Business Growth Strategies » stephen dean

Traffic Patterns – What Influences Traffic

Ryan M. Healy — Mon, 31 Jan 2011 13:04:38 +0000

Last week, I tried an experiment.

Normally, I publish one or two or three blog posts a week. I hold back a lot of my ideas because I don’t want to email my list too much.

But last week I wrote and published a blog post whenever I felt like it. I didn’t hold back.

Now, I continued to email my list like normal — but no more than once a day. I picked the best post of the day and let them know about it.

I didn’t tell them about the other blog posts, but left it up to chance to see if they’d find them or not.

At least one person noticed. Stephen Dean said, “Ryan Healy was busting out blog posts this week like Lindsay Lohan on stimulants.”

While Stephen’s description made me laugh, the question is not, “How similar is Ryan Healy to Lindsay Lohan?” The question is, “Did more frequent blogging increase traffic to my blog?”

The answer is… yes. In fact, traffic to my blog increased quite a bit. Here’s a graph from Google Analytics:

Saturday is consistently my lowest traffic day every single week, so I have noted that above. Monday-Thursday are my highest traffic days.

Conclusion: More frequent blog posts generated more traffic to my blog even though I didn’t increase the frequency that I emailed my list.

You may find the same is true in your market. It’s something worth testing.

Explaining Alexa Traffic Spikes

While Alexa isn’t perfect, I do like to check Alexa to see how I rank against similar blogs. I also like to analyze the charts to see why I’ve gotten more or less traffic than normal.

Here’s a chart of my blog’s Alexa rankings compared to Terry Dean’s blog MyMarketingCoach.com.

As you can see, our sites have similar traffic levels. But I’ve had a couple recent traffic spikes that are explained on the chart.

Ray Edwards is a colleague of mine. He’s a freelance copywriter, as I am. And our blogs have similar traffic levels. But check out this Alexa chart:

As you can see, my Jeff Walker post and more frequent blogging both created noticeable traffic spikes.

But those spikes pale in comparison to an organized promotion where multiple friends and/or affiliates promote your product on the same day or within a narrow window of time.

Last week, Ray promoted his new book Writing Riches. I promoted Ray’s book, as did a number of other bloggers and marketers. This caused a massive spike in traffic to Ray’s blog.

3 Ways to Increase Traffic

If you’d like to increase traffic to your blog or web site, here are three proven ways to do it:

Be controversial.
Blog more frequently.
Get friends and affiliates to promote a product you sell.

As the charts above demonstrate, an organized promotion can generate far more traffic than either of the first two strategies.

This is because people are generally more motivated by money and obligation than the opportunity to share something new or controversial.

Have a great week.

-Ryan M. HealySimilar Posts:

Business Interviews Galore!

Ryan M. Healy — Tue, 04 Jan 2011 14:10:41 +0000

Over the past few years, I’ve done a number of written interviews with fellow bloggers.

You may have seen some of these interviews. But I’m willing to bet you’ve missed one or two of them. And even if you’ve read all of them, I think you’ll still get some value by revisiting them.

So, with that in mind, I’ve collected together links to some of the best written interviews I’ve done during the last 2-3 years. Each of these links opens in a new tab or window.

12 Questions with Ryan Healy – Kevin Rogers asked me a lot of personal questions as well as some out-of-the-ordinary ones that were really good.

5 Questions with Ryan Healy – Jason Leister asked me about business and books. This one is very recent.

Ryan Healy – The Interview – Stephen Dean fired 12 questions at me more than 2 years ago. I think this was the first written interview I ever did.

Is Copywriting Important to Bloggers? – In March 2010, Lynn Terry asked me 5 questions. One of those was, “Is copywriting important to bloggers?” This interview also includes 3 Tips for Improving Your Online Business.

How to Get Lots of New Clients in Hard Times – In this interview, Ben Settle hammered me with 12 questions all about how to get clients. Good stuff if you’re a freelancer.

That should keep you busy for a while. ;-)

Enjoy!

-Ryan M. Healy

P.S. By the way, if you have a blog about business, copywriting, blogging, or marketing… and you’d like to do a written interview with me… just shoot me an email at rhealy@gmail.com.

You provide the questions — and I’ll provide the answers.

It’s the fastest way I know of to get 1,000 to 2,000 words of content for your blog. And I might even link to the interview down the road.

I can only accept 3 interview requests right now (I already have one in the queue from December 2010). So if you’re interested, please email me asap. Thanks!Similar Posts:

So, Have They Actually Done Anything Wrong?

Ryan M. Healy — Wed, 03 Nov 2010 18:27:46 +0000

So far, we’ve gotten an insider’s view of a phone consultation between two high-profile Internet marketers. And we’ve caught wind of other anticompetitive practices that may or may not be going on inside the Internet marketing space. But has anybody actually done anything wrong?

Here’s a great comment Antone Roundy made here on this blog that sheds light on this question:

Up to a point, what these guys are doing is just smart business: build industry connections, promote each others’ stuff, time your product releases so that they don’t drown each other out (not sure whether that’d be illegal or not by itself).

But if they’re promoting each other regardless of product quality or value for the price, that’s unethical at best. And if they’re agreeing to a pricing scheme or taking products off the market during other peoples’ launch periods to reduce competition, I’d expect the FTC to be breathing down their necks really soon.

With that in mind, here’s a list of specific business practices I’d consider blatantly wrong:

Fake Endorsements – I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again. Fake endorsements are wrong. You should not recommend a product unless you’ve personally reviewed it or used it yourself. In cases where you can’t review a product in advance (for instance, a seminar), then hedge your recommendation; tone it down a bit; let people know you’re making the recommendation based on the person’s reputation and not necessarily the product or service itself.

Non-Payment of Affiliate Commissions – Let’s call this for what it is: theft. If you promise to pay a commission to your affiliates based on their performance, and then you refuse to pay them after they’ve performed, then you’re committing a crime. I know this happens quite a bit because people have a tendency to spend the money they owe to affiliates. Then, when it comes time to pay, they have nothing left. The trick is to discipline yourself so affiliate commissions are always paid first, no matter what.

Paying A-List Affiliates, But Not B-List Affiliates – If you selectively pay out affiliate commissions, you’re guilty of favoritism. This is yet another form of theft (non-payment of affiliate commissions), but it’s more sinister because it indicates you actually do have the financial means to pay your affiliates — you just choose not to pay certain ones. It’s willful theft versus theft due to stupidity.

Positioning a Product as a “Magic Bullet” When You Clearly Know It’s Not – I’m fine with enthusiasm, conviction, and metaphors in the sales process. If you have a great product, do your best to sell it! But I personally believe that you should not position a product as a cure-all if you know it’s not a cure-all.

Using Intimidation to Prevent Competitors from Running Promotions at the Same Time as Your Launch – If you and a partner have agreed to promote each other’s products, then of course it makes sense to run your promotions at separate times so you can support each other. As Antone Roundy pointed out in his comment, it’s just smart business. But trying to prevent other promotions from happening by intimidating your competitors is just slimy — almost like what you’d expect the Mafia would do if you marched into their territory and started offering competitive “protection services.”

I’m sure there are other practices that should be included in this list, but these are the ones that come to mind.

So, what should you do when you see these things happening? It’s simple, really. You opt-out of the sales process. You unsubscribe. You choose not to buy.

As Stephen Dean pointed out in a recent blog post, November 2 was voting day. But so is today. And tomorrow. In fact, every day of the year is a day you get to vote for the businesses and charities you want to support.

Rather than get hung up on past financial mistakes you may have made, decide today that you’re going to make better choices. Decide today that you’re going to vote with your dollars and support credible businesses with good reputations. That’s really the best recourse you have — and the fastest way to effect change.

-Ryan M. HealySimilar Posts:

12 Questions with Copywriter Stephen Dean

Ryan M. Healy — Mon, 11 Aug 2008 16:47:10 +0000

[Note: If you're a freelance copywriter, and you're looking for interview questions to ask your client, then check out Interview Questions for Copywriters. Otherwise, keep reading and enjoy! -Ryan]

A few months ago, I came up with 12 questions for copywriter Stephen Dean to answer.

Well, “stuff” got in the way. Stephen went on vacation. I got busy with projects. Etc.

The delay actually turned out to be a good thing. Because I asked Stephen to interview me.

You’ll find the questions I asked Stephen, along with his answers, below.

And you’ll find the questions Stephen asked me, along with my responses, on his blog. (See the link at the end of this article.)

1. What do you LOVE about copywriting?

Wow, a lot of things just went through my mind. I’m an information junkie, so getting deeply involved in a new topic each time I take on a new topic is fantastic brain food.

When you get a project for Real Estate investing, or stock investing, or natural health and so on… you get paid to sit there and research these things heavily. That’s really fun for me.

Copywriting can also be like putting a puzzle together that doesn’t have a “correct solution.” So it becomes an art and a science. I do love that.

2. What do you HATE about copywriting?

The isolation! I’m often envious of people whose work involves a lot of socializing. Most of the time I’m working it’s just me and the computer.

That said, because of copywriting, I have a lot of time outside of work to see friends.

3. What is the single best investment you’ve made in your copywriting career?

By far, it was hiring Michel Fortin to be my coach. I started writing copy when I was young, so my biggest weakness was experience. Hiring Michel allowed me to zap that problem.

So I highly recommend getting a copywriting coach to anyone just starting out. It’s incredible how helpful it is to have someone with more experience take a look at your work as you go.

4. What’s the biggest MISTAKE you’ve made in your business?

I could mention a lot. Not raising my prices fast enough. Not following up with every client to get real performance numbers for the copy to put on my sales page (still need to be doing that).

But another I’ve noticed lately…

I stayed in the “Make Money Online” niche for far too long. And by “stayed,” I mean that’s pretty much all I wrote for. That was fine when my fees were lower. And there still is a lot of work here…

…but as I raised my rates and was approached by more clients in different niches, the only work I had in my portfolio was for one niche. They doubted I could write in their niche and I lost work because of it.

5. What’s the biggest trend impacting copywriters today?

I think everyone’s paying attention to online video. Are copywriters going to be writing scripts in the future? Will copywriters produce videos?

There aren’t many “video copywriters” out there yet, but this could change soon. I don’t see video completely replacing written copy, but it could become a vital component.

One problem with video is that you can’t skim it. That’s terrible for someone like me who skims sales letters. So I only see it complimenting the sales process.

6. What are some untapped markets or opportunities for freelance copywriters?

For U.S. copywriters I’d guess it’d be U.K. clients. With the dollar falling at the rate that it is, it seems like clients from the U.K. keep getting a significant discount courtesy of The Federal Reserve.

7. What’s your #1 tip for finding quality copywriting clients fast?

Do a Google search and check out the sites that are using Adwords. Look for sites that are obviously employing copywriters and get their physical address (usually by looking up their WHOIS information for their domain name). And then start sending them promotional material through postal mail.

It can get more complicated than that. You can see how big their Adwords budget is and if they’re involved in several different markets (which means they’ll probably continue to expand)… but that’s a good start.

This way you’re targeting and choosing clients who have money and experience working with a copywriter.

8. Why do you blog? Is it to attract clients, sell information products, or something else? Explain.

Hmm… Neither, either or both.

To be honest I forget why I started blogging. I’d just come home from Ryan Deiss’ seminar in Dallas so maybe I was encouraged there.

I can tell you why I blog now. The ultimate goal is to establish myself as a copywriting authority and get clients. More and more clients are finding me by searching for copywriters through Google… this would be difficult without a blog.

And since I have several hundred posts, these clients can see that I’ve been around a long time and know what I’m doing. So it helps them to trust me, which is important because sales copy isn’t cheap and they’re going to approach hiring me carefully.

At the same time, having a blog with decent traffic gives you quite a bit of freedom. I could stop writing copy tomorrow and change my focus to selling products.

Because I have a steady flow of traffic I wouldn’t need to start all over again.

9. What’s your #1 tip for instantly boosting conversion rates?

This probably isn’t what you’re looking for. But it’s the first thing that came to mind: Find a higher quality traffic source.

If your copy is converting at 3% from traffic on Adwords, you’re likely to get higher than a 10% conversion from an endorsed mailing. So it’s important to seek out those partnerships when you see that sales are coming in.

10. Is there more money to be made in selling secrets or keeping them? Why?

This is an amazing question because I’ve been thinking about it lately too. James Brausch seems to sell his entire business, doesn’t he?

Is it because he thinks “competition” will help his business or does he think most people won’t act anyway? (Truthfully, I guess that’s not an either/or.)

I definitely have not come to my own conclusion about this. Could KFC sell their secret recipe and stay dominant? They sure don’t think so, check this out off their web site:

“For years, Colonel Harland Sanders carried the secret formula for his Kentucky Fried Chicken in his head and the spice mixture in his car. Today, the recipe is locked away in a safe in Louisville, Kentucky. Only a handful of people know that multi-million dollar recipe, and each is obligated to strict confidentiality by contract.”

In this case, they may be right. Could they continue to get people to pay franchise fees if the secret was spilled? Or keep someone else from offering franchises with the same recipe?

While I’d like to believe in an “open source” business, I’m still not able to get over my instinct that you can make more money by keeping some things secret.

I can guarantee I’ll be pondering this for a long time however.

11. Where do you see yourself two years from today?

Hmm… well I like to shoot big. So in 2 years I see myself leading a team of copywriters putting out 10-20 letters a month… and hopefully most of those will be for my own products/services.

I also hope to be taking a lot more cruises and other various vacations!

12. Where can people learn more about you?

CopywritingDean.com is where I discuss copywriting, business and life. I have a free split test software that I give away in exchange for an email address. I read all comments left on my blog.

It’s also where you can find out more about my “Sales Boostin’ Services!”

******

If you liked this interview, or if you’d like to read my responses to Stephen’s questions, go to this link now:

==> 12 Questions with Copywriter Ryan Healy

-Ryan M. Healy

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