I'm sure you've probably heard about email segmentation before and that you “should” be doing it. But, how do you get started and what do you segment for?

There are a lot of options, and when you're just trying to get started – it becomes overwhelming very quickly.

This post will give you a framework that simplifies the segmentation process and delivers the results you want!

• Related Course: The ActiveCampaign & Interest Driven Sales Funnels Course

What is email segmentation?

Email segmentation occurs when you separate individuals on your list by certain aspects or characteristics – for example:

• Demographics: age, gender, race, location, occupation, marital status, income, religion, etc.
• Date: signup date, birth date, retirement date, etc.
• Interests: hobbies, passions, etc.
• Activity: what they click, what they read, what they purchase, etc.

Why it's so powerful

It keeps things relevant to your subscribers.

Think about yourself for a second. When things are relevant to you – don't you pay more attention?

For example, if you live on the East Coast and there's a hurricane in the Atlantic – you pay attention. You read news and weather reports, you run to the store and stock up on water and non-perishable foods, and you make sure your insurance is up-to-date. Whereas, people on the West Coast probably don't care as much – it's not because they're insensitive, it's just not relevant to them.

Of course, this is an example of segmentation based on location and with this information you'd be able to better relate to your subscribers and sell more product.

Why it can become overwhelming

Given that you can segment subscribers a million different ways, it can become incredibly overwhelming very quickly.

For example; you may decide you want to segment males, age 18-34, who live in the US, and play basketball. But, you also cater to females, age 18-34, who live in the US, and play basketball. And, you know what? Some people in Canada also play basketball that you can cater to as well. And, what about older people who play basketball?!?!

Before you know it, you have 30 segments that you want to send “relevant” content to.

And, instead of writing out all these emails, you just say, “Screw it, I'll send the same one to everyone.”

I know I've done that.

Keep It Simple: Segment Based On Activity

Instead of worrying about age, gender, location, interests, etc. – I want you to only concentrate on two things:

1. Activity
2. Angles

Activity

Subscribers' activity with your emails, on your site, and with your products/services encompasses nearly all segmentation conditions. You can begin sending relevant information, based upon the links and pages the subscriber clicks and visits and the products/services they buy.

Angles

People are different. (shocking!)

Which is why angles are important.

Some people are very features driven. They want to know all the things a particular product/service can do before they make a decision. (Share: reports, testing information, dimensions, speeds, material, etc)

Some people are very benefits driven. They want to know the types of results they can expect from a particular product/service before they make a decision. (Share: testimonials, case studies, reviews, etc)

Some people want social proof. They want to make sure they're not the only one buying a particular product/service and that it's “legit”. (Share: “as seen on”, influencer use, number of people using, etc)

While there are tons of other angles, we're going to stick with these three:

1. Features
2. Benefits
3. Social Proof

Putting Activity and Angles Together

Let's pretend that you run an eCommerce store selling men's ski clothing (ski pants and ski jackets).

You send an email to your list that shows your top selling pair of ski pants and your top selling ski jacket.

The subscriber clicks on the top selling ski jacket.

Based on that activity, you know they're looking for a ski jacket and you can begin sending relevant emails from different angles.

• Email 1 describes how the jacket is made with 100% Gore-Tex and can withstand 20 mph tumbles down a mountain
• Email 2 shows how the jacket will keep you warm in sub zero temperatures so you can enjoy your whole day skiing
• Email 3 shows the jacket was featured in Ski Magazine and Shaun White wears it

Now, it doesn't matter if the subscriber is male, female, young, old, lives in the US, or lives in Canada. What matters is that they're interested in a men's ski jacket and depending on what type of person it is – one of the 3 angles will hopefully connect with them and result in a sale.

How To Track Subscriber Activity

Every decent email autoresponder service comes with the ability to track subscriber activity on your website. For this example I'll be using ActiveCampaign, but if you use another tag based service – the concept will remain the same.

Note: there are many, many, many different ways to track how people act and engage with your content. I've simply outlined one way below, and if it doesn't “fit” what you're trying to do, try and figure out another way! (there's always a way)

• Related Course: The ActiveCampaign & Interest Driven Sales Funnels Course

Steps:

1. Ensure Site Tracking is installed. [learn more]
2. Login to ActiveCampaign.
3. Create a New Automation.
   1. Start from Scratch.
4. Select “Web page is visited”.

5. Enter the Web page URL you have designated to “mark” a particular interest. This URL is typically a sales page; however, it may also be a page on a specific topic or interest.

6. Add as many other “Starts” as makes sense. For example, if you have multiple pages on your site that signal interest in the same topic, product, or service – make sure you have all of them as starting points for this automation.
7. Select the little + icon, then “Contacts” and “Add tag”.

8. Enter in the name of your tag. I typically name mine “Interested In [X]” where [X] is the product/service name or topic.

9. Create a new automation with the “Start” being the tag you added while following steps 1-8. Make the automation do whatever you want, ie. send emails from different angles.

10. Make sure you make your automations active!

Conclusion

As you're well aware, email segmentation is incredibly powerful when it comes to increasing conversions and it should be implemented; however, it can become overwhelming very quickly if you don't have a strategy or plan to follow.

This is why I recommend focusing solely on Activity and Angles. Don't mess with demographics, dates, interests, etc. All that “stuff” can be summed up by the actions subscribers take.

By addressing what people look at and show an interest in, and then relating to those people based on how they think, research, and buy, you'll be able to convert more people into buyers than ever before!

Are you ready to start building sales funnels? Checkout The Sales Funnel Training Vault!

Last week I wrote a post about how most eCommerce stores suck at email marketing where the biggest thing that shocked me was the lack of Welcome Emails.

Out of the 20 email lists I joined, I received Welcome Emails from only 4 of the businesses (20%).

This is unacceptable.

Every email list, eCommerce or otherwise, needs to welcome the user to their list.

In this post, I will examine the 4 Welcome Emails I received telling you what I like/don't like about them and pointing out what you can learn from them.

Holstee

I like this email for a few reasons.

I like that it's from a person – Helen Williams. This makes it much more personal and I really like her title, “Community Love Director”! Ha, that's awesome!

I like that it's fairly short and to the point. Helen introduces me to their mission, gives me a few links to get started, asks me to contact her if I have issues, and then she signs off. Excellent.

I like that she links me to her social media pages and tells me that her company shares “daily doses of what inspires us” – I know what to expect when I follow them.

I like that she linked me to her blog's most popular posts. That's great! A great way to learn more about the company.

What I may, or may not like … depending how it's used … is the third bullet, “Looking for a new Desktop or iPhone background?” If they're using it to segment their list (to see who's on a desktop and/or iPhone) then awesome! If not, then they're alienating a portion of their audience for no apparent reason (Android anyone?).

I would also like some clearer expectations as to what I'm to receive by being subscribed to this email list and how often. For example, when will I receive discounts? When will I receive updates on blog posts? How many emails a week should I expect? It's just something nice to know.

All in all, I really like this Welcome Email – good job Holstee!

Flatspot

I like this email for a few reasons. First, it's very attractive! Look at all the pretty pictures!

I like that the Lead Magnet (Free Shipping Code) I requested was delivered to me immediately. They kept their promise.

I like that they have links to their social media profiles. This helps me easily locate them in order to Like and Follow.

I kind of like that they have one clear objective on this email – “Follow Us On Instagram”. However, I don't know that I necessarily agree with “one clear objective” in regards to a Welcome Series. I believe Welcome Series should be used to segment subscribers and by having “one clear objective”, it makes it a little harder to segment. But, this is also the first email, there's still time!

I don't like that they don't share any expectations of me being on their list. When are you going to send me stuff? How often? What are you going to send me? etc.

I'd also prefer this email to come from a person. Being that this is an eCommerce store, a personal touch is always nice in order to remind the lead/customer that they're working with actual people, not just machines.

All in all, I think it's a decent email; however, I would test a few things … and maybe they already did, and if it's working for them – great!

Shwood

I like this email because it's pretty, it's simple, it's short, it sets expectation, it introduces their social media pages, and it lets me know that if I have an issue that I can email or call them.

My issue is … who do I call? Who do I email? Where's that personal touch?

So, for the most part – I like it, but I think they need to make it more personal.

Skinny Teatox

This isn't really a Welcome Email – instead, they automatically sent me their last broadcast email.

This is an “OK” thing to do, as long as no context is required in order to understand what's going on. It's almost like jumping right into the middle of a conversation, maybe I can figure out what they're saying … but, maybe I can't. You never want to confuse a new subscriber.

So, I'd definitely recommend adding a “true” Welcome Email, and then follow up an hour or two later with your latest broadcast.

Anyway, what I really like about this email is that they have obvious, descriptive, buttons. For example, there's a big, pink button that says “Get A 14 Day Skinny Teatox (Free Shipping)” … and it takes me straight to that product. Great!

I also like that they're sharing their latest blog post so I can read more about what the business represents.

I'm going to stop critiquing it here as this isn't a “real” Welcome Email per se (even tho they sent it as one).

Again, I highly recommend adding a “true” Welcome Email.

6 Things All Welcome Emails Should Include

I'll leave you with a list of things every Welcome Email should include:

1. Say thank you, Welcome!, etc.
2. Include the Lead Magnet
3. Short introduction to the business (maybe a link to the latest blog post)
4. Set expectations for the email list (perks of being subscribed)
5. Include links to Social Media profiles
6. Be personal

Are you a business owner or entrepreneur?

Have you tried to setup your own website, sales funnel, advertising campaign, etc. and stopped halfway through because you figured you were “doing it wrong?”

OR WORSE!

Did you not even try to setup what you wanted to do?!

You probably read a ton of information about how to do the task. You watched some videos, signed up for some guru’s email list, and even took a course.

And, by the end of the day – you had nothing to show for it.

Either you got overwhelmed, scared, intimidated … insert whatever emotion that held you back.

Good news! This article is going to teach you how to get past all that and just freakin’ do it!

The Concept Of The MVP

The Minimal Viable Product (MVP) term was made popular by Eric Reis in his book The Lean Startup.

Simply put, an MVP represents the least amount of risk (or work) vs the greatest amount of measurable results.

For example, when it comes to setting up an email list – it literally takes 5 minutes to create a list and add a signup form to a website or Facebook page.

5 minutes. It’s really that simple.

And, this would be an MVP.

You would be able to measure conversion rates.

Sure, they would probably be abysmal as the “standard issue” form probably wouldn’t look too good, and you wouldn’t have a lead magnet yet.

But, you would have something out there that can be measured.

You would have an MVP.

Take The VERY First Step

Now that you understand the concept of an MVP, it’s time to actually build it.

Nearly every single person I talk to with grand ideas of building X, Y, and Z … but doesn’t … every one of them has the same exact problem.

They do too much research.

We’ll go with the sales funnel example again.

People will read that they need to setup multiple email lists (one for free subscribers, one for paid subscribers, one for people who showed interest in product X, etc), that they’ll probably need to connect their email lists via a 3^rd party tool like Zapier, that they’ll need to have multiple thank you pages and include One-Time-Offers (OTO) on each thank you page, that they’ll need lead magnets galore, and at least 15 emails in their autoresponder series … oh, yeah … and popup opt-in forms … gotta have those too!

And, oh my gosh! Don’t let me get started on actually advertising the sales funnel! SEO, PPC, affiliate marketing, blah, blah, blah!

Holy crap!

That’s a lot of stuff!

No wonder people don’t do anything … that’s an overwhelming amount of work.

My advice to you is …

STOP RESEARCHING.

Figure out what the MVP is. Remember, it’s the simplest thing you can do that produces some sort of measurable result (ie. A conversion).

Then, figure out the very first step to build that MVP.

Be warned, this very first step probably isn’t shiny or fun.

Back to the sales funnel example, maybe you read that you need awesome subject lines and you went down that rabbit hole, learning all kinds of formulas that increase open rates … and it's super exciting and fun.

Subject lines are not the first step to building an MVP for a sales funnel.

Your MVP for a sales funnel is an email list with a signup form on your site.

• The first step is to create a list in your email autoresponder service.
• The second step is to create a form for that list in your email autoresponder service.
• The third step is to put that form on your website.

Boom! MVP.

Go!

I’m going to end the post here.

Stop doing research. Stop reading. Stop watching tutorials.

You already know you want to accomplish.

Now go figure out the MVP and the first step to building that MVP.

Then just freakin’ do it.

If you’ve been surfing the Internet for about five minutes – you’ve probably been retargeted.

Have you ever been to a website, then gone to Facebook and seen an ad for the exact website you just left? That’s retargeting.

Or, have you gone to one website and then seen ads on other websites for that one website you just left? Again, that’s retargeting.

What Is Retargeting?

Retargeting, sometimes referred to as remarketing (Google Adword's name for it), is a type of advertising that helps a business keep its potential customers in arm's reach.

For example, you have a potential lead land on your website – and, unfortunately, they bounce (they leave after seeing the first page, they don’t commit any action, and they're gone forever!)

Instead of letting that potential lead get away, you can use retargeting to advertise to them again and again across different platforms (Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, other websites, etc). Each time, approaching from a different angle (maybe they didn’t like the first page they saw, but the second page you show them they may really like).

For example, if a potential lead lands on THIS exact page, and bounces – I can retarget them to introduce other articles they may find beneficial and/or I can advertise lead magnets like our Top Converting Email Series.

How Does Retargeting Work?

Retargeting is “normally” a combination of a cookie and JavaScript that allows people to be “followed” anonymously as they surf the Internet.

When a person who’s being “followed” with a retargeting cookie arrives on a website that’s part of the retargeting ad network, the JavaScript code is executed. The JavaScript code sends a signal to the retargeting advertising network which then performs a bunch of fancy calculations where they figure out which retargeting ad to display. Then, an ad is displayed.

One of the downsides with this is that if the user clears their cookies – you’ll lose them. Or, if they use another browser – you’ll use them. Or, if they’re on their phone at first, and then switch to a computer – you’ll lose them.

When retargeting on social networks, like Facebook and Twitter, retargeting works a little bit differently. A cookie may or may not be involved at first, but eventually, the users, themselves, are added to a retargeting list. This allows you to retarget individuals no matter what computer or device they’re on – as long as they’re logged in under the same user profile on the social network.

I know, this might be getting a little too “in-depth” for an intro to retargeting article; but, it’s an important concept!

Ideally, you’ll want to retarget across the web and social networks. The combination of the two will allow you to retarget across all devices and browsers – making your business ever present, no matter where the individual is browsing.

Where To Buy Retargeting

Retargeting Companies

There are various services to help you retarget your customers. Some of them are companies whose sole purpose is retargeting. Two of the top companies are AdRoll and Perfect Audience.

The great part about going through one of these companies is that they cover a wide range of retargeting options – they're essentially a one-stop-shop. They allow you to advertise on the web, on social media, and more … all from within their service.

Of course, these retargeting services cost a little more because they'll need to take their cut as well; however, it's a pretty low cost compared to the amount of convenience they provide.

Social Media

Pretty much all social media networks, that have advertising, have some form of retargeting available.

For example, Facebook has Custom Audiences. In simple terms, this allows you to place some code on your site that will “collect” your site's visitors and add them to your Custom Audience. You can then create an ad to be displayed to that Custom Audience, which, in essence, is retargeting.

Twitter has Tailored Audiences, which works in a similar fashion to Facebook's Custom Audiences.

Google Adwords (remarketing)

Of course Google offers their own retargeting service, which they've decided to call remarketing.

Their service allows you to display ads across their ad network – allowing you to display your ads on millions of websites.

It's a “beast” of a system because it also integrates with Google Analytics and can assist you in developing some crazy lists. Learning how to retarget with Google Adwords can easily become a full time job – it can be that intense.

Here's a little more information on it.

Retargeting Your Sales Funnel

Retargeting can be a powerful tool to help pull people through your sales funnel.

It’s true, emails are normally the first wave of sales funnel systems; however, emails can have abysmal open rates with even worse click-through rates.

Some of the best autoresponse emails only have a 20% click-through rate – meaning, out of 100 people that receive an email from your business, only 20 will actually click any of the links inside of it.

So, how do you stay in front of the other 80 people?

Retargeting.

Retargeting allows you to help “pull” and/or re-engage an individual in your sales funnel.

For example, when a user enters your sales funnel, you can begin retargeting them. Start showing them ads in the same fashion that you send them emails: value and action.

When they look at a particular page that’s full of valuable information, start showing them ads on where to buy the complementary product that that valuable information spoke about.

Continue following the Value/Action series with your ads, just like with your emails.

Finale!

Have you tried retargeting for your business? What were your results? Comment below!

This article is part of a bigger article that can be found by clicking here.

This Is The Most Important Aspect

Where your traffic is coming from is the most important aspect for the success of your sales funnel.

If the people visiting your website don’t care about you, your business, or your products, they will never convert into paying customers (the whole point of a business).

Needless to say, too many people go for cheap traffic. They’ll look at sites like fiverr that offer to send UNLIMITED people to your site for $5. Sure, that sounds like an awesome deal … but, you know it can’t possibly be true. There’s no way UNLIMITED visitors cost only $5.

Yet, time and time again, businesses are buying these gigs and are then in shock that their sales funnel isn’t working, or their squeeze page isn’t converting.

Here’s the deal, if your squeeze page isn’t converting … the first thing you need to consider is where your traffic is coming from.

Below you'll find two key rules to ensure you're getting the right traffic to your sales funnel.

• Related Course: How To Increase Leads & Sales On Facebook With The Triple Threat Strategy

#1 Rule – Hangout With Your Audience

If you read nothing else in this article, read this section because it will save you time, effort, energy, and money.

The #1 Rule for driving traffic to your website is to hangout where your audience hangs out.

If your audience hangs out on Facebook … be on Facebook.

If your audience normally finds you through Google Search … be heavy on Search Engine Optimization (SEO).

If your audience hangs out on a forum online … be an active member of that community.

I know, this all sounds so simple and “duh” … but, so many people get caught up in what’s “hot right now.”

They’ll see that someone just made X dollars through LinkedIn. So, they’ll get excited and go over to LinkedIn to make X dollars too; however, they end up failing because their particular audience isn’t even on LinkedIn. They then get discouraged, figure their squeeze page isn’t working, and so they change the color of their subscribe button. I see it happen all the time.

Please, do not over think this. It really is simple. All you have to do is avoid the noise that Internet Marketers push down your throat of “what’s hot right now.” Learn to get through that noise, focus on where your audience actually hangs out … and hangout with them. It’s that easy.

• Related Article: How to develop a Marketing Persona

#2 Rule – Set Expectations

The second biggest issue businesses have in driving traffic to their sales funnel is that they aren’t properly setting expectations with their marketing efforts.

For example, if you have an ad that says “Click Here for 10% off” … when a person clicks there, they should be presented with the 10% off coupon.

Duh … right?

This is called Conversion Coupling.

Conversion Coupling is “the bond that exists between the pre-click experience and the corresponding post-click landing experience. Conversion coupling means maintaining consistent messaging throughout your campaign.” [unbounce]

Too easy.

Whatever the ad says, should match what the landing page says.

Simple stuff, yet it’s overlooked all the time.

“Free” vs. Paid Traffic

There are already 39 million different articles on the various traffic sources, which one works “best”, and yaddy-yadda.

Remember, there is no single “best” source of traffic for all businesses. You must hangout where your audience hangs out.

But, I digress …

Most people break traffic sources into two types: Free and Paid.

The problem with this breakdown is that it’s deceptive … because, no advertising is “free” … it’s still going to cost you time.

Here are some common traffic sources with links to courses to help  you get started.

“Free” Traffic

• SEO – What Is SEO? Learn SEO Basics & Optimize Your Website
• Social Media – Social Media Marketing 2016 – Complete Certificate Course
• Blogging – 2016 Blog Blueprint: How To Turn Blogging Into A Career

Paid Traffic

• Google Adwords – Ultimate Google AdWords Course 2016–Stop SEO & Win With PPC!
• Facebook Ads – How To Fill Your Sales Funnel With Facebook Ads
• Twitter Ads – Twitter Ads NEW 2016 – For Business Agencies & Entrepreneurs

Remember

No matter what type of traffic you’re sending, “free” or paid … remember these 2 things:

1. Only advertise where your audience hangs out
2. Make sure your ad matches your landing page

Once these two rules are followed unconditionally, you can begin to optimize your landing page.

Many businesses struggle with figuring out how much money they should spend on advertising.

Some businesses don’t spend any money on advertising, other businesses spend too much.

Sure, the “free” advertising methods are great and if you’re generating enough money to make you and your business happy – then … good for you! Keep at it!

However, if you want to generate more sales, revenue, and profit … you’ll want to be sure that you’re spending your advertising dollars wisely.

• Related Course: How To Optimize Your Sales Funnel

How Much Should You Spend On PPC Advertising?

Believe it or not, figuring out how much money you should spend on your Pay Per Click (PPC) advertising campaigns is very simple.

Unfortunately, too many businesses don’t do the simple math to figure out how much they can and should spend on advertising. So, they wind up spending too much, or running away to cheaper, lower quality, sources of traffic.

You’ll need 3 numbers to calculate your PPC budget:

• How much gross profit you make per product/service sold ($)
  • Gross Profit = Sale Price – Cost of Good Sold
• Profit you want to keep per sale ($)
  • This is known as the Operating Profit
  • The amount of money, from each sale, that you want in your pocket
  • Conversely, what amount of gross profit you’re willing to spend on advertising to sell the product/service
  • Note: Don’t forget, operating profit is taxable and may incur other expenses
• Conversion rate (%)
  • For every 100 people who land on your sales page, X people make a purchase.
  • X/100 = conversion rate.
  • Related Tutorial: How to track conversion rates with Google Analytics

Bear with me a moment!

I know, those definitions may be a bit confusing at first sight, but after I run through a few examples, you’ll understand.

The PPC Formula

Here’s the formula the calculator follows … you can do your own math if you’d rather!

(Gross Profit – (Gross Profit * (Operating Profit / Gross Profit))) * Conversion Rate

The PPC Calculator

PPC Calculator Examples

Example 1 (Our Product)

We’re an eCommerce store that sells t-shirts.

We buy the t-shirts from the manufacturer for $2 per unit and sell them for $20 to our customers … resulting in an $18 gross profit.

We want to pocket $10 per shirt sold (Operating Profit).

We’ve determined Facebook Advertising traffic to our Sales Page converts at 5%.

Plug the numbers into the calculator …

Viola! We can comfortably spend $0.40 per click in order to pocket $10 per sale!

Example 2 (Affiliate Product)

We’re an affiliate for an online course that pays us $50 each time we refer someone to the course (Gross Profit).

We’ve decided we want to pocket at least half of that and spend the other half on advertising. So, $25 in operating profit is our goal.

Over time, we’ve figure out that the course’s sales page converts at around 3%, when traffic is sent via Google Adwords, for a few specific keywords.

Plug the numbers into the calculator …

Viola! We can comfortably spend $0.75 per click in order to pocket $25 per sale!

Profit Maximization

When you’re launching PPC campaigns, you may notice some people are paying ridiculous amounts of money per each click.

For example, the product for sale on the sales page is only $49, yet, people are bidding upwards of $15 per click! More than likely, their sales page isn’t converting above 30% to make it profitable.

So, how the heck are they able to bid so much and still turn a profit?!

Simple answer: The have a sales funnel.

That $49 product you see is just the front-end offer (sometimes called a tripwire). It’s what gets people in the door. Once they’re in the door, they go through upsell after upsell … which tend to have high conversion rates, thus making individuals worth way more than the original $49 they spend.

So, the average person may be worth about $200, making the $15 per click more practical, possible, and realistic.

Needless to say, if you find yourself surrounded by very expensive PPC ads, and you can’t compete … you need to spend some time building out and optimizing your sales funnel and sales pipelines.

Of course, if you need help with this … we’re here to help!

Ready For More?

Knowing how much you should spend per click is just one part of the equation.

Knowing how to decrease the cost and/or increase the profit is the other part …

The Sales Funnel Training Vault will teach you all the parts!