) that’s kind of what I’m leading up to. It is the working knowledge of this stark difference in fear of the other, that has put me in a stroppy mood today. 

I love the idea of International Women’s day. I’ve been a nice thing to sit here in my knickers, drink tea and scroll through all the things people are posting on the socials about how inspiring the women in their lives are. I love the articles detailing women’s role in history, our progress to date and what may be on the near horizon. There is so much cause for celebration, and I am immensely proud that I get to be amongst the fold of a group of humans who do not seek revenge, but rather equality. I mean, feminism actually makes things better for men. We seek to redress toxic masculinity, we care deeply about men and how the current state of things that make “being a man” near untenable. As feminists, we simply want everyone to be happy. I mean, what’s good for the goose is good for the gander.

It is troubling, however, that even after packaging feminism as being good for men, and despite all the whistles, self-defence classes, opting to get an Uber home even when “home” is only one suburb away, there are some things that just wont stop. Men keep hurting us. 

I’m going to dive straight into the deep end and get to the point. Women are not doing bad things to themselves, nor are rapes accidents. We don’t trip and fall into a rape. Sexual violence is intentional, and in every single case, someone/s is doing it to us. Here in Australia, a place largely considered to be one of the safer corners of the world, we have a shocking epidemic of rape. SBS reported that “Australia has one of the highest rates of reported sexual assault in the world, at almost 92 people per 100,000 of the population, according to the United Nations”. SBS states in no uncertain terms that we are at more than double the global average for reported sexual assault. The key word there, in case you missed it, was the word reported. These are the numbers we can, hand on heart, say we actually know about. 

Based on numbers collected by the ABS in 2016, “one in five women (18% or 1.7 million) have now experienced sexual violence” in Australia. If you have not been sexually assaulted, don’t worry, it might still happen. If you have, you don’t need to worry either… it might happen again, because let’s face it, it’s not exactly the chicken pox.

How many women do you know? Is it five or more? Have any of them been sexually assaulted? If you’re shaking your head or if you’re unsure, either you have never had an honest conversation with a woman, or, none of them trust you. 

 Sit with that for a moment. 

At this point in things, it is important to note that I did not write that last bit just for men. If you are a woman and you don’t know of another woman who has been sexually assaulted, then maybe…. you’re not a safe woman. Make sure you consider that as a possibility. 

Now young lady, you seem a bit fixated in the violence? what’s up with that? Cool, you there in the back raise a very strong point, and I thank you for your candour. Let’s move swiftly over to a more palatable topic, let’s have a chat about….art.

Let’s start with music. Below is an excerpt from my master’s thesis on women in the music industry, steel yourself for some dry academic writing, but it is relevant: 

 …female songwriters are far less visible than performing artists, and the numbers show it. Within APRAs member base of 85, 000 Australian musicians, “20% of songwriters in this category are women”. What this tells us, is that out of just one sub-category, that is contemporary popular music, while 20% are of songwriters are women, within the larger music industry women are still less likely to be booked or included in a festival line-up than their male peers. When drilling the numbers down further, out of the entire APRA membership, “the gender divide between registered APRA members was on the most drastic across (an) entire analysis- only about one in five APRAH members are women” (McCormack, 2018). While this may “seem low, it was a 3.8% increase” (McCormack, 2018) from 2017. 

The statistics of most interest are the numbers associated with sub-categories within the music industry. Continuing with songwriters as an example, “APRA outlines the genres where women are under-represented and over-represented” (McCormack, 2018), with their numbers showing “only 7% of jingle writers in the industry are women” and within that 7%, “53% of children’s music writers are women”. From this statistic alone, it shows women are under-represented song writing as whole, but for roles culturally associated with women’s roles within society, that being child orientated content, women are over-represented.

Commenting on the Australian music industry, and the Skipping a Beat report, The Workplace Gender Equality Agency concluded that “women are not only confronted with a glass ceiling, but also glass walls, where women congregate in occupations and sectors where the majority of employees are women”. Meaning, that women are more likely to find employment as song writers if they write for children rather than for their own peers. 

Conversely, within a study by Dr Smith of the Annenberg Institute of Inclusion found that “nine male songwriters… have been responsible for almost one-fifth of the top songs in the last six years” (Sisario, 2018), that being from 2012-2018 in the Billboard Hot 100 in North America. In addition, figures pulled from APRA are important, not only because “APRAH AMCOS help artists get paid for their work” (McCormack, 2018), but also because of their “member base is a huge sample (over 85,000 registered members)” (McCormack, 2018). From that alone “we can reasonably assume that it’s a fairly accurate reflection of the large gender gap between songwriters in Australia” (McCormack, 2018). However, it’s not just the numbers pulled from APRA membership base that provide evidence of the continuing severe gender gaps within the Australian, and international, music industry. Going further afield, when looking at the nominees selected for both Australian and international awards ceremonies, top 100 count downs and radio playlists, a clear gender gap emerges across the broad field of music industry related occupations. 

Skipping a Beat found that “female artists received significantly fewer industry awards than their male peers, with only 20 female artists out of 367 musicians featured in the Triple J’s Hottest 100” (Workplace Gender Equality Agency, 2018), further to that “only 11 out of 75 inductees into the ARIA Hall of Fame” (Workplace Gender Equality Agency, 2018) have been women to date. Internationally speaking, the figures are no better for women. When looking to the most prestigious accolades within the international music industry, “of the 899 individuals who have been nominated for the last six Grammy ceremonies, 90.7 % were men, and 9.3% were women” (Sisario, 2018). From these numbers and studies conducted on gender disparities within the Australian and international music industries, a trickle-down effect is becoming all the clearer.

For Australian top radio playlists, women’s representation does not appear to be any better off when compared to those played globally. In 2018’s Tripe J Hottest 100, which happens to be the world biggest democratic song count down, of the 100 songs voted in, “37 song…were from artists with at least one woman” (McCormack, 2018). Further to that, only “twenty-four of those were by acts where at least half of its members are women” (McCormack, 2018). Interestingly, “none of those songs scored enough to make it to the top 10” (McCormack, 2018). What this tells us is that women consistently represent 20-30% of the Australian and International radio play lists, despite seeing an increase in artist royalty registrations and some festival line-ups. Data available from Spotify Australia solidifies this, by revealing that of the top 100 songs played from Australian IP addresses, “21 female artists” (McCormack, 2018) make the cut, and “none of them are in the top 10” (McCormack, 2018). What is not clear is if these female artists are Australian or internationally based, however, what is clear is that it is entirely irrelevant where a female artist is from or based, her visibility within the music industry appears to be capped at 20-30%. 

 Do you know what I’m thinking? I’m reckoning that perhaps there is a wedge that exists in this world. Imagine this wedge is a door stopper (if you will), and at one end there sits a small inequality, starting with small transgressions that grows fatter and bigger until it carried such weight it can stop the full force of a swinging door. 

Call this wedge a tap on the bum at a pub. Call it an uncomfortable vibe from the guy who is walking just a tad too close to you in the dark. Call it the stranger who puts his hand on the inside of your leg while you’re drunk and asks if you want another. Call it the moment you realise that in this instance it’s safest to play dead and wait for it to stop. Call it Ryan Adams, call it Bowie, call it John Lennon, call it Picasso, call it the local sleaze everyone just rolls their eyes at. Call it a lack of representation in film, art, music, politics, writing. Call it the silencing of women. 

Call it a wedge where we excuse shitty behaviour, because “no harm no foul”, and watch as we all spin in confusion when an 11-year-old girl is forced to deliver a baby conceived by rape, or when another girl gets murdered 100 metres from her fucking tram stop, or another on her way home from her own god damn comedy show. 

We must be seen. We must be heard. Our rage must be contended with. Our time and what we do with it must be acknowledge and treated equally. We are 52% of the population, how is it we have to fight so damn hard to just.fucking.see.ourselves. 

There is a link between what some may excuse as a small annoyance and an overall systematic silencing of women. The silencing of our music, our voices, our contributions to history and culture, and the total erasure of our lives must end. Once you’re on that wedge, it doesn’t take long to move from end to the other. We all must acknowledge this link; our lives depend on it. 

But you know, it’s not all doom and gloom, and on a more personal note, I’m not always raging. So now that I’ve gotten this shit off my chest, I’m going to pour a fresh cold beer down my gob, because beer was invented by us females and by fuck, I’m going to celebrate women today. See you at the show.    

[selina569]

1) What images do you have set for your desktop/cell phone wallpapers?

Phone: Ignis Scientia Desktop: Natalie Dormer

2) Have you ever had a crush on a teacher?

Yeah I have lol

3) What was your last text message?

“Ok”

4) What do you see yourself doing in 10 years?

I would like to have a career in publishing, and/or doing something with my writing, be married, and have at least one kid :)

5) If you could be anywhere else right now, where would you be?

Sleeping. I’m tired af

6) What was your coolest Halloween costume?

Poison Ivy <3

7) What was your favorite 90s show?

Charmed

8) Who was your last kiss?

@jaesylvr

9) Have you ever been stood up?

Yes multiple times in high school

10) Favorite ice cream flavor?

World Class Chocolate: dark and white chocolate mousse flavored icecream

11) Have you been to Las Vegas?

No, but I want to.  

12) Your favorite pair of shoes? 

Silver, sparkly, peep-toe, stilettos

13) Honestly, have you ever cheated on your significant other?

Yes.  

14) What is your favorite fruit?

Grapes

15) Have you talked to anyone on tumblr that you could see yourself dating/having sex with? If possible?

@jaesylvr​

16) Are you into hookups? Short or long term relationships?

Doesn’t really matter i’m up for whatever.

17) Do you smoke? If so, what?

Yes: hookah and weed

18) What do you do to get over your anger?

Shut myself away and watch tv or listen to music

19) Do you believe in God?

I believe in the kind of God situation that Supernatural has.

20) Does the person you're in love with know it?

I hope so ;)

21) Favorite position?

Sexually? Me on bottom because I’m lazy lol  

22) What's your horoscope sign?

Gemini

23) Your fears?

Clowns, bugs, cars, drinking fountains, throwing up, someone I love dying, failure

24) How many pets do you have? What kind? 

5 Cats: Mistique, Finn, Kiki, Thor, and Loki

25) What never fails to turn you on?

Neck kisses, when the other takes control/initiates, hugs from behind :3

26) Your idea of a perfect first date?

I don’t really have one I’m down for whatever just don’t be boring.

27) What is something most people don't know about you?

I was sexually harrassed and assaulted

28) What makes you feel the happiest?

My cats, music, spring days, book smell, TV, those rare moments i have where I can just do nothing.

29) What store do you shop at most often?

Either Charlotte Rousse, Victoria’s Secret, or Hot Topic

30) How do you feel about oral? Giving and/or receiving? 

I like giving and receiving, but I have jaw problems so after giving I am in extreme pain :(

31) Do you believe in karma?

Hell Yeah

32) Are you single?

Nope

33) Do you think flowers or candy are a better way to apologize?

Use your words! Material objects do not substitute an apology......but chocolate.

34) Are you a good swimmer?

Yes

35) Coffee or Tea?

COFFEE!!!

36) Online shopping or shopping in person?

Shopping in person because girls clothes are fucking weird!

37) Would you rather be older or younger than your current age?

Younger, I miss being a carefree child.

38) Cats or Dogs?

Both!

39) Are you a competitive person?

It depends on the situation.

40) Do you believe in aliens?

Duh.

41) Do you like dancing?

Yes!

42) What kind of music to you listen to?

I listen to everything there isn’t a lot I don’t like

43) What is your favorite cartoon character?

Flynn Rider <3

44) Where are you from?

Shaumburg, Illinois, U.S

45) Eat at home or eat out?

Getting food to pickup and bring back home lol

46) How much more social are you when you're drunk?

Very! My alcohol of choice is tequila and I become a sloot

47) What was the last thing you bought for yourself? 

Chips at my school’s vending machine

48) Why do you think your followers follow you?

I have no idea lol but if anything probably my variety of content. It’s a little of everything.

49) How many hours do you sleep at night?

Average: 5-6

50) What worries you most about the future?

Finances

51) If you had a friend that spoke to you the same way you speak to yourself, how long would you be friends?

Probably, I try to reassure myself a lot because of my constant doubt

52) Are you happy with yourself?

Overall yes, but there is always room for improvement

53) What do you wish you didn't know?

I wish I didn’t know my fear of driving and cars because it is so crippling to my daily life.

54) What big lesson could people learn from your life?

STOP OBSESSING OVER SOME STUPID ASS PERSON WHO DON’T GIVE A FUCK ABOUT YOU, also don’t let people invalidate your sexuality.

55) If you could live in any home on a television series, what would it be?

Probably the bunker in Supernatural because hot boys and loads of books <3

56) What's your favorite Website?

Netflix.com

57) What's the habit you're proudest of breaking?

Holding onto toxic people

58) What was your most recent trip of more than 50 miles?

From my college to my parents’ house.

59) What's the best bargain you've ever found at a garage sale or thrift store?

Goodwill and Savers always have super cheep book and I can get like 10 books for $5-$15

60) What do you order when you eat Chinese food?

Hot and sour soup, chicken or shrimp entree, fried rice, egg roll, crab rangoons

61) If you had to be named after one of the 50 states, which would it be?

Alaska cuz John Green lol

62) If you had to teach a subject to a class, what would it be?

English or Creative Writing

63) Favorite kind of chips?

Lime flamin hot cheetos

64) Favorite kind of sandwich?

Italian Sub

65) Which do you use more often, the dictionary or the thesaurus?

As a writer, definitely the thesaurus

66) Have you ever been stung by a bee?

Bee no. Wasps 3 times

67) What's your favorite form of exercise?

Any exercise that doesn’t feel like I’m exercising 

68) Are you afraid of heights?

Without restraints yes

69) What's the most memorable class you've ever taken?

Senior year high school creative writing

70) What's your favorite breakfast?

Eggs (over medium), bacon, sausage, chocolate chip pancakes, coffee

71) Do you like guacamole?

Fuck yes

72) Have you ever been in a physical fight?

Not by choice. Two guys were fighting and took me down with them

73) What/who are you thinking about right now?

How much I want to leave this class, and @hipstalexis​ because she told me to answer all of these lol

74) Do you like cuddling?

Yes!!!

75) Are you holding onto something you need to let go of?

Yeah I’m always dwelling on shit

76) Have you ever experienced one of your biggest fears?

Yeah I have been in multiple car accidents, and Clowns are a popular part of culture unfortunately.

77) Favorite city you've been to?

NEW YORK. I was only 7, but I fell in love and need to go back

78) Would you break the law to save a family member?

Depends on the family member

79) Talk about an embarrassing moment?

My roommate walked in and heard me having sexy time lol

80) Are there any causes you strongly believe in?

Rape prevention, Suicide prevention, Animal rights, Civil rights, Feminism

81) What's the worst injury you've ever had?

Either my concussion or breaking 3 bones in my hand

82) Favorite day of the week?

Thursday because I only have one class, and I usually don’t work

83) Do you consider yourself sexually open minded?

Yes, very. I’ll try everything once. 

84) How do you feel about porn?

Perfectly natural. I watch, read, and write porn

85) Which living celebrity would you like to know?

Natalie Dormer and Tom Hiddleston <3 <3 <3

86) Who was your hottest ex?

No

87) Do you want/have kids?

Yes I want 3

88) Has anyone ever told you that they wanted to marry you?

Yes and they were all liars

89) Do you get easily distracted?

All the time

90) Ass or titties?

TIDDYS!

91) What is your favorite word?

Antidisestablishmentarianism

92) How do you feel about tattoos?

Love them! Have 1; want more!

93) Do you have any pets?

Already answered lol

94) How tall are you?

5′4′’

95) How old are you?

21

96) 3 physical features you get complimented on a lot?

Eyes, hair, and legs

97) Is there anything you're really passionate about?

Writing and makeup

98) Do you have trust issues?

Fuck yes

99) Do you believe in love at first sight?

No

100) What are some words that you live by? Why? 

“I learned a long time ago that a person can stand just about anything for 10 seconds, then you just start on a new 10 seconds. All you’ve got to do is take it 10 seconds at a time.” -Kimmy Schmidt, Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt.

Because whenever something bad, upsetting, or whatever is happening to me I live by this and take 10 seconds to get through it, then I start over. It makes the pain and self doubt manageable.

[thumper-darling]

Can I ask you all 100 questions??

1. What is your middle name?

Lynn

2. How old are you?

17 (18 in about a month)

3. When is your birthday?

November 21st 

4. What is your zodiac sign?

Scorpio aS HECK 

5. What is your favorite color?

AGH RED/ PURPLE????

6. What’s your lucky number?

5 or 6

7. Do you have any pets?

no :’)

8. Where are you from?

Hell

9. How tall are you?

5 foot 7 binch 

10. What shoe size are you?

8 ½ to 9??

11. How many pairs of shoes do you own?

A GOOD FEW, LEMME COUNT

12????

12. What was your last dream about?

Pennywise the motherfuckin clown was hunting me and I cried,,,t’was spooky

13. What talents do you have?

I can juggle, I act a bit,,,is creativity a talent?

14. Are you psychic in any way?

I DON’T KNOW, BUT I TRIED TO BE. I BOUGHT TAROT CARDS AND A BOOK TO HELP ME BE CLAIRVOYANT BUT IDK

15. Favorite song?

All-time fave: (If you want it) by Relient K

Current fave: Northwood by Oakhill

16. Favorite movie?

kids movie: “All Dogs Go To Heaven”

coming of age movie: “The Perks of being a Wallflower”

super-hero movie: “Spider-man: Homecoming”

Horror movie: “Scream” or “It”

Rom-Com: “Two Night Stand” or “Love, Rosie”

17. Who would be your ideal partner?

Tom??Holland??

18. Do you want children?

I don’t think so, maybe I’ll change my mind when I’m older. 

19. Do you want a church wedding?

Not really, I kind of want to elope if I ever get married

20. Are you religious?

No, but I was born into a Catholic family,,,so I’m “supposed” to be but,,,

21. Have you ever been to the hospital?

:’)

Of course

22. Have you ever got in trouble with the law?

Nope

23. Have you ever met any celebrities?

No, but I once Tinder matched with a guy who is in my new favorite band,,,so,,,

24. Baths or showers?

Showers plz

25. What color socks are you wearing?

none,,,dude,,,

26. Have you ever been famous?

Uh, no? But I’ve been on the cover of the newspaper in my town a few times

27. Would you like to be a big celebrity?

I’m not sure I would want to have a big celebrity status, but I’d like to be well-known and successful in what I do.

28. What type of music do you like?

Indie pop or alternative

29. Have you ever been skinny dipping?

No, but almost a few times??

30. How many pillows do you sleep with?

I have 3 on my bed, but only use 1

31. What position do you usually sleep in?

Curled up with crossed ankles, or sprawled out on my back 

32. How big is your house?

Pretty small. 

33. What do you typically have for breakfast?

Peanut butter and jelly or cereal 

34. Have you ever fired a gun?

n o 

35. Have you ever tried archery?

It was actually a lesson in my elementary school P.E. class, so yeah, a few times. My family is also really big into hunting, so my dad bought me a bow for Christmas when I was like, 12? I got pretty good at it, but I don’t hunt so,,it went unused.  

36. Favorite clean word?

Cluster

37. Favorite swear word?

Heckin ;)

38. What’s the longest you’ve ever gone without sleep?

30 hours 

39. Do you have any scars?

A few 

40. Have you ever had a secret admirer?

L O FUCKING L 

41. Are you a good liar?

yes 

42. Are you a good judge of character?

NO BUT DAMN I WISH THAT I WAS BINCH 

43. Can you do any other accents other than your own?

I got pretty good at doing a british accent when I was younger 

44. Do you have a strong accent?

How the heck would I know?? I had an old friend from England who said that my accent was pretty heavy, but she’s my only source 

45. What is your favorite accent?

A U S T RA L I A N 

46. What is your personality type?

Sweet & stupid

Mainly naive 

47. What is your most expensive piece of clothing?

Um,,,a sweartshirt that I snatched from my friend’s brother. But as far as things that I’ve purchased myself, my jeans are the most expensive item of clothing at $36 

(Also, I realize it sounds like I stole the sweatshirt, but I didn’t. My friend let me keep it because her brother didn’t wear it anymore,,,so) 

48. Can you curl your tongue?

Yeet

49. Are you an innie or an outie?

Innie

50. Left or right handed?

right 

51. Are you scared of spiders?

A wee bit 

52. Favorite food?

I LOVE VEGGIE SUBS OR JALAPENO POPPERS 

53. Favorite foreign food?

Hmmm, greek spinach and cheese pie 

54. Are you a clean or messy person?

MESSILY CLEAN? 

55. Most used phrased?

“hecking, what?” or “Wow, I can’t believe ___”

56. Most used word?

Heck and Fuck 

57. How long does it take for you to get ready?

DEPENDS. Some days, 10 minutes. Others? 2 hours 

58. Do you have much of an ego?

Ewghhh, probably a lil itty bitty bit

59. Do you suck or bite lollipops?

WHAT KIND OF HEATHEN BITES THEM 

60. Do you talk to yourself?

Not usually, in my head mostly 

61. Do you sing to yourself?

On occasion 

62. Are you a good singer?

FUCKING NO,,MISS ME WITH THAT TALENT, BINCH 

63. Biggest Fear?

If I’m gonna be serious for a second, my biggest fear is being shot. 

64. Are you a gossip?

I mean,,,,,

65. Best dramatic movie you’ve seen?

Umm,,,I don’t know dude..UGHHHH, I hate thinking. HMmmmMMMM,,,,,The Perks of being a Wallflower (God bless its heart) is a bit dramatic. So that one counts 

66. Do you like long or short hair?

Personally, I love short hair. But, whatever makes you comfortable is ideal

67. Can you name all 50 states of America?

Michigan, Hawaii, Alaska, North Dakota, South Dakota, Massachusetts, Oregon, Washington, California, New York, Georgia, Nevada, Delaware, Virginia, West Virginia, Florida, Alabama, Maine, Illinois, Indiana, Texas, omg why are there so many states, New Mexico, New Jersey, Tennessee, Louisiana, Kansas, Arkansas, who invented the state system in America bcuz fuck them, oH, Ohio, Idaho, Wisconsin, fuck it I listed 30 off the top of my head so fuck you 

68. Favorite school subject?

English (OBVI not geography)

69. Extrovert or Introvert?

Extrovert-ish

70. Have you ever been scuba diving?

No 

71. What makes you nervous?

Talking to people without a plan 

72. Are you scared of the dark?

Not always 

73. Do you correct people when they make mistakes?

Not in most circumstances. 

74. Are you ticklish?

Nah motherhecker

75. Have you ever started a rumor?

Definitely not, don’t be rude

76. Have you ever been in a position of authority?

I don’t know, kind of? I’m a co-director for my old school’s theatre program, so that counts technically?

77. Have you ever drank underage?

WHHATTT??? ME?!??? No…

78. Have you ever done drugs?

IS THAT A WEED, I’M CALLING THE POLICE. 

79. Who was your first real crush?

I’m not gonna say his name, but he was in my 7th grade class. When I was new to the school, he was one of the few boys who was kind to me. 

80. How many piercings do you have?

None, I used to have my ears pierced, gauged even, but one of the holes closed up so,,,

81. Can you roll your Rs?“

NOPE 

82. How fast can you type?

I TRY TO BE FAST BUT I’M MERELY AVERAGE AT SPEED TYPING BECAUSE I KEEP FUCKING UP 

83. How fast can you run?

I don’t even know or care

84. What color is your hair?

Dark brown, binch 

85. What color are your eyes?

Hazel (green and brown) 

86. What are you allergic to?

Seafood, bees, and bunnies 

87. Do you keep a journal?

Yes 

88. What do your parents do?

My mom is a marketing manager for a candy distributor 

89. Do you like your age?

Yeah, 17 is fun 

90. What makes you angry?

PEOPLE WHO DON’T HAVE MANNERS 

91. Do you like your own name?

I’ve grown into my first name, but I’m thinking of getting my last name legally changed. 

92. Have you already thought of baby names, and if so what are they?

Charlie and Cadence 

93. Do you want a boy a girl for a child?

If I ever were to be a mom, I would want a son 

94. What are you strengths?

None. Not a single,,,one. 

95. What are your weaknesses?

Self-doubt 

96. How did you get your name?

….

after a country song…

97. Were your ancestors royalty?

lol no 

98. Do you have any scars?

A few

99. Color of your bedspread?

Black and white 

100. Color of your room?

Cream and Orange. My furniture is mainly black with gray accent colors 

Thanks for asking xx

[flauntpage]

Fantasy Football Week 4: Is Wendell Smallwood a Potential Feature Back for Philly?

If one tailback on the Eagles could consume a bell-cow share of the touches—meaning a player who is capable of handling around 15 carries and the rich allotment of routes and targets the team dedicates to the position—they’d likely become a fantasy star.

If we had a time machine and mind control over Howie Roseman like Smokey had over Debo, this imaginary back would likely be named Dalvin Cook or Joe Mixon (or hey, maybe don’t draft the 17-pound satellite back in the middle of the fourth round; Jamaal Williams or Marlon Mack would be helpful to this roster).

Since we don’t have these options at our disposal, we can instead focus on what remains in the wake of Darren Sproles’ devastating series of injuries on a single play. Some might even spin Sproles as the archetype for the elite change-of-pace back and one arguably worthy of Canton, but that’s another article.

As for his part in Doug Pederson’s West Coast-ish scheme, Sproles has been immensely involved in the Birds’ passing game, as only David Johnson, Le’Veon Bell, Todd Gurley and DeMarco Murray have run more than the 315 routes the diminutive dynamo has since the start of last season.

With the Olde English tilted in Sproles’ honor, it’s time to move on.

We already know what LeGarrette Blount is—he can provide a rousing jolt on early downs to a team in need of his physical running style, yet he also entirely tips the hand to the defense given his utter lack of versatility as a receiver in space. There is also a ceiling to his big-play ability—Blount is the guy who will get you three yards when you need three and three yards when you need seven. Since 2014, Blount has averaged 1.3 rushes of at least 10 yards per game, a middling rate that leaves him 27th among tailbacks who’ve tallied at least 100 carries over this sample. His peers in this data set are the likes of Jeremy Hill, Ronnie Hillman, and Matt Forte.

We’ve already witnessed Blount’s apex as a fantasy option, having led the league in rushing touchdowns as the short-yardage workhorse for a Patriots offense that led the NFL in points per drive once Tom Brady took the keys in Week 5. We know the troubling history for backs coming off of 300-touch workloads. Blount’s best-case outcome in the wake of Sproles’ injury is around 14-16 carries per game and a valuable share of goal-to-go work, but his floor, as Week 2 revealed, is incredibly low, especially in scenarios that see the Eagles trailing (such as in Kansas City), nearly removing him from the game script.

Can either of Wendell Smallwood and Corey Clement consolidate a valuable share of the work Blount simply won’t consume?

Rotoviz produced a deft breakdown on Clement this past winter that offers another former Patriot, Stevan Ridley, as an apt comparison for the Wisconsin product. Clement is an early-down bruiser in the mold of Ridley, netting just 12 receptions to 314 totes as a senior.

As the spider chart from MockDraftable reveals below, we’re not dealing with a special athlete in Clement relative to his positional peers (the site’s database displays a player’s given rating, by percentile, in a variety of athletic combine tests). The first percentile in the vertical and 14th in the 40 are numbers we rarely see for successful NFL backs. BenJarvus Green-Ellis is also a close comparable!

As a lifelong Eagles fan, I can confirm many fans will cry for Clement to get more work simply because he’s the unknown factor. I simply don’t think he’s up to the challenge at this level, at least for anything more than spot duties in short-yardage situations—presenting overlap with Blount’s utility.

Which brings us to Smallwood, a man with a terrible name for a male porn star, but completely acceptable for a professional halfback. Smallwood handled 57 receptions over his final two seasons in college and around 18 carries per game as a workhorse for West Virginia.

Another MockDraftable combine chart confirms Smallwood is, well, small, as he’s in the 31st percentile in weight and 35th in height among running back prospects since 1999. This is why you’ll find Christian McCaffrey and Kenjon Barner as relatively close comparables in regards to athletic profiles. I’m most intrigued by Smallwood’s impressive agility results; finishing in the 82nd percentile in the 3-cone drill and with his straight-line burst, evidenced by a sub-4.5 40-yard performance.

Citing Rotoviz again, fellow football nerd Anthony Amico believes another Mountaineer, Steve Slaton—he of the legendary rookie fantasy season for Houston years ago—is a valid comparison for Smallwood’s pro prospects. This results in Smallwood earning consideration as a “Profile Two” running back—one who can handle a three-down workload, but possibly leave the field in high-leverage short yardage situations (such as goal-to-go work).

The chart above, another Rotoviz production (great site for fantasy and NFL draft analysis, by the way), sifts through players with similar collegiate production profiles. Seeing names like Marshawn Lynch and Jamaal Charles could either incite scoffs or erections depending on your belief in Smallwood. Or, you could reasonably trust that these names offer a wide spectrum of outcomes and that Smallwood is just as likely, if not more so, to have a flameout professional career like Javon Ringer.

We simply don’t know who Smallwood really is yet on this level, while the risk of acquisition in fantasy free agency is minimal. Your fantasy league’s waivers have likely already processed and it’s also likely Smallwood was claimed. If Smallwood is still floating in free agency, I think he’s entirely worth the opportunity cost of a roster spot in most situations. I’m most interested in Smallwood because he offers a wide range of possible outcomes as a professional, while Blount’s story has been written and Clement’s limitations are relatively glaring.

It’s most likely that Pederson plays this straight and lets Blount be Blount and allows Smallwood some less creative approximation of Sproles’ workload, but we bet on outliers and shifts in fantasy as much as we chase trends. With Sproles running so many routes per game, it’s unlikely those schematics are completely abandoned, which means Smallwood could earn up to 4.5 targets per game. If the staff ever does audition Smallwood for something approximating featured duties, he could top the 9.3 touches Sproles has averaged under Pederson.

Like with most late-round running backs added to fantasy teams a month in, it’s unlikely Smallwood is special or a profitable fantasy play, but there are at least some threads in his prospect narrative that imply he could be a productive outlier among this demographic.

  Week 4

Whether the focus is the waiver wire in traditional season-long leagues or the daily fantasy market, let’s highlight some of the names and numbers that demand attention for Week 4.

Quarterback

I really like Tyrod Taylor’s ($5,300 on DraftKings) setup in Atlanta this week—he’s a high-floor option thanks to his league-best rushing production from the position (dating back to last season), which suggests he’s fit for cash games. Yet he’s also interesting as a ceiling play for tournaments, especially in a game with a healthy point total (48) against a Falcons defense that has ceded the fourth-most points per drive to opponents since the start of last season. Taylor is only owned in a small percentage of ESPN leagues, thus could also be a quality streamer if you’re among the Andrew Luck loyalists.

It’s difficult to trust Russell Wilson ($7,300) in a cash lineup given the pricing is still so demanding (Aaron Rodgers is just $300 more and he and the Bears have engaged in early-season shootouts before), but I’m all about him for tournament deployment. Since Wilson’s rookie year in 2012, Seattle is 9-1 in home night games and they’ve won those nine games by an average of 18.5 points. Home blowouts can actually prove limiting for a fantasy quarterback, but I’ll ride Narrative Street here and propose that Wilson and the Seahawks are backed up and need a slumpbuster performance against the hapless Colts.

Running Back

Lamar Miller ($4,500) has been pedestrian as the Texans’ feature back over the past 17 games, but at this price point, it’s helpful to consider he’s 14th in the league with 18.3 touches per game. Fantasy Labs’ predictive models admire Miller’s low cost and impressive potential ceiling. Bilal Powell’s ($4,600) cadre of truthers finally get a chance to celebrate, as Matt Forte is banged up. Mark Ingram ($4,600) has looked really good on tape and could be due for a healthy workload on the road in Miami.

Devonta Freeman ($7,300) might be the best running back on Earth. That reads as blasphemy, but he’s the rare back that can carry his offense in both phases (watch the Lions tape, he was a marvel). The Bills have been solid against the run, but on the Atlanta fast-track, Freeman could shine at this discounted price point.

Receiver

Dez Bryant ($6,500) had 16 targets in Week 2 and nine in Week 1, so this last Monday’s two-target showing is the outlier. With Lamarcus Joyner banged up and the Rams somewhat thin in the secondary, Bryant could feast at a discount. Michael Thomas ($7,300) could abuse the Miami secondary this week—they made the Jets look capable last week. When will the market price Rishard Matthews ($4,900) for his rapport with Marcus Mariota?

For those seeking a punt play in order to afford Rodgers at QB or to pay-up for Zeke in the backfield, Jordan Matthews ($3,900) could earn extra attention as game script is likely to trend pass-heavier for the Bills as sizable road dogs.

Tight End

It’s simple this week for me; Eric Ebron ($3,100) or Marty Bennett ($3,700).

D/ST

The Dallas ($2,500) defense is light on talent but big on scheme, so paying basement pricing for a shot at Jared Goff regression is worthy. Otherwise, I actually like shares of the Chargers ($2,500), as they have two edge menaces to fluster Carson Wentz and we know he’s not afraid to put 50/50 balls down the field. That, or just pay up for Jacksonville ($3,600) against the Jets.

Fantasy Football Week 4: Is Wendell Smallwood a Potential Feature Back for Philly? published first on http://ift.tt/2pLTmlv

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The Anatomy of a $97 Million Page: A CRO Case Study

The Anatomy of a $97 Million Page: A CRO Case Study

Posted by jkuria

In this post, we share a CRO case study from Protalus, one of the fastest-growing footwear companies in the world. They make an insole that corrects the misalignment suffered by roughly 85% of the population. Misalignment is the cause of most back, knee, and foot pain. Back pain alone is estimated to be worth $100 billion a year.

Summary

We (with Protalus’ team) increased direct sales by 91% in about 6 months through one-click upsells and CRO.

Based on the direct sales increase, current run-rate revenue, the "Virtuous Cycle of CRO"-fueled growth rate, and revenue multiple for their industry, we estimate this will add about $97 million to the company’s valuation over the next 12–18 months*.

A concrete example of the Virtuous Cycle of CRO: Before we increased the conversion rate and average order value, Google Adwords was not a viable channel. Now it is, opening a whole new floodgate of profitable sales! Ditto for at least two other channels. In part due to our work, Protalus’ annual run-rate revenue has grown by 1,212% in less than a year.

* Protalus’ core product is differentiated, patent protected, and high margin. They also have a strong brand and raving fans. In the Shoes & Apparel category, they're most similar to Lululemon Athletica, which has a 4x plus revenue multiple. While Nike and Under Armor engage in a bloody price war and margin-eroding celebrity endorsements, Lululemon commands significantly higher prices than its peers, without big-name backers! Business gurus Warren Buffett and Charlie Munger often say that the true test of a defensive moat around a business is “Can you raise prices without hurting sales?” Protalus has this in spades. They've raised prices several times while simultaneously increasing units sold — from $39 to $49 to $59 to $69 to $79 to $99 to $119.

One-click upsells: A 21% sales boost

When we do engagements, the first order of business to uncover low-hanging fruit growth opportunities. This accomplishes two things:

It helps the client get an immediate ROI on the engagement

It earns us goodwill and credibility within the company. We then have wide latitude to run the big, bold experiments that produce huge conversion lifts

In Protalus’ case, we determined they were not doing post-purchase one-click upsells. Adding these immediately boosted sales by 21%. Here’s how we did it:

On their main sales landing page, Protalus has an offer where you get $30 off on the second pair of insoles, as well as free expedited shipping for both. About 30% of customers were taking this offer.

For those who didn’t, right after they purchased but BEFORE they got to the "Thank You" page, we presented the offer again, which led to the 21% sales increase.

Done correctly, one-click upsells easily boost sales, as customers do not have to re-enter credit card details. Here’s the best way to do them: The Little Secret that Made McDonalds a $106 Billion Behemoth.

Below is the final upsell page that got the 21% sales increase:

We tested our way to it. The key effective elements are:

1. Including “free upgrade to expedited shipping” in the headline: 145% lift

The original page had it lower in the body copy:

Google Experiments screenshot showing 145% lift

2. Adding celebrity testimonials: 60% lift

Google Experiments screenshot showing a 60% lift

Elisabeth Howard’s (Ms. Senior America) unsolicited endorsement is especially effective because about 60% of Protalus’ customers are female and almost one-third are retired. We uncovered these gems by reviewing all 11,000 (at the time) customers' testimonials.

3. Explaining the reasons why other customers bought additional insoles.

See the three bulleted reasons on the first screenshot (convenience, different models, purchasing for loved ones).

Radical re-design and long-form page: A 58% conversion lift

With the upsells producing positive ROI for the client, we turned to re-designing the main sales page. The new page produced a cumulative lift of 58%, attained in two steps.

[Step 1] 35% lift: Long-form content-rich page

Optimizely screenshot shows 35% lift at 99% statistical significance

Note that even after reaching 99% statistical significance, the lift fluctuated between 33% and 37%, so we'll claim 35%.

[Step 2] 17% lift: Performance improvements

The new page was quite a bit longer, so its "fully loaded" time increased a lot — especially on mobile devices with poor connections. A combination of lazy loading, lossless image shrinking, CSS sprites, and other ninja tactics led to a further 17% lift.

These optimizations reduced the page load time by 40% and shrunk the size by a factor of 4x!

The total cumulative lift was therefore 58% (1.35 x 1.17 = 1.58).

With the earlier 21% sales gain from one-click upsells, that's a 91% sales increase (1.21 x 1.35 x 1.17 = 1.91).

Dissecting the anatomy of the winning page

To determine what vital few elements to change, we surveyed the non-converting visitors. Much of the work in A/B testing is the tedious research required to understand non-converting visitors.

"Give me six hours to chop a tree and I'll spend the first four sharpening the axe." – Abraham Lincoln

All CRO practitioners would do well to learn from good, ol’ honest Abe! We used Mouseflow’s feedback feature to survey bouncing visitors from the main landing page and the check-out page. The top objection themes were:

Price is too high/product too expensive

Not sure it will work (because others didn’t work before)

Not sure it will work for my specific condition

Difficulty in using website

We then came up with specific counter-objections for each: A landing page is a “salesmanship in digital print,” so many of the techniques that work in face-to-face selling also apply.

On a landing page, though, you must overcorrect because you lack the back- and-forth conversation in a live selling situation. Below is the list of key elements on the winning page.

1. Price is too high/product is too expensive

This was by far the biggest objection, cited by over 50% of all respondents. Thus, we spent a disproportionate amount of effort and page real estate on it.

Protalus’ insoles cost $79, whereas Dr. Scholls (the 100-year-old brand) cost less than $10. When asked what other products they considered, customers frequently said Dr. Scholls.

Coupled with this, nearly one-third of customers are retired and living on a fixed income.

“I ain’t gonna pay no stinkin' $79! They cost more than my shoes,” one visitor remarked.

To overcome the price objection, we did a couple of things.

Articulated the core value proposition and attacked the price from the top

When prospects complain about price it simply means that they do not understand or appreciate the the product’s value proposition. They are seeing this:

The product’s cost exceeds the perceived value

To effectively deal with price, you must tilt the scale so that it looks like this instead:

The perceived value exceeds cost

While the sub-$10 Dr. Scholls was the reference point for many, we also learned that some customers had tried custom orthotics ($600 to $3,000) and Protalus’ insoles compared favorably.

We therefore decided our core value proposition would be:

“Avoid paying $600 for custom orthotics. Protalus insoles are almost as effective but cost 87% less.”

...forcing the $600 reference point, instead of the $10 for Dr. Scholls. In the conversion rate heuristic we use, the value proposition is the single biggest lever.

We explained all this from a "neutral" educational standpoint (rather than a salesy one) in three steps:

1. First, we use “market data” to explain the cause of most pain and establish that custom orthotics are more effective than over-the-counter insoles. Market data is always more compelling than product data, so you should lead with it.

2. Next, like a good trial lawyer, we show why Protalus insoles are similar to custom orthotics but cost 87% less:

3. Finally, we deal with the "elephant in the room" and explain how Protalus insoles are fundamentally different from Dr. Scholls:

We also used several verbatim customer testimonials to reinforce this point:

Whenever possible, let others do your bragging!

Attacked price from the bottom

Here, we used a technique known as “break the price down to the ridiculous.” $79 is just 44 cents per day, less than a K-cup of coffee — which most people consume once or twice a day! This makes the price more palatable.

Used the quality argument

The quality technique is from Zig Ziglar’s Sales Training. You say to a prospect:

“Many years ago, our company/founder/founding team made a basic decision. We decided it would be easier to use the highest quality materials and explain price one time than it would be to apologize for low quality forever. When you use the product/service, you’ll be glad we made that decision."

It's especially effective if the company has a well-known "maker" founder (like Yvon Chouinardat at Patagonia). It doesn’t work as well for MBAs or suits, much as we need them!

Protalus’ founder Chris Buck designed the insoles and has a cult-like following, so it works for him.

Dire outcomes of not taking action

Here we talked about the dire outcomes if you do not get the insoles; for example, surgery, doctors’ bills, and lost productivity at work! Many customers work on their feet all day (nurses, steelworkers, etc.) so this last point is highly relevant.

Microsoft employed this technique successfully against Linux in the early 2000s. While Linux was free, the "Total Cost of Ownership" for not getting Windows was much higher when you considered support, frequent bugs, less accountability, fewer feature updates, and so on.

2. Not sure the product will work

For this objection, we did the following:

Used Dr. Romansky

We prominently featured Dr. Romansky, Protalus’ resident podiatrist. A consultant to the US Men’s and Women’s soccer teams and the Philadephia Phillies baseball team, he has serious credibility.

The "educational" part of the landing page (above the fold) is done in "his voice." Before, only his name appeared on a rarely visited page. This is an example of a "hidden wealth" opportunity!

Used celebrity testimonials on the main landing page

Back in 1997, a sports writer asked Phil Knight (Nike’s founder): “Is there no better way for you to spend $100 million?”

You see, Knight had just paid that staggering sum to a young Tiger Woods — and it seemed extravagant!

Knight’s answer? An emphatic “No!” That $100 million would generate several billion dollars in sales for Nike over the next decade!

Celebrity testimonials work. Period.

Since our celebrity endorsements increased the one-click upsell take-rate by 60%, we also used them on the main page:

Used expert reviews

We solicited and included expert reviews from industry and medical professionals. Below are two of the four we used:

These also helped address the price concern because some site visitors had expressed discomfort paying so much for an over-the-counter product without doctor recommendation.

3. Not sure the product will work for me

This is different from “Not sure the product will work” and needs to be treated separately. If there’s one thing we’ve learned over the years, it is that everyone thinks their situation is one-in-a-million unique!

We listed all the conditions that Protalus insoles address, as well as those they do not.

In addition, we clearly stated that the product does not work for 15% of the population.

By conspicuously admitting this (NOT just in the fine print section!) you are more credible. This is expressed in the Prospect’s Protest as:

“First tell me what your product CANNOT do and I might believe you when you tell me what it can do!”

4. Difficulty in using the site

Several visitors reported difficulty using the site, so we used Mouseflow’s powerful features to detect and fix usability issues.

Interestingly, the visitor session recordings confirmed that price was a big issue as we could clearly see prospects navigate to the price, stare incredulously, and then leave!

Accentuate the customers’ reasons for buying

Most of the opportunity in CRO is in the non-converting visitors (often over 90%), but understanding converting ones can yield crucial insights.*

For Protalus, the top reasons for buying were:

Desperation/too much leg, knee, or back pain/willing to try anything (This is the 4M, for "motivation," in the strategic formula we use)

The testimonials were persuasive

Video was convincing

On the last point, the Mouseflow heatmaps showed that those who watched the video bought at a much higher rate, yet few watched it.

We therefore placed the video higher above the fold, used an arrow to draw attention, and inserted a sub-headline:

A million-dollar question we ask buyers is:

“Was there any reason you ALMOST DID NOT buy?”

Devised by Cambridge-educated Dr. Karl Blanks, who coined the term “conversion rate optimization” in 2006, this question earned him a knighthood from the Queen of England! Thanks, Sir Karl!

It's a great question because its answer is usually the reason many others didn’t buy. For every person who almost didn’t buy for reason X, I guarantee at least three others did not buy!

Given the low response rates when surveying non-converting visitors, this question helps get additional intelligence. In our case, price came up again.

*Sometimes the customers’ reasons for buying will surprise you. One of our past clients is in the e-cigarette/vaping business and a common reason cited by men for vaping was “to quit smoking because of my young daughter.” They almost never said “child” or “son”! Armed with this knowledge, we converted a whole new segment of smokers who had not considered vaping.

Speed testimonials

One of the most frequently asked questions was "How soon can I expect relief?" While Protalus addressed this in their Q&A section, we included conspicuous “speed testimonials” on the main page:

For someone in excruciating pain, the promise of fast relief is persuasive!

Patent protection exclusivity & social proof

Many of Protalus’ site visitors are older and still prefer to buy in physical stores, as we learned from our survey. They may like the product, but then think “I’ll buy them at the store.” We clarified that the product is only available on Protalus’ site.

Mentioning the patent-protection added exclusivity, one of the two required elements for a compelling value proposition.

At its core, landing page optimization isn’t about optimizing pages. A page just happens to be the medium used to optimize thought sequences in the prospect’s mind.

Dr. Flint likes to say, “The geography of the page determines the chronology of thought sequences in the prospect’s mind.” As shown above, we repeated the social proof elements at the point of purchase.

Tying it all together

After systematically addressing each objection and adding various appeal elements, we strung them all in the cohesive long-form page below.

We start with a powerful headline and Elisabeth’s story because it's both intriguing and relevant to Protalus’ audience, which skews female and over 55. The only goal of a headline is to get visitors to read what comes next — NOT to sell.

The product’s price is not mentioned until we have told a compelling story, educated visitors and engaged them emotionally.

Note that the winning page is several times longer than the control. There is a mistaken belief that you “just need to get to the point” because people won’t read long pages. In fact, a previous consultant told Protalus that their sales were low because the “buy button” wasn’t high enough on the page. :-)

Nothing could be further from the truth. For a high-priced product, you must articulate a compelling value proposition before you sell!

But also note the page is "as long as necessary, but as short as possible." Buy buttons are sprinkled liberally after the initial third of the page so that those who are convinced needn’t "sit through the entire presentation."

Acknowledgement

We’d like to thank team Protalus for giving us wide latitude to conduct bold experiments and for allowing us to publish this. Their entrepreneurial culture has been refreshing. We are most grateful to Don Vasquez, their forward-thinking CMO (and minority owner), for trusting the process and standing by us when the first test caused some revenue loss.

Thanks to Hayk Saakian, Nick Jordan, Yin-so Chen, and Jon Powell for reading drafts of this piece.

Free CRO audit

I can’t stress this enough: CRO is hard work. We spent countless hours on market research, studied visitor behavior, and reviewed tens of thousands of customer comments before we ran a single A/B test. We also solicited additional testimonials from industry experts and doctors. There is no magical silver bullet — just lots of little lead ones!

Results like this don’t happen by accident. If you are unhappy with your current conversion rate for sales, leads or app downloads, first, we encourage you to review the tried-and-true strategic formula. Next, we would like to offer Moz readers a free CRO audit. We’ll also throw in a free SEO (Search Engine Optimization) review. While we specialize in CRO, we’ve partnered with one of the best SEO firms due to client demand. Lastly, we are hiring. Review the roles and reasons why you should come work for us!

Sign up for The Moz Top 10, a semimonthly mailer updating you on the top ten hottest pieces of SEO news, tips, and rad links uncovered by the Moz team. Think of it as your exclusive digest of stuff you don't have time to hunt down but want to read!

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[swunlimitednj]

The Anatomy of a $97 Million Page: A CRO Case Study

Posted by jkuria

In this post, we share a CRO case study from Protalus, one of the fastest-growing footwear companies in the world. They make an insole that corrects the misalignment suffered by roughly 85% of the population. Misalignment is the cause of most back, knee, and foot pain. Back pain alone is estimated to be worth $100 billion a year.

Summary

We (with Protalus’ team) increased direct sales by 91% in about 6 months through one-click upsells and CRO.

Based on the direct sales increase, current run-rate revenue, the "Virtuous Cycle of CRO"-fueled growth rate, and revenue multiple for their industry, we estimate this will add about $97 million to the company’s valuation over the next 12–18 months*.

A concrete example of the Virtuous Cycle of CRO: Before we increased the conversion rate and average order value, Google Adwords was not a viable channel. Now it is, opening a whole new floodgate of profitable sales! Ditto for at least two other channels. In part due to our work, Protalus’ annual run-rate revenue has grown by 1,212% in less than a year.

* Protalus’ core product is differentiated, patent protected, and high margin. They also have a strong brand and raving fans. In the Shoes & Apparel category, they're most similar to Lululemon Athletica, which has a 4x plus revenue multiple. While Nike and Under Armor engage in a bloody price war and margin-eroding celebrity endorsements, Lululemon commands significantly higher prices than its peers, without big-name backers! Business gurus Warren Buffett and Charlie Munger often say that the true test of a defensive moat around a business is “Can you raise prices without hurting sales?” Protalus has this in spades. They've raised prices several times while simultaneously increasing units sold — from $39 to $49 to $59 to $69 to $79 to $99 to $119.

One-click upsells: A 21% sales boost

When we do engagements, the first order of business to uncover low-hanging fruit growth opportunities. This accomplishes two things:

It helps the client get an immediate ROI on the engagement

It earns us goodwill and credibility within the company. We then have wide latitude to run the big, bold experiments that produce huge conversion lifts

In Protalus’ case, we determined they were not doing post-purchase one-click upsells. Adding these immediately boosted sales by 21%. Here’s how we did it:

On their main sales landing page, Protalus has an offer where you get $30 off on the second pair of insoles, as well as free expedited shipping for both. About 30% of customers were taking this offer.

For those who didn’t, right after they purchased but BEFORE they got to the "Thank You" page, we presented the offer again, which led to the 21% sales increase.

Done correctly, one-click upsells easily boost sales, as customers do not have to re-enter credit card details. Here’s the best way to do them: The Little Secret that Made McDonalds a $106 Billion Behemoth.

Below is the final upsell page that got the 21% sales increase:

We tested our way to it. The key effective elements are:

1. Including “free upgrade to expedited shipping” in the headline: 145% lift

The original page had it lower in the body copy:

Google Experiments screenshot showing 145% lift

2. Adding celebrity testimonials: 60% lift

Google Experiments screenshot showing a 60% lift

Elisabeth Howard’s (Ms. Senior America) unsolicited endorsement is especially effective because about 60% of Protalus’ customers are female and almost one-third are retired. We uncovered these gems by reviewing all 11,000 (at the time) customers' testimonials.

3. Explaining the reasons why other customers bought additional insoles.

See the three bulleted reasons on the first screenshot (convenience, different models, purchasing for loved ones).

Radical re-design and long-form page: A 58% conversion lift

With the upsells producing positive ROI for the client, we turned to re-designing the main sales page. The new page produced a cumulative lift of 58%, attained in two steps.

[Step 1] 35% lift: Long-form content-rich page

Optimizely screenshot shows 35% lift at 99% statistical significance

Note that even after reaching 99% statistical significance, the lift fluctuated between 33% and 37%, so we'll claim 35%.

[Step 2] 17% lift: Performance improvements

The new page was quite a bit longer, so its "fully loaded" time increased a lot — especially on mobile devices with poor connections. A combination of lazy loading, lossless image shrinking, CSS sprites, and other ninja tactics led to a further 17% lift.

These optimizations reduced the page load time by 40% and shrunk the size by a factor of 4x!

The total cumulative lift was therefore 58% (1.35 x 1.17 = 1.58).

With the earlier 21% sales gain from one-click upsells, that's a 91% sales increase (1.21 x 1.35 x 1.17 = 1.91).

Dissecting the anatomy of the winning page

To determine what vital few elements to change, we surveyed the non-converting visitors. Much of the work in A/B testing is the tedious research required to understand non-converting visitors.

"Give me six hours to chop a tree and I'll spend the first four sharpening the axe." – Abraham Lincoln

All CRO practitioners would do well to learn from good, ol’ honest Abe! We used Mouseflow’s feedback feature to survey bouncing visitors from the main landing page and the check-out page. The top objection themes were:

Price is too high/product too expensive

Not sure it will work (because others didn’t work before)

Not sure it will work for my specific condition

Difficulty in using website

We then came up with specific counter-objections for each: A landing page is a “salesmanship in digital print,” so many of the techniques that work in face-to-face selling also apply.

On a landing page, though, you must overcorrect because you lack the back- and-forth conversation in a live selling situation. Below is the list of key elements on the winning page.

1. Price is too high/product is too expensive

This was by far the biggest objection, cited by over 50% of all respondents. Thus, we spent a disproportionate amount of effort and page real estate on it.

Protalus’ insoles cost $79, whereas Dr. Scholls (the 100-year-old brand) cost less than $10. When asked what other products they considered, customers frequently said Dr. Scholls.

Coupled with this, nearly one-third of customers are retired and living on a fixed income.

“I ain’t gonna pay no stinkin' $79! They cost more than my shoes,” one visitor remarked.

To overcome the price objection, we did a couple of things.

Articulated the core value proposition and attacked the price from the top

When prospects complain about price it simply means that they do not understand or appreciate the the product’s value proposition. They are seeing this:

The product’s cost exceeds the perceived value

To effectively deal with price, you must tilt the scale so that it looks like this instead:

The perceived value exceeds cost

While the sub-$10 Dr. Scholls was the reference point for many, we also learned that some customers had tried custom orthotics ($600 to $3,000) and Protalus’ insoles compared favorably.

We therefore decided our core value proposition would be:

“Avoid paying $600 for custom orthotics. Protalus insoles are almost as effective but cost 87% less.”

...forcing the $600 reference point, instead of the $10 for Dr. Scholls. In the conversion rate heuristic we use, the value proposition is the single biggest lever.

We explained all this from a "neutral" educational standpoint (rather than a salesy one) in three steps:

1. First, we use “market data” to explain the cause of most pain and establish that custom orthotics are more effective than over-the-counter insoles. Market data is always more compelling than product data, so you should lead with it.

2. Next, like a good trial lawyer, we show why Protalus insoles are similar to custom orthotics but cost 87% less:

3. Finally, we deal with the "elephant in the room" and explain how Protalus insoles are fundamentally different from Dr. Scholls:

We also used several verbatim customer testimonials to reinforce this point:

Whenever possible, let others do your bragging!

Attacked price from the bottom

Here, we used a technique known as “break the price down to the ridiculous.” $79 is just 44 cents per day, less than a K-cup of coffee — which most people consume once or twice a day! This makes the price more palatable.

Used the quality argument

The quality technique is from Zig Ziglar’s Sales Training. You say to a prospect:

“Many years ago, our company/founder/founding team made a basic decision. We decided it would be easier to use the highest quality materials and explain price one time than it would be to apologize for low quality forever. When you use the product/service, you’ll be glad we made that decision."

It's especially effective if the company has a well-known "maker" founder (like Yvon Chouinardat at Patagonia). It doesn’t work as well for MBAs or suits, much as we need them!

Protalus’ founder Chris Buck designed the insoles and has a cult-like following, so it works for him.

Dire outcomes of not taking action

Here we talked about the dire outcomes if you do not get the insoles; for example, surgery, doctors’ bills, and lost productivity at work! Many customers work on their feet all day (nurses, steelworkers, etc.) so this last point is highly relevant.

Microsoft employed this technique successfully against Linux in the early 2000s. While Linux was free, the "Total Cost of Ownership" for not getting Windows was much higher when you considered support, frequent bugs, less accountability, fewer feature updates, and so on.

2. Not sure the product will work

For this objection, we did the following:

Used Dr. Romansky

We prominently featured Dr. Romansky, Protalus’ resident podiatrist. A consultant to the US Men’s and Women’s soccer teams and the Philadephia Phillies baseball team, he has serious credibility.

The "educational" part of the landing page (above the fold) is done in "his voice." Before, only his name appeared on a rarely visited page. This is an example of a "hidden wealth" opportunity!

Used celebrity testimonials on the main landing page

Back in 1997, a sports writer asked Phil Knight (Nike’s founder): “Is there no better way for you to spend $100 million?”

You see, Knight had just paid that staggering sum to a young Tiger Woods — and it seemed extravagant!

Knight’s answer? An emphatic “No!” That $100 million would generate several billion dollars in sales for Nike over the next decade!

Celebrity testimonials work. Period.

Since our celebrity endorsements increased the one-click upsell take-rate by 60%, we also used them on the main page:

Used expert reviews

We solicited and included expert reviews from industry and medical professionals. Below are two of the four we used:

These also helped address the price concern because some site visitors had expressed discomfort paying so much for an over-the-counter product without doctor recommendation.

3. Not sure the product will work for me

This is different from “Not sure the product will work” and needs to be treated separately. If there’s one thing we’ve learned over the years, it is that everyone thinks their situation is one-in-a-million unique!

We listed all the conditions that Protalus insoles address, as well as those they do not.

In addition, we clearly stated that the product does not work for 15% of the population.

By conspicuously admitting this (NOT just in the fine print section!) you are more credible. This is expressed in the Prospect’s Protest as:

“First tell me what your product CANNOT do and I might believe you when you tell me what it can do!”

4. Difficulty in using the site

Several visitors reported difficulty using the site, so we used Mouseflow’s powerful features to detect and fix usability issues.

Interestingly, the visitor session recordings confirmed that price was a big issue as we could clearly see prospects navigate to the price, stare incredulously, and then leave!

Accentuate the customers’ reasons for buying

Most of the opportunity in CRO is in the non-converting visitors (often over 90%), but understanding converting ones can yield crucial insights.*

For Protalus, the top reasons for buying were:

Desperation/too much leg, knee, or back pain/willing to try anything (This is the 4M, for "motivation," in the strategic formula we use)

The testimonials were persuasive

Video was convincing

On the last point, the Mouseflow heatmaps showed that those who watched the video bought at a much higher rate, yet few watched it.

We therefore placed the video higher above the fold, used an arrow to draw attention, and inserted a sub-headline:

A million-dollar question we ask buyers is:

“Was there any reason you ALMOST DID NOT buy?”

Devised by Cambridge-educated Dr. Karl Blanks, who coined the term “conversion rate optimization” in 2006, this question earned him a knighthood from the Queen of England! Thanks, Sir Karl!

It's a great question because its answer is usually the reason many others didn’t buy. For every person who almost didn’t buy for reason X, I guarantee at least three others did not buy!

Given the low response rates when surveying non-converting visitors, this question helps get additional intelligence. In our case, price came up again.

*Sometimes the customers’ reasons for buying will surprise you. One of our past clients is in the e-cigarette/vaping business and a common reason cited by men for vaping was “to quit smoking because of my young daughter.” They almost never said “child” or “son”! Armed with this knowledge, we converted a whole new segment of smokers who had not considered vaping.

Speed testimonials

One of the most frequently asked questions was "How soon can I expect relief?" While Protalus addressed this in their Q&A section, we included conspicuous “speed testimonials” on the main page:

For someone in excruciating pain, the promise of fast relief is persuasive!

Patent protection exclusivity & social proof

Many of Protalus’ site visitors are older and still prefer to buy in physical stores, as we learned from our survey. They may like the product, but then think “I’ll buy them at the store.” We clarified that the product is only available on Protalus’ site.

Mentioning the patent-protection added exclusivity, one of the two required elements for a compelling value proposition.

At its core, landing page optimization isn’t about optimizing pages. A page just happens to be the medium used to optimize thought sequences in the prospect’s mind.

Dr. Flint likes to say, “The geography of the page determines the chronology of thought sequences in the prospect’s mind.” As shown above, we repeated the social proof elements at the point of purchase.

Tying it all together

After systematically addressing each objection and adding various appeal elements, we strung them all in the cohesive long-form page below.

We start with a powerful headline and Elisabeth’s story because it's both intriguing and relevant to Protalus’ audience, which skews female and over 55. The only goal of a headline is to get visitors to read what comes next — NOT to sell.

The product’s price is not mentioned until we have told a compelling story, educated visitors and engaged them emotionally.

Note that the winning page is several times longer than the control. There is a mistaken belief that you “just need to get to the point” because people won’t read long pages. In fact, a previous consultant told Protalus that their sales were low because the “buy button” wasn’t high enough on the page. :-)

Nothing could be further from the truth. For a high-priced product, you must articulate a compelling value proposition before you sell!

But also note the page is "as long as necessary, but as short as possible." Buy buttons are sprinkled liberally after the initial third of the page so that those who are convinced needn’t "sit through the entire presentation."

Acknowledgement

We’d like to thank team Protalus for giving us wide latitude to conduct bold experiments and for allowing us to publish this. Their entrepreneurial culture has been refreshing. We are most grateful to Don Vasquez, their forward-thinking CMO (and minority owner), for trusting the process and standing by us when the first test caused some revenue loss.

Thanks to Hayk Saakian, Nick Jordan, Yin-so Chen, and Jon Powell for reading drafts of this piece.

Free CRO audit

I can’t stress this enough: CRO is hard work. We spent countless hours on market research, studied visitor behavior, and reviewed tens of thousands of customer comments before we ran a single A/B test. We also solicited additional testimonials from industry experts and doctors. There is no magical silver bullet — just lots of little lead ones!

Results like this don’t happen by accident. If you are unhappy with your current conversion rate for sales, leads or app downloads, first, we encourage you to review the tried-and-true strategic formula. Next, we would like to offer Moz readers a free CRO audit. We’ll also throw in a free SEO (Search Engine Optimization) review. While we specialize in CRO, we’ve partnered with one of the best SEO firms due to client demand. Lastly, we are hiring. Review the roles and reasons why you should come work for us!

Sign up for The Moz Top 10, a semimonthly mailer updating you on the top ten hottest pieces of SEO news, tips, and rad links uncovered by the Moz team. Think of it as your exclusive digest of stuff you don't have time to hunt down but want to read!

from Blogger http://ift.tt/2wFmI4S via SW Unlimited

[ubizheroes]

The Anatomy of a $97 Million Page: A CRO Case Study

Posted by jkuria

In this post, we share a CRO case study from Protalus, one of the fastest-growing footwear companies in the world. They make an insole that corrects the misalignment suffered by roughly 85% of the population. Misalignment is the cause of most back, knee, and foot pain. Back pain alone is estimated to be worth $100 billion a year.

Summary

We (with Protalus’ team) increased direct sales by 91% in about 6 months through one-click upsells and CRO.

Based on the direct sales increase, current run-rate revenue, the “Virtuous Cycle of CRO”-fueled growth rate, and revenue multiple for their industry, we estimate this will add about $97 million to the company’s valuation over the next 12–18 months*.

A concrete example of the Virtuous Cycle of CRO: Before we increased the conversion rate and average order value, Google Adwords was not a viable channel. Now it is, opening a whole new floodgate of profitable sales! Ditto for at least two other channels. In part due to our work, Protalus’ annual run-rate revenue has grown by 1,212% in less than a year.

* Protalus’ core product is differentiated, patent protected, and high margin. They also have a strong brand and raving fans. In the Shoes & Apparel category, they’re most similar to Lululemon Athletica, which has a 4x plus revenue multiple. While Nike and Under Armor engage in a bloody price war and margin-eroding celebrity endorsements, Lululemon commands significantly higher prices than its peers, without big-name backers! Business gurus Warren Buffett and Charlie Munger often say that the true test of a defensive moat around a business is “Can you raise prices without hurting sales?” Protalus has this in spades. They’ve raised prices several times while simultaneously increasing units sold — from $39 to $49 to $59 to $69 to $79 to $99 to $119.

One-click upsells: A 21% sales boost

When we do engagements, the first order of business to uncover low-hanging fruit growth opportunities. This accomplishes two things:

It helps the client get an immediate ROI on the engagement

It earns us goodwill and credibility within the company. We then have wide latitude to run the big, bold experiments that produce huge conversion lifts

In Protalus’ case, we determined they were not doing post-purchase one-click upsells. Adding these immediately boosted sales by 21%. Here’s how we did it:

On their main sales landing page, Protalus has an offer where you get $30 off on the second pair of insoles, as well as free expedited shipping for both. About 30% of customers were taking this offer.

For those who didn’t, right after they purchased but BEFORE they got to the “Thank You” page, we presented the offer again, which led to the 21% sales increase.

Done correctly, one-click upsells easily boost sales, as customers do not have to re-enter credit card details. Here’s the best way to do them: The Little Secret that Made McDonalds a $106 Billion Behemoth.

Below is the final upsell page that got the 21% sales increase:

We tested our way to it. The key effective elements are:

1. Including “free upgrade to expedited shipping” in the headline: 145% lift

The original page had it lower in the body copy:

Google Experiments screenshot showing 145% lift

2. Adding celebrity testimonials: 60% lift

Google Experiments screenshot showing a 60% lift

Elisabeth Howard’s (Ms. Senior America) unsolicited endorsement is especially effective because about 60% of Protalus’ customers are female and almost one-third are retired. We uncovered these gems by reviewing all 11,000 (at the time) customers’ testimonials.

3. Explaining the reasons why other customers bought additional insoles.

See the three bulleted reasons on the first screenshot (convenience, different models, purchasing for loved ones).

Radical re-design and long-form page: A 58% conversion lift

With the upsells producing positive ROI for the client, we turned to re-designing the main sales page. The new page produced a cumulative lift of 58%, attained in two steps.

[Step 1] 35% lift: Long-form content-rich page

Optimizely screenshot shows 35% lift at 99% statistical significance

Note that even after reaching 99% statistical significance, the lift fluctuated between 33% and 37%, so we’ll claim 35%.

[Step 2] 17% lift: Performance improvements

The new page was quite a bit longer, so its “fully loaded” time increased a lot — especially on mobile devices with poor connections. A combination of lazy loading, lossless image shrinking, CSS sprites, and other ninja tactics led to a further 17% lift.

These optimizations reduced the page load time by 40% and shrunk the size by a factor of 4x!

The total cumulative lift was therefore 58% (1.35 x 1.17 = 1.58).

With the earlier 21% sales gain from one-click upsells, that’s a 91% sales increase (1.21 x 1.35 x 1.17 = 1.91).

Dissecting the anatomy of the winning page

To determine what vital few elements to change, we surveyed the non-converting visitors. Much of the work in A/B testing is the tedious research required to understand non-converting visitors.

“Give me six hours to chop a tree and I’ll spend the first four sharpening the axe.” – Abraham Lincoln

All CRO practitioners would do well to learn from good, ol’ honest Abe! We used Mouseflow’s feedback feature to survey bouncing visitors from the main landing page and the check-out page. The top objection themes were:

Price is too high/product too expensive

Not sure it will work (because others didn’t work before)

Not sure it will work for my specific condition

Difficulty in using website

We then came up with specific counter-objections for each: A landing page is a “salesmanship in digital print,” so many of the techniques that work in face-to-face selling also apply.

On a landing page, though, you must overcorrect because you lack the back- and-forth conversation in a live selling situation. Below is the list of key elements on the winning page.

1. Price is too high/product is too expensive

This was by far the biggest objection, cited by over 50% of all respondents. Thus, we spent a disproportionate amount of effort and page real estate on it.

Protalus’ insoles cost $79, whereas Dr. Scholls (the 100-year-old brand) cost less than $10. When asked what other products they considered, customers frequently said Dr. Scholls.

Coupled with this, nearly one-third of customers are retired and living on a fixed income.

“I ain’t gonna pay no stinkin’ $79! They cost more than my shoes,” one visitor remarked.

To overcome the price objection, we did a couple of things.

Articulated the core value proposition and attacked the price from the top

When prospects complain about price it simply means that they do not understand or appreciate the the product’s value proposition. They are seeing this:

The product’s cost exceeds the perceived value

To effectively deal with price, you must tilt the scale so that it looks like this instead:

The perceived value exceeds cost

While the sub-$10 Dr. Scholls was the reference point for many, we also learned that some customers had tried custom orthotics ($600 to $3,000) and Protalus’ insoles compared favorably.

We therefore decided our core value proposition would be:

“Avoid paying $600 for custom orthotics. Protalus insoles are almost as effective but cost 87% less.”

…forcing the $600 reference point, instead of the $10 for Dr. Scholls. In the conversion rate heuristic we use, the value proposition is the single biggest lever.

We explained all this from a “neutral” educational standpoint (rather than a salesy one) in three steps:

1. First, we use “market data” to explain the cause of most pain and establish that custom orthotics are more effective than over-the-counter insoles. Market data is always more compelling than product data, so you should lead with it.

2. Next, like a good trial lawyer, we show why Protalus insoles are similar to custom orthotics but cost 87% less:

3. Finally, we deal with the “elephant in the room” and explain how Protalus insoles are fundamentally different from Dr. Scholls:

We also used several verbatim customer testimonials to reinforce this point:

Whenever possible, let others do your bragging!

Attacked price from the bottom

Here, we used a technique known as “break the price down to the ridiculous.” $79 is just 44 cents per day, less than a K-cup of coffee — which most people consume once or twice a day! This makes the price more palatable.

Used the quality argument

The quality technique is from Zig Ziglar’s Sales Training. You say to a prospect:

“Many years ago, our company/founder/founding team made a basic decision. We decided it would be easier to use the highest quality materials and explain price one time than it would be to apologize for low quality forever. When you use the product/service, you’ll be glad we made that decision.”

It’s especially effective if the company has a well-known “maker” founder (like Yvon Chouinardat at Patagonia). It doesn’t work as well for MBAs or suits, much as we need them!

Protalus’ founder Chris Buck designed the insoles and has a cult-like following, so it works for him.

Dire outcomes of not taking action

Here we talked about the dire outcomes if you do not get the insoles; for example, surgery, doctors’ bills, and lost productivity at work! Many customers work on their feet all day (nurses, steelworkers, etc.) so this last point is highly relevant.

Microsoft employed this technique successfully against Linux in the early 2000s. While Linux was free, the “Total Cost of Ownership” for not getting Windows was much higher when you considered support, frequent bugs, less accountability, fewer feature updates, and so on.

2. Not sure the product will work

For this objection, we did the following:

Used Dr. Romansky

We prominently featured Dr. Romansky, Protalus’ resident podiatrist. A consultant to the US Men’s and Women’s soccer teams and the Philadephia Phillies baseball team, he has serious credibility.

The “educational” part of the landing page (above the fold) is done in “his voice.” Before, only his name appeared on a rarely visited page. This is an example of a “hidden wealth” opportunity!

Used celebrity testimonials on the main landing page

Back in 1997, a sports writer asked Phil Knight (Nike’s founder): “Is there no better way for you to spend $100 million?”

You see, Knight had just paid that staggering sum to a young Tiger Woods — and it seemed extravagant!

Knight’s answer? An emphatic “No!” That $100 million would generate several billion dollars in sales for Nike over the next decade!

Celebrity testimonials work. Period.

Since our celebrity endorsements increased the one-click upsell take-rate by 60%, we also used them on the main page:

Used expert reviews

We solicited and included expert reviews from industry and medical professionals. Below are two of the four we used:

These also helped address the price concern because some site visitors had expressed discomfort paying so much for an over-the-counter product without doctor recommendation.

3. Not sure the product will work for me

This is different from “Not sure the product will work” and needs to be treated separately. If there’s one thing we’ve learned over the years, it is that everyone thinks their situation is one-in-a-million unique!

We listed all the conditions that Protalus insoles address, as well as those they do not.

In addition, we clearly stated that the product does not work for 15% of the population.

By conspicuously admitting this (NOT just in the fine print section!) you are more credible. This is expressed in the Prospect’s Protest as:

“First tell me what your product CANNOT do and I might believe you when you tell me what it can do!”

4. Difficulty in using the site

Several visitors reported difficulty using the site, so we used Mouseflow’s powerful features to detect and fix usability issues.

Interestingly, the visitor session recordings confirmed that price was a big issue as we could clearly see prospects navigate to the price, stare incredulously, and then leave!

Accentuate the customers’ reasons for buying

Most of the opportunity in CRO is in the non-converting visitors (often over 90%), but understanding converting ones can yield crucial insights.*

For Protalus, the top reasons for buying were:

Desperation/too much leg, knee, or back pain/willing to try anything (This is the 4M, for “motivation,” in the strategic formula we use)

The testimonials were persuasive

Video was convincing

On the last point, the Mouseflow heatmaps showed that those who watched the video bought at a much higher rate, yet few watched it.

We therefore placed the video higher above the fold, used an arrow to draw attention, and inserted a sub-headline:

A million-dollar question we ask buyers is:

“Was there any reason you ALMOST DID NOT buy?”

Devised by Cambridge-educated Dr. Karl Blanks, who coined the term “conversion rate optimization” in 2006, this question earned him a knighthood from the Queen of England! Thanks, Sir Karl!

It’s a great question because its answer is usually the reason many others didn’t buy. For every person who almost didn’t buy for reason X, I guarantee at least three others did not buy!

Given the low response rates when surveying non-converting visitors, this question helps get additional intelligence. In our case, price came up again.

*Sometimes the customers’ reasons for buying will surprise you. One of our past clients is in the e-cigarette/vaping business and a common reason cited by men for vaping was “to quit smoking because of my young daughter.” They almost never said “child” or “son”! Armed with this knowledge, we converted a whole new segment of smokers who had not considered vaping.

Speed testimonials

One of the most frequently asked questions was “How soon can I expect relief?” While Protalus addressed this in their Q&A section, we included conspicuous “speed testimonials” on the main page:

For someone in excruciating pain, the promise of fast relief is persuasive!

Patent protection exclusivity & social proof

Many of Protalus’ site visitors are older and still prefer to buy in physical stores, as we learned from our survey. They may like the product, but then think “I’ll buy them at the store.” We clarified that the product is only available on Protalus’ site.

Mentioning the patent-protection added exclusivity, one of the two required elements for a compelling value proposition.

At its core, landing page optimization isn’t about optimizing pages. A page just happens to be the medium used to optimize thought sequences in the prospect’s mind.

Dr. Flint likes to say, “The geography of the page determines the chronology of thought sequences in the prospect’s mind.” As shown above, we repeated the social proof elements at the point of purchase.

Tying it all together

After systematically addressing each objection and adding various appeal elements, we strung them all in the cohesive long-form page below.

We start with a powerful headline and Elisabeth’s story because it’s both intriguing and relevant to Protalus’ audience, which skews female and over 55. The only goal of a headline is to get visitors to read what comes next — NOT to sell.

The product’s price is not mentioned until we have told a compelling story, educated visitors and engaged them emotionally.

Note that the winning page is several times longer than the control. There is a mistaken belief that you “just need to get to the point” because people won’t read long pages. In fact, a previous consultant told Protalus that their sales were low because the “buy button” wasn’t high enough on the page.

Nothing could be further from the truth. For a high-priced product, you must articulate a compelling value proposition before you sell!

But also note the page is “as long as necessary, but as short as possible.” Buy buttons are sprinkled liberally after the initial third of the page so that those who are convinced needn’t “sit through the entire presentation.”

Acknowledgement

We’d like to thank team Protalus for giving us wide latitude to conduct bold experiments and for allowing us to publish this. Their entrepreneurial culture has been refreshing. We are most grateful to Don Vasquez, their forward-thinking CMO (and minority owner), for trusting the process and standing by us when the first test caused some revenue loss.

Thanks to Hayk Saakian, Nick Jordan, Yin-so Chen, and Jon Powell for reading drafts of this piece.

Free CRO audit

I can’t stress this enough: CRO is hard work. We spent countless hours on market research, studied visitor behavior, and reviewed tens of thousands of customer comments before we ran a single A/B test. We also solicited additional testimonials from industry experts and doctors. There is no magical silver bullet — just lots of little lead ones!

Results like this don’t happen by accident. If you are unhappy with your current conversion rate for sales, leads or app downloads, first, we encourage you to review the tried-and-true strategic formula. Next, we would like to offer Moz readers a free CRO audit. We’ll also throw in a free SEO (Search Engine Optimization) review. While we specialize in CRO, we’ve partnered with one of the best SEO firms due to client demand. Lastly, we are hiring. Review the roles and reasons why you should come work for us!

Sign up for The Moz Top 10, a semimonthly mailer updating you on the top ten hottest pieces of SEO news, tips, and rad links uncovered by the Moz team. Think of it as your exclusive digest of stuff you don’t have time to hunt down but want to read!

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[lawrenceseitz22]

The Anatomy of a $97 Million Page: A CRO Case Study

Posted by jkuria

In this post, we share a CRO case study from Protalus, one of the fastest-growing footwear companies in the world. They make an insole that corrects the misalignment suffered by roughly 85% of the population. Misalignment is the cause of most back, knee, and foot pain. Back pain alone is estimated to be worth $100 billion a year.

Summary

We (with Protalus’ team) increased direct sales by 91% in about 6 months through one-click upsells and CRO.

Based on the direct sales increase, current run-rate revenue, the "Virtuous Cycle of CRO"-fueled growth rate, and revenue multiple for their industry, we estimate this will add about $97 million to the company’s valuation over the next 12–18 months*.

A concrete example of the Virtuous Cycle of CRO: Before we increased the conversion rate and average order value, Google Adwords was not a viable channel. Now it is, opening a whole new floodgate of profitable sales! Ditto for at least two other channels. In part due to our work, Protalus’ annual run-rate revenue has grown by 1,212% in less than a year.

* Protalus’ core product is differentiated, patent protected, and high margin. They also have a strong brand and raving fans. In the Shoes & Apparel category, they're most similar to Lululemon Athletica, which has a 4x plus revenue multiple. While Nike and Under Armor engage in a bloody price war and margin-eroding celebrity endorsements, Lululemon commands significantly higher prices than its peers, without big-name backers! Business gurus Warren Buffett and Charlie Munger often say that the true test of a defensive moat around a business is “Can you raise prices without hurting sales?” Protalus has this in spades. They've raised prices several times while simultaneously increasing units sold — from $39 to $49 to $59 to $69 to $79 to $99 to $119.

One-click upsells: A 21% sales boost

When we do engagements, the first order of business to uncover low-hanging fruit growth opportunities. This accomplishes two things:

It helps the client get an immediate ROI on the engagement

It earns us goodwill and credibility within the company. We then have wide latitude to run the big, bold experiments that produce huge conversion lifts

In Protalus’ case, we determined they were not doing post-purchase one-click upsells. Adding these immediately boosted sales by 21%. Here’s how we did it:

On their main sales landing page, Protalus has an offer where you get $30 off on the second pair of insoles, as well as free expedited shipping for both. About 30% of customers were taking this offer.

For those who didn’t, right after they purchased but BEFORE they got to the "Thank You" page, we presented the offer again, which led to the 21% sales increase.

Done correctly, one-click upsells easily boost sales, as customers do not have to re-enter credit card details. Here’s the best way to do them: The Little Secret that Made McDonalds a $106 Billion Behemoth.

Below is the final upsell page that got the 21% sales increase:

We tested our way to it. The key effective elements are:

1. Including “free upgrade to expedited shipping” in the headline: 145% lift

The original page had it lower in the body copy:

Google Experiments screenshot showing 145% lift

2. Adding celebrity testimonials: 60% lift

Google Experiments screenshot showing a 60% lift

Elisabeth Howard’s (Ms. Senior America) unsolicited endorsement is especially effective because about 60% of Protalus’ customers are female and almost one-third are retired. We uncovered these gems by reviewing all 11,000 (at the time) customers' testimonials.

3. Explaining the reasons why other customers bought additional insoles.

See the three bulleted reasons on the first screenshot (convenience, different models, purchasing for loved ones).

Radical re-design and long-form page: A 58% conversion lift

With the upsells producing positive ROI for the client, we turned to re-designing the main sales page. The new page produced a cumulative lift of 58%, attained in two steps.

[Step 1] 35% lift: Long-form content-rich page

Optimizely screenshot shows 35% lift at 99% statistical significance

Note that even after reaching 99% statistical significance, the lift fluctuated between 33% and 37%, so we'll claim 35%.

[Step 2] 17% lift: Performance improvements

The new page was quite a bit longer, so its "fully loaded" time increased a lot — especially on mobile devices with poor connections. A combination of lazy loading, lossless image shrinking, CSS sprites, and other ninja tactics led to a further 17% lift.

These optimizations reduced the page load time by 40% and shrunk the size by a factor of 4x!

The total cumulative lift was therefore 58% (1.35 x 1.17 = 1.58).

With the earlier 21% sales gain from one-click upsells, that's a 91% sales increase (1.21 x 1.35 x 1.17 = 1.91).

Dissecting the anatomy of the winning page

To determine what vital few elements to change, we surveyed the non-converting visitors. Much of the work in A/B testing is the tedious research required to understand non-converting visitors.

"Give me six hours to chop a tree and I'll spend the first four sharpening the axe." – Abraham Lincoln

All CRO practitioners would do well to learn from good, ol’ honest Abe! We used Mouseflow’s feedback feature to survey bouncing visitors from the main landing page and the check-out page. The top objection themes were:

Price is too high/product too expensive

Not sure it will work (because others didn’t work before)

Not sure it will work for my specific condition

Difficulty in using website

We then came up with specific counter-objections for each: A landing page is a “salesmanship in digital print,” so many of the techniques that work in face-to-face selling also apply.

On a landing page, though, you must overcorrect because you lack the back- and-forth conversation in a live selling situation. Below is the list of key elements on the winning page.

1. Price is too high/product is too expensive

This was by far the biggest objection, cited by over 50% of all respondents. Thus, we spent a disproportionate amount of effort and page real estate on it.

Protalus’ insoles cost $79, whereas Dr. Scholls (the 100-year-old brand) cost less than $10. When asked what other products they considered, customers frequently said Dr. Scholls.

Coupled with this, nearly one-third of customers are retired and living on a fixed income.

“I ain’t gonna pay no stinkin' $79! They cost more than my shoes,” one visitor remarked.

To overcome the price objection, we did a couple of things.

Articulated the core value proposition and attacked the price from the top

When prospects complain about price it simply means that they do not understand or appreciate the the product’s value proposition. They are seeing this:

The product’s cost exceeds the perceived value

To effectively deal with price, you must tilt the scale so that it looks like this instead:

The perceived value exceeds cost

While the sub-$10 Dr. Scholls was the reference point for many, we also learned that some customers had tried custom orthotics ($600 to $3,000) and Protalus’ insoles compared favorably.

We therefore decided our core value proposition would be:

“Avoid paying $600 for custom orthotics. Protalus insoles are almost as effective but cost 87% less.”

...forcing the $600 reference point, instead of the $10 for Dr. Scholls. In the conversion rate heuristic we use, the value proposition is the single biggest lever.

We explained all this from a "neutral" educational standpoint (rather than a salesy one) in three steps:

1. First, we use “market data” to explain the cause of most pain and establish that custom orthotics are more effective than over-the-counter insoles. Market data is always more compelling than product data, so you should lead with it.

2. Next, like a good trial lawyer, we show why Protalus insoles are similar to custom orthotics but cost 87% less:

3. Finally, we deal with the "elephant in the room" and explain how Protalus insoles are fundamentally different from Dr. Scholls:

We also used several verbatim customer testimonials to reinforce this point:

Whenever possible, let others do your bragging!

Attacked price from the bottom

Here, we used a technique known as “break the price down to the ridiculous.” $79 is just 44 cents per day, less than a K-cup of coffee — which most people consume once or twice a day! This makes the price more palatable.

Used the quality argument

The quality technique is from Zig Ziglar’s Sales Training. You say to a prospect:

“Many years ago, our company/founder/founding team made a basic decision. We decided it would be easier to use the highest quality materials and explain price one time than it would be to apologize for low quality forever. When you use the product/service, you’ll be glad we made that decision."

It's especially effective if the company has a well-known "maker" founder (like Yvon Chouinardat at Patagonia). It doesn’t work as well for MBAs or suits, much as we need them!

Protalus’ founder Chris Buck designed the insoles and has a cult-like following, so it works for him.

Dire outcomes of not taking action

Here we talked about the dire outcomes if you do not get the insoles; for example, surgery, doctors’ bills, and lost productivity at work! Many customers work on their feet all day (nurses, steelworkers, etc.) so this last point is highly relevant.

Microsoft employed this technique successfully against Linux in the early 2000s. While Linux was free, the "Total Cost of Ownership" for not getting Windows was much higher when you considered support, frequent bugs, less accountability, fewer feature updates, and so on.

2. Not sure the product will work

For this objection, we did the following:

Used Dr. Romansky

We prominently featured Dr. Romansky, Protalus’ resident podiatrist. A consultant to the US Men’s and Women’s soccer teams and the Philadephia Phillies baseball team, he has serious credibility.

The "educational" part of the landing page (above the fold) is done in "his voice." Before, only his name appeared on a rarely visited page. This is an example of a "hidden wealth" opportunity!

Used celebrity testimonials on the main landing page

Back in 1997, a sports writer asked Phil Knight (Nike’s founder): “Is there no better way for you to spend $100 million?”

You see, Knight had just paid that staggering sum to a young Tiger Woods — and it seemed extravagant!

Knight’s answer? An emphatic “No!” That $100 million would generate several billion dollars in sales for Nike over the next decade!

Celebrity testimonials work. Period.

Since our celebrity endorsements increased the one-click upsell take-rate by 60%, we also used them on the main page:

Used expert reviews

We solicited and included expert reviews from industry and medical professionals. Below are two of the four we used:

These also helped address the price concern because some site visitors had expressed discomfort paying so much for an over-the-counter product without doctor recommendation.

3. Not sure the product will work for me

This is different from “Not sure the product will work” and needs to be treated separately. If there’s one thing we’ve learned over the years, it is that everyone thinks their situation is one-in-a-million unique!

We listed all the conditions that Protalus insoles address, as well as those they do not.

In addition, we clearly stated that the product does not work for 15% of the population.

By conspicuously admitting this (NOT just in the fine print section!) you are more credible. This is expressed in the Prospect’s Protest as:

“First tell me what your product CANNOT do and I might believe you when you tell me what it can do!”

4. Difficulty in using the site

Several visitors reported difficulty using the site, so we used Mouseflow’s powerful features to detect and fix usability issues.

Interestingly, the visitor session recordings confirmed that price was a big issue as we could clearly see prospects navigate to the price, stare incredulously, and then leave!

Accentuate the customers’ reasons for buying

Most of the opportunity in CRO is in the non-converting visitors (often over 90%), but understanding converting ones can yield crucial insights.*

For Protalus, the top reasons for buying were:

Desperation/too much leg, knee, or back pain/willing to try anything (This is the 4M, for "motivation," in the strategic formula we use)

The testimonials were persuasive

Video was convincing

On the last point, the Mouseflow heatmaps showed that those who watched the video bought at a much higher rate, yet few watched it.

We therefore placed the video higher above the fold, used an arrow to draw attention, and inserted a sub-headline:

A million-dollar question we ask buyers is:

“Was there any reason you ALMOST DID NOT buy?”

Devised by Cambridge-educated Dr. Karl Blanks, who coined the term “conversion rate optimization” in 2006, this question earned him a knighthood from the Queen of England! Thanks, Sir Karl!

It's a great question because its answer is usually the reason many others didn’t buy. For every person who almost didn’t buy for reason X, I guarantee at least three others did not buy!

Given the low response rates when surveying non-converting visitors, this question helps get additional intelligence. In our case, price came up again.

*Sometimes the customers’ reasons for buying will surprise you. One of our past clients is in the e-cigarette/vaping business and a common reason cited by men for vaping was “to quit smoking because of my young daughter.” They almost never said “child” or “son”! Armed with this knowledge, we converted a whole new segment of smokers who had not considered vaping.

Speed testimonials

One of the most frequently asked questions was "How soon can I expect relief?" While Protalus addressed this in their Q&A section, we included conspicuous “speed testimonials” on the main page:

For someone in excruciating pain, the promise of fast relief is persuasive!

Patent protection exclusivity & social proof

Many of Protalus’ site visitors are older and still prefer to buy in physical stores, as we learned from our survey. They may like the product, but then think “I’ll buy them at the store.” We clarified that the product is only available on Protalus’ site.

Mentioning the patent-protection added exclusivity, one of the two required elements for a compelling value proposition.

At its core, landing page optimization isn’t about optimizing pages. A page just happens to be the medium used to optimize thought sequences in the prospect’s mind.

Dr. Flint likes to say, “The geography of the page determines the chronology of thought sequences in the prospect’s mind.” As shown above, we repeated the social proof elements at the point of purchase.

Tying it all together

After systematically addressing each objection and adding various appeal elements, we strung them all in the cohesive long-form page below.

We start with a powerful headline and Elisabeth’s story because it's both intriguing and relevant to Protalus’ audience, which skews female and over 55. The only goal of a headline is to get visitors to read what comes next — NOT to sell.

The product’s price is not mentioned until we have told a compelling story, educated visitors and engaged them emotionally.

Note that the winning page is several times longer than the control. There is a mistaken belief that you “just need to get to the point” because people won’t read long pages. In fact, a previous consultant told Protalus that their sales were low because the “buy button” wasn’t high enough on the page. :-)

Nothing could be further from the truth. For a high-priced product, you must articulate a compelling value proposition before you sell!

But also note the page is "as long as necessary, but as short as possible." Buy buttons are sprinkled liberally after the initial third of the page so that those who are convinced needn’t "sit through the entire presentation."

Acknowledgement

We’d like to thank team Protalus for giving us wide latitude to conduct bold experiments and for allowing us to publish this. Their entrepreneurial culture has been refreshing. We are most grateful to Don Vasquez, their forward-thinking CMO (and minority owner), for trusting the process and standing by us when the first test caused some revenue loss.

Thanks to Hayk Saakian, Nick Jordan, Yin-so Chen, and Jon Powell for reading drafts of this piece.

Free CRO audit

I can’t stress this enough: CRO is hard work. We spent countless hours on market research, studied visitor behavior, and reviewed tens of thousands of customer comments before we ran a single A/B test. We also solicited additional testimonials from industry experts and doctors. There is no magical silver bullet — just lots of little lead ones!

Results like this don’t happen by accident. If you are unhappy with your current conversion rate for sales, leads or app downloads, first, we encourage you to review the tried-and-true strategic formula. Next, we would like to offer Moz readers a free CRO audit. We’ll also throw in a free SEO (Search Engine Optimization) review. While we specialize in CRO, we’ve partnered with one of the best SEO firms due to client demand. Lastly, we are hiring. Review the roles and reasons why you should come work for us!

Sign up for The Moz Top 10, a semimonthly mailer updating you on the top ten hottest pieces of SEO news, tips, and rad links uncovered by the Moz team. Think of it as your exclusive digest of stuff you don't have time to hunt down but want to read!

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[christinesumpmg1]

The Anatomy of a $97 Million Page: A CRO Case Study

Posted by jkuria

In this post, we share a CRO case study from Protalus, one of the fastest-growing footwear companies in the world. They make an insole that corrects the misalignment suffered by roughly 85% of the population. Misalignment is the cause of most back, knee, and foot pain. Back pain alone is estimated to be worth $100 billion a year.

Summary

We (with Protalus’ team) increased direct sales by 91% in about 6 months through one-click upsells and CRO.

Based on the direct sales increase, current run-rate revenue, the "Virtuous Cycle of CRO"-fueled growth rate, and revenue multiple for their industry, we estimate this will add about $97 million to the company’s valuation over the next 12–18 months*.

A concrete example of the Virtuous Cycle of CRO: Before we increased the conversion rate and average order value, Google Adwords was not a viable channel. Now it is, opening a whole new floodgate of profitable sales! Ditto for at least two other channels. In part due to our work, Protalus’ annual run-rate revenue has grown by 1,212% in less than a year.

* Protalus’ core product is differentiated, patent protected, and high margin. They also have a strong brand and raving fans. In the Shoes & Apparel category, they're most similar to Lululemon Athletica, which has a 4x plus revenue multiple. While Nike and Under Armor engage in a bloody price war and margin-eroding celebrity endorsements, Lululemon commands significantly higher prices than its peers, without big-name backers! Business gurus Warren Buffett and Charlie Munger often say that the true test of a defensive moat around a business is “Can you raise prices without hurting sales?” Protalus has this in spades. They've raised prices several times while simultaneously increasing units sold — from $39 to $49 to $59 to $69 to $79 to $99 to $119.

One-click upsells: A 21% sales boost

When we do engagements, the first order of business to uncover low-hanging fruit growth opportunities. This accomplishes two things:

It helps the client get an immediate ROI on the engagement

It earns us goodwill and credibility within the company. We then have wide latitude to run the big, bold experiments that produce huge conversion lifts

In Protalus’ case, we determined they were not doing post-purchase one-click upsells. Adding these immediately boosted sales by 21%. Here’s how we did it:

On their main sales landing page, Protalus has an offer where you get $30 off on the second pair of insoles, as well as free expedited shipping for both. About 30% of customers were taking this offer.

For those who didn’t, right after they purchased but BEFORE they got to the "Thank You" page, we presented the offer again, which led to the 21% sales increase.

Done correctly, one-click upsells easily boost sales, as customers do not have to re-enter credit card details. Here’s the best way to do them: The Little Secret that Made McDonalds a $106 Billion Behemoth.

Below is the final upsell page that got the 21% sales increase:

We tested our way to it. The key effective elements are:

1. Including “free upgrade to expedited shipping” in the headline: 145% lift

The original page had it lower in the body copy:

Google Experiments screenshot showing 145% lift

2. Adding celebrity testimonials: 60% lift

Google Experiments screenshot showing a 60% lift

Elisabeth Howard’s (Ms. Senior America) unsolicited endorsement is especially effective because about 60% of Protalus’ customers are female and almost one-third are retired. We uncovered these gems by reviewing all 11,000 (at the time) customers' testimonials.

3. Explaining the reasons why other customers bought additional insoles.

See the three bulleted reasons on the first screenshot (convenience, different models, purchasing for loved ones).

Radical re-design and long-form page: A 58% conversion lift

With the upsells producing positive ROI for the client, we turned to re-designing the main sales page. The new page produced a cumulative lift of 58%, attained in two steps.

[Step 1] 35% lift: Long-form content-rich page

Optimizely screenshot shows 35% lift at 99% statistical significance

Note that even after reaching 99% statistical significance, the lift fluctuated between 33% and 37%, so we'll claim 35%.

[Step 2] 17% lift: Performance improvements

The new page was quite a bit longer, so its "fully loaded" time increased a lot — especially on mobile devices with poor connections. A combination of lazy loading, lossless image shrinking, CSS sprites, and other ninja tactics led to a further 17% lift.

These optimizations reduced the page load time by 40% and shrunk the size by a factor of 4x!

The total cumulative lift was therefore 58% (1.35 x 1.17 = 1.58).

With the earlier 21% sales gain from one-click upsells, that's a 91% sales increase (1.21 x 1.35 x 1.17 = 1.91).

Dissecting the anatomy of the winning page

To determine what vital few elements to change, we surveyed the non-converting visitors. Much of the work in A/B testing is the tedious research required to understand non-converting visitors.

"Give me six hours to chop a tree and I'll spend the first four sharpening the axe." – Abraham Lincoln

All CRO practitioners would do well to learn from good, ol’ honest Abe! We used Mouseflow’s feedback feature to survey bouncing visitors from the main landing page and the check-out page. The top objection themes were:

Price is too high/product too expensive

Not sure it will work (because others didn’t work before)

Not sure it will work for my specific condition

Difficulty in using website

We then came up with specific counter-objections for each: A landing page is a “salesmanship in digital print,” so many of the techniques that work in face-to-face selling also apply.

On a landing page, though, you must overcorrect because you lack the back- and-forth conversation in a live selling situation. Below is the list of key elements on the winning page.

1. Price is too high/product is too expensive

This was by far the biggest objection, cited by over 50% of all respondents. Thus, we spent a disproportionate amount of effort and page real estate on it.

Protalus’ insoles cost $79, whereas Dr. Scholls (the 100-year-old brand) cost less than $10. When asked what other products they considered, customers frequently said Dr. Scholls.

Coupled with this, nearly one-third of customers are retired and living on a fixed income.

“I ain’t gonna pay no stinkin' $79! They cost more than my shoes,” one visitor remarked.

To overcome the price objection, we did a couple of things.

Articulated the core value proposition and attacked the price from the top

When prospects complain about price it simply means that they do not understand or appreciate the the product’s value proposition. They are seeing this:

The product’s cost exceeds the perceived value

To effectively deal with price, you must tilt the scale so that it looks like this instead:

The perceived value exceeds cost

While the sub-$10 Dr. Scholls was the reference point for many, we also learned that some customers had tried custom orthotics ($600 to $3,000) and Protalus’ insoles compared favorably.

We therefore decided our core value proposition would be:

“Avoid paying $600 for custom orthotics. Protalus insoles are almost as effective but cost 87% less.”

...forcing the $600 reference point, instead of the $10 for Dr. Scholls. In the conversion rate heuristic we use, the value proposition is the single biggest lever.

We explained all this from a "neutral" educational standpoint (rather than a salesy one) in three steps:

1. First, we use “market data” to explain the cause of most pain and establish that custom orthotics are more effective than over-the-counter insoles. Market data is always more compelling than product data, so you should lead with it.

2. Next, like a good trial lawyer, we show why Protalus insoles are similar to custom orthotics but cost 87% less:

3. Finally, we deal with the "elephant in the room" and explain how Protalus insoles are fundamentally different from Dr. Scholls:

We also used several verbatim customer testimonials to reinforce this point:

Whenever possible, let others do your bragging!

Attacked price from the bottom

Here, we used a technique known as “break the price down to the ridiculous.” $79 is just 44 cents per day, less than a K-cup of coffee — which most people consume once or twice a day! This makes the price more palatable.

Used the quality argument

The quality technique is from Zig Ziglar’s Sales Training. You say to a prospect:

“Many years ago, our company/founder/founding team made a basic decision. We decided it would be easier to use the highest quality materials and explain price one time than it would be to apologize for low quality forever. When you use the product/service, you’ll be glad we made that decision."

It's especially effective if the company has a well-known "maker" founder (like Yvon Chouinardat at Patagonia). It doesn’t work as well for MBAs or suits, much as we need them!

Protalus’ founder Chris Buck designed the insoles and has a cult-like following, so it works for him.

Dire outcomes of not taking action

Here we talked about the dire outcomes if you do not get the insoles; for example, surgery, doctors’ bills, and lost productivity at work! Many customers work on their feet all day (nurses, steelworkers, etc.) so this last point is highly relevant.

Microsoft employed this technique successfully against Linux in the early 2000s. While Linux was free, the "Total Cost of Ownership" for not getting Windows was much higher when you considered support, frequent bugs, less accountability, fewer feature updates, and so on.

2. Not sure the product will work

For this objection, we did the following:

Used Dr. Romansky

We prominently featured Dr. Romansky, Protalus’ resident podiatrist. A consultant to the US Men’s and Women’s soccer teams and the Philadephia Phillies baseball team, he has serious credibility.

The "educational" part of the landing page (above the fold) is done in "his voice." Before, only his name appeared on a rarely visited page. This is an example of a "hidden wealth" opportunity!

Used celebrity testimonials on the main landing page

Back in 1997, a sports writer asked Phil Knight (Nike’s founder): “Is there no better way for you to spend $100 million?”

You see, Knight had just paid that staggering sum to a young Tiger Woods — and it seemed extravagant!

Knight’s answer? An emphatic “No!” That $100 million would generate several billion dollars in sales for Nike over the next decade!

Celebrity testimonials work. Period.

Since our celebrity endorsements increased the one-click upsell take-rate by 60%, we also used them on the main page:

Used expert reviews

We solicited and included expert reviews from industry and medical professionals. Below are two of the four we used:

These also helped address the price concern because some site visitors had expressed discomfort paying so much for an over-the-counter product without doctor recommendation.

3. Not sure the product will work for me

This is different from “Not sure the product will work” and needs to be treated separately. If there’s one thing we’ve learned over the years, it is that everyone thinks their situation is one-in-a-million unique!

We listed all the conditions that Protalus insoles address, as well as those they do not.

In addition, we clearly stated that the product does not work for 15% of the population.

By conspicuously admitting this (NOT just in the fine print section!) you are more credible. This is expressed in the Prospect’s Protest as:

“First tell me what your product CANNOT do and I might believe you when you tell me what it can do!”

4. Difficulty in using the site

Several visitors reported difficulty using the site, so we used Mouseflow’s powerful features to detect and fix usability issues.

Interestingly, the visitor session recordings confirmed that price was a big issue as we could clearly see prospects navigate to the price, stare incredulously, and then leave!

Accentuate the customers’ reasons for buying

Most of the opportunity in CRO is in the non-converting visitors (often over 90%), but understanding converting ones can yield crucial insights.*

For Protalus, the top reasons for buying were:

Desperation/too much leg, knee, or back pain/willing to try anything (This is the 4M, for "motivation," in the strategic formula we use)

The testimonials were persuasive

Video was convincing

On the last point, the Mouseflow heatmaps showed that those who watched the video bought at a much higher rate, yet few watched it.

We therefore placed the video higher above the fold, used an arrow to draw attention, and inserted a sub-headline:

A million-dollar question we ask buyers is:

“Was there any reason you ALMOST DID NOT buy?”

Devised by Cambridge-educated Dr. Karl Blanks, who coined the term “conversion rate optimization” in 2006, this question earned him a knighthood from the Queen of England! Thanks, Sir Karl!

It's a great question because its answer is usually the reason many others didn’t buy. For every person who almost didn’t buy for reason X, I guarantee at least three others did not buy!

Given the low response rates when surveying non-converting visitors, this question helps get additional intelligence. In our case, price came up again.

*Sometimes the customers’ reasons for buying will surprise you. One of our past clients is in the e-cigarette/vaping business and a common reason cited by men for vaping was “to quit smoking because of my young daughter.” They almost never said “child” or “son”! Armed with this knowledge, we converted a whole new segment of smokers who had not considered vaping.

Speed testimonials

One of the most frequently asked questions was "How soon can I expect relief?" While Protalus addressed this in their Q&A section, we included conspicuous “speed testimonials” on the main page:

For someone in excruciating pain, the promise of fast relief is persuasive!

Patent protection exclusivity & social proof

Many of Protalus’ site visitors are older and still prefer to buy in physical stores, as we learned from our survey. They may like the product, but then think “I’ll buy them at the store.” We clarified that the product is only available on Protalus’ site.

Mentioning the patent-protection added exclusivity, one of the two required elements for a compelling value proposition.

At its core, landing page optimization isn’t about optimizing pages. A page just happens to be the medium used to optimize thought sequences in the prospect’s mind.

Dr. Flint likes to say, “The geography of the page determines the chronology of thought sequences..

http://ift.tt/2ynEETQ

[rodneyevesuarywk]

The Anatomy of a $97 Million Page: A CRO Case Study

Posted by jkuria

In this post, we share a CRO case study from Protalus, one of the fastest-growing footwear companies in the world. They make an insole that corrects the misalignment suffered by roughly 85% of the population. Misalignment is the cause of most back, knee, and foot pain. Back pain alone is estimated to be worth $100 billion a year.

Summary

We (with Protalus’ team) increased direct sales by 91% in about 6 months through one-click upsells and CRO.

Based on the direct sales increase, current run-rate revenue, the "Virtuous Cycle of CRO"-fueled growth rate, and revenue multiple for their industry, we estimate this will add about $97 million to the company’s valuation over the next 12–18 months*.

A concrete example of the Virtuous Cycle of CRO: Before we increased the conversion rate and average order value, Google Adwords was not a viable channel. Now it is, opening a whole new floodgate of profitable sales! Ditto for at least two other channels. In part due to our work, Protalus’ annual run-rate revenue has grown by 1,212% in less than a year.

* Protalus’ core product is differentiated, patent protected, and high margin. They also have a strong brand and raving fans. In the Shoes & Apparel category, they're most similar to Lululemon Athletica, which has a 4x plus revenue multiple. While Nike and Under Armor engage in a bloody price war and margin-eroding celebrity endorsements, Lululemon commands significantly higher prices than its peers, without big-name backers! Business gurus Warren Buffett and Charlie Munger often say that the true test of a defensive moat around a business is “Can you raise prices without hurting sales?” Protalus has this in spades. They've raised prices several times while simultaneously increasing units sold — from $39 to $49 to $59 to $69 to $79 to $99 to $119.

One-click upsells: A 21% sales boost

When we do engagements, the first order of business to uncover low-hanging fruit growth opportunities. This accomplishes two things:

It helps the client get an immediate ROI on the engagement

It earns us goodwill and credibility within the company. We then have wide latitude to run the big, bold experiments that produce huge conversion lifts

In Protalus’ case, we determined they were not doing post-purchase one-click upsells. Adding these immediately boosted sales by 21%. Here’s how we did it:

On their main sales landing page, Protalus has an offer where you get $30 off on the second pair of insoles, as well as free expedited shipping for both. About 30% of customers were taking this offer.

For those who didn’t, right after they purchased but BEFORE they got to the "Thank You" page, we presented the offer again, which led to the 21% sales increase.

Done correctly, one-click upsells easily boost sales, as customers do not have to re-enter credit card details. Here’s the best way to do them: The Little Secret that Made McDonalds a $106 Billion Behemoth.

Below is the final upsell page that got the 21% sales increase:

We tested our way to it. The key effective elements are:

1. Including “free upgrade to expedited shipping” in the headline: 145% lift

The original page had it lower in the body copy:

Google Experiments screenshot showing 145% lift

2. Adding celebrity testimonials: 60% lift

Google Experiments screenshot showing a 60% lift

Elisabeth Howard’s (Ms. Senior America) unsolicited endorsement is especially effective because about 60% of Protalus’ customers are female and almost one-third are retired. We uncovered these gems by reviewing all 11,000 (at the time) customers' testimonials.

3. Explaining the reasons why other customers bought additional insoles.

See the three bulleted reasons on the first screenshot (convenience, different models, purchasing for loved ones).

Radical re-design and long-form page: A 58% conversion lift

With the upsells producing positive ROI for the client, we turned to re-designing the main sales page. The new page produced a cumulative lift of 58%, attained in two steps.

[Step 1] 35% lift: Long-form content-rich page

Optimizely screenshot shows 35% lift at 99% statistical significance

Note that even after reaching 99% statistical significance, the lift fluctuated between 33% and 37%, so we'll claim 35%.

[Step 2] 17% lift: Performance improvements

The new page was quite a bit longer, so its "fully loaded" time increased a lot — especially on mobile devices with poor connections. A combination of lazy loading, lossless image shrinking, CSS sprites, and other ninja tactics led to a further 17% lift.

These optimizations reduced the page load time by 40% and shrunk the size by a factor of 4x!

The total cumulative lift was therefore 58% (1.35 x 1.17 = 1.58).

With the earlier 21% sales gain from one-click upsells, that's a 91% sales increase (1.21 x 1.35 x 1.17 = 1.91).

Dissecting the anatomy of the winning page

To determine what vital few elements to change, we surveyed the non-converting visitors. Much of the work in A/B testing is the tedious research required to understand non-converting visitors.

"Give me six hours to chop a tree and I'll spend the first four sharpening the axe." – Abraham Lincoln

All CRO practitioners would do well to learn from good, ol’ honest Abe! We used Mouseflow’s feedback feature to survey bouncing visitors from the main landing page and the check-out page. The top objection themes were:

Price is too high/product too expensive

Not sure it will work (because others didn’t work before)

Not sure it will work for my specific condition

Difficulty in using website

We then came up with specific counter-objections for each: A landing page is a “salesmanship in digital print,” so many of the techniques that work in face-to-face selling also apply.

On a landing page, though, you must overcorrect because you lack the back- and-forth conversation in a live selling situation. Below is the list of key elements on the winning page.

1. Price is too high/product is too expensive

This was by far the biggest objection, cited by over 50% of all respondents. Thus, we spent a disproportionate amount of effort and page real estate on it.

Protalus’ insoles cost $79, whereas Dr. Scholls (the 100-year-old brand) cost less than $10. When asked what other products they considered, customers frequently said Dr. Scholls.

Coupled with this, nearly one-third of customers are retired and living on a fixed income.

“I ain’t gonna pay no stinkin' $79! They cost more than my shoes,” one visitor remarked.

To overcome the price objection, we did a couple of things.

Articulated the core value proposition and attacked the price from the top

When prospects complain about price it simply means that they do not understand or appreciate the the product’s value proposition. They are seeing this:

The product’s cost exceeds the perceived value

To effectively deal with price, you must tilt the scale so that it looks like this instead:

The perceived value exceeds cost

While the sub-$10 Dr. Scholls was the reference point for many, we also learned that some customers had tried custom orthotics ($600 to $3,000) and Protalus’ insoles compared favorably.

We therefore decided our core value proposition would be:

“Avoid paying $600 for custom orthotics. Protalus insoles are almost as effective but cost 87% less.”

...forcing the $600 reference point, instead of the $10 for Dr. Scholls. In the conversion rate heuristic we use, the value proposition is the single biggest lever.

We explained all this from a "neutral" educational standpoint (rather than a salesy one) in three steps:

1. First, we use “market data” to explain the cause of most pain and establish that custom orthotics are more effective than over-the-counter insoles. Market data is always more compelling than product data, so you should lead with it.

2. Next, like a good trial lawyer, we show why Protalus insoles are similar to custom orthotics but cost 87% less:

3. Finally, we deal with the "elephant in the room" and explain how Protalus insoles are fundamentally different from Dr. Scholls:

We also used several verbatim customer testimonials to reinforce this point:

Whenever possible, let others do your bragging!

Attacked price from the bottom

Here, we used a technique known as “break the price down to the ridiculous.” $79 is just 44 cents per day, less than a K-cup of coffee — which most people consume once or twice a day! This makes the price more palatable.

Used the quality argument

The quality technique is from Zig Ziglar’s Sales Training. You say to a prospect:

“Many years ago, our company/founder/founding team made a basic decision. We decided it would be easier to use the highest quality materials and explain price one time than it would be to apologize for low quality forever. When you use the product/service, you’ll be glad we made that decision."

It's especially effective if the company has a well-known "maker" founder (like Yvon Chouinardat at Patagonia). It doesn’t work as well for MBAs or suits, much as we need them!

Protalus’ founder Chris Buck designed the insoles and has a cult-like following, so it works for him.

Dire outcomes of not taking action

Here we talked about the dire outcomes if you do not get the insoles; for example, surgery, doctors’ bills, and lost productivity at work! Many customers work on their feet all day (nurses, steelworkers, etc.) so this last point is highly relevant.

Microsoft employed this technique successfully against Linux in the early 2000s. While Linux was free, the "Total Cost of Ownership" for not getting Windows was much higher when you considered support, frequent bugs, less accountability, fewer feature updates, and so on.

2. Not sure the product will work

For this objection, we did the following:

Used Dr. Romansky

We prominently featured Dr. Romansky, Protalus’ resident podiatrist. A consultant to the US Men’s and Women’s soccer teams and the Philadephia Phillies baseball team, he has serious credibility.

The "educational" part of the landing page (above the fold) is done in "his voice." Before, only his name appeared on a rarely visited page. This is an example of a "hidden wealth" opportunity!

Used celebrity testimonials on the main landing page

Back in 1997, a sports writer asked Phil Knight (Nike’s founder): “Is there no better way for you to spend $100 million?”

You see, Knight had just paid that staggering sum to a young Tiger Woods — and it seemed extravagant!

Knight’s answer? An emphatic “No!” That $100 million would generate several billion dollars in sales for Nike over the next decade!

Celebrity testimonials work. Period.

Since our celebrity endorsements increased the one-click upsell take-rate by 60%, we also used them on the main page:

Used expert reviews

We solicited and included expert reviews from industry and medical professionals. Below are two of the four we used:

These also helped address the price concern because some site visitors had expressed discomfort paying so much for an over-the-counter product without doctor recommendation.

3. Not sure the product will work for me

This is different from “Not sure the product will work” and needs to be treated separately. If there’s one thing we’ve learned over the years, it is that everyone thinks their situation is one-in-a-million unique!

We listed all the conditions that Protalus insoles address, as well as those they do not.

In addition, we clearly stated that the product does not work for 15% of the population.

By conspicuously admitting this (NOT just in the fine print section!) you are more credible. This is expressed in the Prospect’s Protest as:

“First tell me what your product CANNOT do and I might believe you when you tell me what it can do!”

4. Difficulty in using the site

Several visitors reported difficulty using the site, so we used Mouseflow’s powerful features to detect and fix usability issues.

Interestingly, the visitor session recordings confirmed that price was a big issue as we could clearly see prospects navigate to the price, stare incredulously, and then leave!

Accentuate the customers’ reasons for buying

Most of the opportunity in CRO is in the non-converting visitors (often over 90%), but understanding converting ones can yield crucial insights.*

For Protalus, the top reasons for buying were:

Desperation/too much leg, knee, or back pain/willing to try anything (This is the 4M, for "motivation," in the strategic formula we use)

The testimonials were persuasive

Video was convincing

On the last point, the Mouseflow heatmaps showed that those who watched the video bought at a much higher rate, yet few watched it.

We therefore placed the video higher above the fold, used an arrow to draw attention, and inserted a sub-headline:

A million-dollar question we ask buyers is:

“Was there any reason you ALMOST DID NOT buy?”

Devised by Cambridge-educated Dr. Karl Blanks, who coined the term “conversion rate optimization” in 2006, this question earned him a knighthood from the Queen of England! Thanks, Sir Karl!

It's a great question because its answer is usually the reason many others didn’t buy. For every person who almost didn’t buy for reason X, I guarantee at least three others did not buy!

Given the low response rates when surveying non-converting visitors, this question helps get additional intelligence. In our case, price came up again.

*Sometimes the customers’ reasons for buying will surprise you. One of our past clients is in the e-cigarette/vaping business and a common reason cited by men for vaping was “to quit smoking because of my young daughter.” They almost never said “child” or “son”! Armed with this knowledge, we converted a whole new segment of smokers who had not considered vaping.

Speed testimonials

One of the most frequently asked questions was "How soon can I expect relief?" While Protalus addressed this in their Q&A section, we included conspicuous “speed testimonials” on the main page:

For someone in excruciating pain, the promise of fast relief is persuasive!

Patent protection exclusivity & social proof

Many of Protalus’ site visitors are older and still prefer to buy in physical stores, as we learned from our survey. They may like the product, but then think “I’ll buy them at the store.” We clarified that the product is only available on Protalus’ site.

Mentioning the patent-protection added exclusivity, one of the two required elements for a compelling value proposition.

At its core, landing page optimization isn’t about optimizing pages. A page just happens to be the medium used to optimize thought sequences in the prospect’s mind.

Dr. Flint likes to say, “The geography of the page determines the chronology of thought sequences..

http://ift.tt/2ynEETQ

[christinesumpmg]

The Anatomy of a $97 Million Page: A CRO Case Study

Posted by jkuria

In this post, we share a CRO case study from Protalus, one of the fastest-growing footwear companies in the world. They make an insole that corrects the misalignment suffered by roughly 85% of the population. Misalignment is the cause of most back, knee, and foot pain. Back pain alone is estimated to be worth $100 billion a year.

Summary

We (with Protalus’ team) increased direct sales by 91% in about 6 months through one-click upsells and CRO.

Based on the direct sales increase, current run-rate revenue, the "Virtuous Cycle of CRO"-fueled growth rate, and revenue multiple for their industry, we estimate this will add about $97 million to the company’s valuation over the next 12–18 months*.

A concrete example of the Virtuous Cycle of CRO: Before we increased the conversion rate and average order value, Google Adwords was not a viable channel. Now it is, opening a whole new floodgate of profitable sales! Ditto for at least two other channels. In part due to our work, Protalus’ annual run-rate revenue has grown by 1,212% in less than a year.

* Protalus’ core product is differentiated, patent protected, and high margin. They also have a strong brand and raving fans. In the Shoes & Apparel category, they're most similar to Lululemon Athletica, which has a 4x plus revenue multiple. While Nike and Under Armor engage in a bloody price war and margin-eroding celebrity endorsements, Lululemon commands significantly higher prices than its peers, without big-name backers! Business gurus Warren Buffett and Charlie Munger often say that the true test of a defensive moat around a business is “Can you raise prices without hurting sales?” Protalus has this in spades. They've raised prices several times while simultaneously increasing units sold — from $39 to $49 to $59 to $69 to $79 to $99 to $119.

One-click upsells: A 21% sales boost

When we do engagements, the first order of business to uncover low-hanging fruit growth opportunities. This accomplishes two things:

It helps the client get an immediate ROI on the engagement

It earns us goodwill and credibility within the company. We then have wide latitude to run the big, bold experiments that produce huge conversion lifts

In Protalus’ case, we determined they were not doing post-purchase one-click upsells. Adding these immediately boosted sales by 21%. Here’s how we did it:

On their main sales landing page, Protalus has an offer where you get $30 off on the second pair of insoles, as well as free expedited shipping for both. About 30% of customers were taking this offer.

For those who didn’t, right after they purchased but BEFORE they got to the "Thank You" page, we presented the offer again, which led to the 21% sales increase.

Done correctly, one-click upsells easily boost sales, as customers do not have to re-enter credit card details. Here’s the best way to do them: The Little Secret that Made McDonalds a $106 Billion Behemoth.

Below is the final upsell page that got the 21% sales increase:

We tested our way to it. The key effective elements are:

1. Including “free upgrade to expedited shipping” in the headline: 145% lift

The original page had it lower in the body copy:

Google Experiments screenshot showing 145% lift

2. Adding celebrity testimonials: 60% lift

Google Experiments screenshot showing a 60% lift

Elisabeth Howard’s (Ms. Senior America) unsolicited endorsement is especially effective because about 60% of Protalus’ customers are female and almost one-third are retired. We uncovered these gems by reviewing all 11,000 (at the time) customers' testimonials.

3. Explaining the reasons why other customers bought additional insoles.

See the three bulleted reasons on the first screenshot (convenience, different models, purchasing for loved ones).

Radical re-design and long-form page: A 58% conversion lift

With the upsells producing positive ROI for the client, we turned to re-designing the main sales page. The new page produced a cumulative lift of 58%, attained in two steps.

[Step 1] 35% lift: Long-form content-rich page

Optimizely screenshot shows 35% lift at 99% statistical significance

Note that even after reaching 99% statistical significance, the lift fluctuated between 33% and 37%, so we'll claim 35%.

[Step 2] 17% lift: Performance improvements

The new page was quite a bit longer, so its "fully loaded" time increased a lot — especially on mobile devices with poor connections. A combination of lazy loading, lossless image shrinking, CSS sprites, and other ninja tactics led to a further 17% lift.

These optimizations reduced the page load time by 40% and shrunk the size by a factor of 4x!

The total cumulative lift was therefore 58% (1.35 x 1.17 = 1.58).

With the earlier 21% sales gain from one-click upsells, that's a 91% sales increase (1.21 x 1.35 x 1.17 = 1.91).

Dissecting the anatomy of the winning page

To determine what vital few elements to change, we surveyed the non-converting visitors. Much of the work in A/B testing is the tedious research required to understand non-converting visitors.

"Give me six hours to chop a tree and I'll spend the first four sharpening the axe." – Abraham Lincoln

All CRO practitioners would do well to learn from good, ol’ honest Abe! We used Mouseflow’s feedback feature to survey bouncing visitors from the main landing page and the check-out page. The top objection themes were:

Price is too high/product too expensive

Not sure it will work (because others didn’t work before)

Not sure it will work for my specific condition

Difficulty in using website

We then came up with specific counter-objections for each: A landing page is a “salesmanship in digital print,” so many of the techniques that work in face-to-face selling also apply.

On a landing page, though, you must overcorrect because you lack the back- and-forth conversation in a live selling situation. Below is the list of key elements on the winning page.

1. Price is too high/product is too expensive

This was by far the biggest objection, cited by over 50% of all respondents. Thus, we spent a disproportionate amount of effort and page real estate on it.

Protalus’ insoles cost $79, whereas Dr. Scholls (the 100-year-old brand) cost less than $10. When asked what other products they considered, customers frequently said Dr. Scholls.

Coupled with this, nearly one-third of customers are retired and living on a fixed income.

“I ain’t gonna pay no stinkin' $79! They cost more than my shoes,” one visitor remarked.

To overcome the price objection, we did a couple of things.

Articulated the core value proposition and attacked the price from the top

When prospects complain about price it simply means that they do not understand or appreciate the the product’s value proposition. They are seeing this:

The product’s cost exceeds the perceived value

To effectively deal with price, you must tilt the scale so that it looks like this instead:

The perceived value exceeds cost

While the sub-$10 Dr. Scholls was the reference point for many, we also learned that some customers had tried custom orthotics ($600 to $3,000) and Protalus’ insoles compared favorably.

We therefore decided our core value proposition would be:

“Avoid paying $600 for custom orthotics. Protalus insoles are almost as effective but cost 87% less.”

...forcing the $600 reference point, instead of the $10 for Dr. Scholls. In the conversion rate heuristic we use, the value proposition is the single biggest lever.

We explained all this from a "neutral" educational standpoint (rather than a salesy one) in three steps:

1. First, we use “market data” to explain the cause of most pain and establish that custom orthotics are more effective than over-the-counter insoles. Market data is always more compelling than product data, so you should lead with it.

2. Next, like a good trial lawyer, we show why Protalus insoles are similar to custom orthotics but cost 87% less:

3. Finally, we deal with the "elephant in the room" and explain how Protalus insoles are fundamentally different from Dr. Scholls:

We also used several verbatim customer testimonials to reinforce this point:

Whenever possible, let others do your bragging!

Attacked price from the bottom

Here, we used a technique known as “break the price down to the ridiculous.” $79 is just 44 cents per day, less than a K-cup of coffee — which most people consume once or twice a day! This makes the price more palatable.

Used the quality argument

The quality technique is from Zig Ziglar’s Sales Training. You say to a prospect:

“Many years ago, our company/founder/founding team made a basic decision. We decided it would be easier to use the highest quality materials and explain price one time than it would be to apologize for low quality forever. When you use the product/service, you’ll be glad we made that decision."

It's especially effective if the company has a well-known "maker" founder (like Yvon Chouinardat at Patagonia). It doesn’t work as well for MBAs or suits, much as we need them!

Protalus’ founder Chris Buck designed the insoles and has a cult-like following, so it works for him.

Dire outcomes of not taking action

Here we talked about the dire outcomes if you do not get the insoles; for example, surgery, doctors’ bills, and lost productivity at work! Many customers work on their feet all day (nurses, steelworkers, etc.) so this last point is highly relevant.

Microsoft employed this technique successfully against Linux in the early 2000s. While Linux was free, the "Total Cost of Ownership" for not getting Windows was much higher when you considered support, frequent bugs, less accountability, fewer feature updates, and so on.

2. Not sure the product will work

For this objection, we did the following:

Used Dr. Romansky

We prominently featured Dr. Romansky, Protalus’ resident podiatrist. A consultant to the US Men’s and Women’s soccer teams and the Philadephia Phillies baseball team, he has serious credibility.

The "educational" part of the landing page (above the fold) is done in "his voice." Before, only his name appeared on a rarely visited page. This is an example of a "hidden wealth" opportunity!

Used celebrity testimonials on the main landing page

Back in 1997, a sports writer asked Phil Knight (Nike’s founder): “Is there no better way for you to spend $100 million?”

You see, Knight had just paid that staggering sum to a young Tiger Woods — and it seemed extravagant!

Knight’s answer? An emphatic “No!” That $100 million would generate several billion dollars in sales for Nike over the next decade!

Celebrity testimonials work. Period.

Since our celebrity endorsements increased the one-click upsell take-rate by 60%, we also used them on the main page:

Used expert reviews

We solicited and included expert reviews from industry and medical professionals. Below are two of the four we used:

These also helped address the price concern because some site visitors had expressed discomfort paying so much for an over-the-counter product without doctor recommendation.

3. Not sure the product will work for me

This is different from “Not sure the product will work” and needs to be treated separately. If there’s one thing we’ve learned over the years, it is that everyone thinks their situation is one-in-a-million unique!

We listed all the conditions that Protalus insoles address, as well as those they do not.

In addition, we clearly stated that the product does not work for 15% of the population.

By conspicuously admitting this (NOT just in the fine print section!) you are more credible. This is expressed in the Prospect’s Protest as:

“First tell me what your product CANNOT do and I might believe you when you tell me what it can do!”

4. Difficulty in using the site

Several visitors reported difficulty using the site, so we used Mouseflow’s powerful features to detect and fix usability issues.

Interestingly, the visitor session recordings confirmed that price was a big issue as we could clearly see prospects navigate to the price, stare incredulously, and then leave!

Accentuate the customers’ reasons for buying

Most of the opportunity in CRO is in the non-converting visitors (often over 90%), but understanding converting ones can yield crucial insights.*

For Protalus, the top reasons for buying were:

Desperation/too much leg, knee, or back pain/willing to try anything (This is the 4M, for "motivation," in the strategic formula we use)

The testimonials were persuasive

Video was convincing

On the last point, the Mouseflow heatmaps showed that those who watched the video bought at a much higher rate, yet few watched it.

We therefore placed the video higher above the fold, used an arrow to draw attention, and inserted a sub-headline:

A million-dollar question we ask buyers is:

“Was there any reason you ALMOST DID NOT buy?”

Devised by Cambridge-educated Dr. Karl Blanks, who coined the term “conversion rate optimization” in 2006, this question earned him a knighthood from the Queen of England! Thanks, Sir Karl!

It's a great question because its answer is usually the reason many others didn’t buy. For every person who almost didn’t buy for reason X, I guarantee at least three others did not buy!

Given the low response rates when surveying non-converting visitors, this question helps get additional intelligence. In our case, price came up again.

*Sometimes the customers’ reasons for buying will surprise you. One of our past clients is in the e-cigarette/vaping business and a common reason cited by men for vaping was “to quit smoking because of my young daughter.” They almost never said “child” or “son”! Armed with this knowledge, we converted a whole new segment of smokers who had not considered vaping.

Speed testimonials

One of the most frequently asked questions was "How soon can I expect relief?" While Protalus addressed this in their Q&A section, we included conspicuous “speed testimonials” on the main page:

For someone in excruciating pain, the promise of fast relief is persuasive!

Patent protection exclusivity & social proof

Many of Protalus’ site visitors are older and still prefer to buy in physical stores, as we learned from our survey. They may like the product, but then think “I’ll buy them at the store.” We clarified that the product is only available on Protalus’ site.

Mentioning the patent-protection added exclusivity, one of the two required elements for a compelling value proposition.

At its core, landing page optimization isn’t about optimizing pages. A page just happens to be the medium used to optimize thought sequences in the prospect’s mind.

Dr. Flint likes to say, “The geography of the page determines the chronology of thought sequences..

http://ift.tt/2ynEETQ

[conniecogeie]

The Anatomy of a $97 Million Page: A CRO Case Study

Posted by jkuria

In this post, we share a CRO case study from Protalus, one of the fastest-growing footwear companies in the world. They make an insole that corrects the misalignment suffered by roughly 85% of the population. Misalignment is the cause of most back, knee, and foot pain. Back pain alone is estimated to be worth $100 billion a year.

Summary

We (with Protalus’ team) increased direct sales by 91% in about 6 months through one-click upsells and CRO.

Based on the direct sales increase, current run-rate revenue, the "Virtuous Cycle of CRO"-fueled growth rate, and revenue multiple for their industry, we estimate this will add about $97 million to the company’s valuation over the next 12–18 months*.

A concrete example of the Virtuous Cycle of CRO: Before we increased the conversion rate and average order value, Google Adwords was not a viable channel. Now it is, opening a whole new floodgate of profitable sales! Ditto for at least two other channels. In part due to our work, Protalus’ annual run-rate revenue has grown by 1,212% in less than a year.

* Protalus’ core product is differentiated, patent protected, and high margin. They also have a strong brand and raving fans. In the Shoes & Apparel category, they're most similar to Lululemon Athletica, which has a 4x plus revenue multiple. While Nike and Under Armor engage in a bloody price war and margin-eroding celebrity endorsements, Lululemon commands significantly higher prices than its peers, without big-name backers! Business gurus Warren Buffett and Charlie Munger often say that the true test of a defensive moat around a business is “Can you raise prices without hurting sales?” Protalus has this in spades. They've raised prices several times while simultaneously increasing units sold — from $39 to $49 to $59 to $69 to $79 to $99 to $119.

One-click upsells: A 21% sales boost

When we do engagements, the first order of business to uncover low-hanging fruit growth opportunities. This accomplishes two things:

It helps the client get an immediate ROI on the engagement

It earns us goodwill and credibility within the company. We then have wide latitude to run the big, bold experiments that produce huge conversion lifts

In Protalus’ case, we determined they were not doing post-purchase one-click upsells. Adding these immediately boosted sales by 21%. Here’s how we did it:

On their main sales landing page, Protalus has an offer where you get $30 off on the second pair of insoles, as well as free expedited shipping for both. About 30% of customers were taking this offer.

For those who didn’t, right after they purchased but BEFORE they got to the "Thank You" page, we presented the offer again, which led to the 21% sales increase.

Done correctly, one-click upsells easily boost sales, as customers do not have to re-enter credit card details. Here’s the best way to do them: The Little Secret that Made McDonalds a $106 Billion Behemoth.

Below is the final upsell page that got the 21% sales increase:

We tested our way to it. The key effective elements are:

1. Including “free upgrade to expedited shipping” in the headline: 145% lift

The original page had it lower in the body copy:

Google Experiments screenshot showing 145% lift

2. Adding celebrity testimonials: 60% lift

Google Experiments screenshot showing a 60% lift

Elisabeth Howard’s (Ms. Senior America) unsolicited endorsement is especially effective because about 60% of Protalus’ customers are female and almost one-third are retired. We uncovered these gems by reviewing all 11,000 (at the time) customers' testimonials.

3. Explaining the reasons why other customers bought additional insoles.

See the three bulleted reasons on the first screenshot (convenience, different models, purchasing for loved ones).

Radical re-design and long-form page: A 58% conversion lift

With the upsells producing positive ROI for the client, we turned to re-designing the main sales page. The new page produced a cumulative lift of 58%, attained in two steps.

[Step 1] 35% lift: Long-form content-rich page

Optimizely screenshot shows 35% lift at 99% statistical significance

Note that even after reaching 99% statistical significance, the lift fluctuated between 33% and 37%, so we'll claim 35%.

[Step 2] 17% lift: Performance improvements

The new page was quite a bit longer, so its "fully loaded" time increased a lot — especially on mobile devices with poor connections. A combination of lazy loading, lossless image shrinking, CSS sprites, and other ninja tactics led to a further 17% lift.

These optimizations reduced the page load time by 40% and shrunk the size by a factor of 4x!

The total cumulative lift was therefore 58% (1.35 x 1.17 = 1.58).

With the earlier 21% sales gain from one-click upsells, that's a 91% sales increase (1.21 x 1.35 x 1.17 = 1.91).

Dissecting the anatomy of the winning page

To determine what vital few elements to change, we surveyed the non-converting visitors. Much of the work in A/B testing is the tedious research required to understand non-converting visitors.

"Give me six hours to chop a tree and I'll spend the first four sharpening the axe." – Abraham Lincoln

All CRO practitioners would do well to learn from good, ol’ honest Abe! We used Mouseflow’s feedback feature to survey bouncing visitors from the main landing page and the check-out page. The top objection themes were:

Price is too high/product too expensive

Not sure it will work (because others didn’t work before)

Not sure it will work for my specific condition

Difficulty in using website

We then came up with specific counter-objections for each: A landing page is a “salesmanship in digital print,” so many of the techniques that work in face-to-face selling also apply.

On a landing page, though, you must overcorrect because you lack the back- and-forth conversation in a live selling situation. Below is the list of key elements on the winning page.

1. Price is too high/product is too expensive

This was by far the biggest objection, cited by over 50% of all respondents. Thus, we spent a disproportionate amount of effort and page real estate on it.

Protalus’ insoles cost $79, whereas Dr. Scholls (the 100-year-old brand) cost less than $10. When asked what other products they considered, customers frequently said Dr. Scholls.

Coupled with this, nearly one-third of customers are retired and living on a fixed income.

“I ain’t gonna pay no stinkin' $79! They cost more than my shoes,” one visitor remarked.

To overcome the price objection, we did a couple of things.

Articulated the core value proposition and attacked the price from the top

When prospects complain about price it simply means that they do not understand or appreciate the the product’s value proposition. They are seeing this:

The product’s cost exceeds the perceived value

To effectively deal with price, you must tilt the scale so that it looks like this instead:

The perceived value exceeds cost

While the sub-$10 Dr. Scholls was the reference point for many, we also learned that some customers had tried custom orthotics ($600 to $3,000) and Protalus’ insoles compared favorably.

We therefore decided our core value proposition would be:

“Avoid paying $600 for custom orthotics. Protalus insoles are almost as effective but cost 87% less.”

...forcing the $600 reference point, instead of the $10 for Dr. Scholls. In the conversion rate heuristic we use, the value proposition is the single biggest lever.

We explained all this from a "neutral" educational standpoint (rather than a salesy one) in three steps:

1. First, we use “market data” to explain the cause of most pain and establish that custom orthotics are more effective than over-the-counter insoles. Market data is always more compelling than product data, so you should lead with it.

2. Next, like a good trial lawyer, we show why Protalus insoles are similar to custom orthotics but cost 87% less:

3. Finally, we deal with the "elephant in the room" and explain how Protalus insoles are fundamentally different from Dr. Scholls:

We also used several verbatim customer testimonials to reinforce this point:

Whenever possible, let others do your bragging!

Attacked price from the bottom

Here, we used a technique known as “break the price down to the ridiculous.” $79 is just 44 cents per day, less than a K-cup of coffee — which most people consume once or twice a day! This makes the price more palatable.

Used the quality argument

The quality technique is from Zig Ziglar’s Sales Training. You say to a prospect:

“Many years ago, our company/founder/founding team made a basic decision. We decided it would be easier to use the highest quality materials and explain price one time than it would be to apologize for low quality forever. When you use the product/service, you’ll be glad we made that decision."

It's especially effective if the company has a well-known "maker" founder (like Yvon Chouinardat at Patagonia). It doesn’t work as well for MBAs or suits, much as we need them!

Protalus’ founder Chris Buck designed the insoles and has a cult-like following, so it works for him.

Dire outcomes of not taking action

Here we talked about the dire outcomes if you do not get the insoles; for example, surgery, doctors’ bills, and lost productivity at work! Many customers work on their feet all day (nurses, steelworkers, etc.) so this last point is highly relevant.

Microsoft employed this technique successfully against Linux in the early 2000s. While Linux was free, the "Total Cost of Ownership" for not getting Windows was much higher when you considered support, frequent bugs, less accountability, fewer feature updates, and so on.

2. Not sure the product will work

For this objection, we did the following:

Used Dr. Romansky

We prominently featured Dr. Romansky, Protalus’ resident podiatrist. A consultant to the US Men’s and Women’s soccer teams and the Philadephia Phillies baseball team, he has serious credibility.

The "educational" part of the landing page (above the fold) is done in "his voice." Before, only his name appeared on a rarely visited page. This is an example of a "hidden wealth" opportunity!

Used celebrity testimonials on the main landing page

Back in 1997, a sports writer asked Phil Knight (Nike’s founder): “Is there no better way for you to spend $100 million?”

You see, Knight had just paid that staggering sum to a young Tiger Woods — and it seemed extravagant!

Knight’s answer? An emphatic “No!” That $100 million would generate several billion dollars in sales for Nike over the next decade!

Celebrity testimonials work. Period.

Since our celebrity endorsements increased the one-click upsell take-rate by 60%, we also used them on the main page:

Used expert reviews

We solicited and included expert reviews from industry and medical professionals. Below are two of the four we used:

These also helped address the price concern because some site visitors had expressed discomfort paying so much for an over-the-counter product without doctor recommendation.

3. Not sure the product will work for me

This is different from “Not sure the product will work” and needs to be treated separately. If there’s one thing we’ve learned over the years, it is that everyone thinks their situation is one-in-a-million unique!

We listed all the conditions that Protalus insoles address, as well as those they do not.

In addition, we clearly stated that the product does not work for 15% of the population.

By conspicuously admitting this (NOT just in the fine print section!) you are more credible. This is expressed in the Prospect’s Protest as:

“First tell me what your product CANNOT do and I might believe you when you tell me what it can do!”

4. Difficulty in using the site

Several visitors reported difficulty using the site, so we used Mouseflow’s powerful features to detect and fix usability issues.

Interestingly, the visitor session recordings confirmed that price was a big issue as we could clearly see prospects navigate to the price, stare incredulously, and then leave!

Accentuate the customers’ reasons for buying

Most of the opportunity in CRO is in the non-converting visitors (often over 90%), but understanding converting ones can yield crucial insights.*

For Protalus, the top reasons for buying were:

Desperation/too much leg, knee, or back pain/willing to try anything (This is the 4M, for "motivation," in the strategic formula we use)

The testimonials were persuasive

Video was convincing

On the last point, the Mouseflow heatmaps showed that those who watched the video bought at a much higher rate, yet few watched it.

We therefore placed the video higher above the fold, used an arrow to draw attention, and inserted a sub-headline:

A million-dollar question we ask buyers is:

“Was there any reason you ALMOST DID NOT buy?”

Devised by Cambridge-educated Dr. Karl Blanks, who coined the term “conversion rate optimization” in 2006, this question earned him a knighthood from the Queen of England! Thanks, Sir Karl!

It's a great question because its answer is usually the reason many others didn’t buy. For every person who almost didn’t buy for reason X, I guarantee at least three others did not buy!

Given the low response rates when surveying non-converting visitors, this question helps get additional intelligence. In our case, price came up again.

*Sometimes the customers’ reasons for buying will surprise you. One of our past clients is in the e-cigarette/vaping business and a common reason cited by men for vaping was “to quit smoking because of my young daughter.” They almost never said “child” or “son”! Armed with this knowledge, we converted a whole new segment of smokers who had not considered vaping.

Speed testimonials

One of the most frequently asked questions was "How soon can I expect relief?" While Protalus addressed this in their Q&A section, we included conspicuous “speed testimonials” on the main page:

For someone in excruciating pain, the promise of fast relief is persuasive!

Patent protection exclusivity & social proof

Many of Protalus’ site visitors are older and still prefer to buy in physical stores, as we learned from our survey. They may like the product, but then think “I’ll buy them at the store.” We clarified that the product is only available on Protalus’ site.

Mentioning the patent-protection added exclusivity, one of the two required elements for a compelling value proposition.

At its core, landing page optimization isn’t about optimizing pages. A page just happens to be the medium used to optimize thought sequences in the prospect’s mind.

Dr. Flint likes to say, “The geography of the page determines the chronology of thought sequences..

http://ift.tt/2ynEETQ