We discuss different ways to increase leads on your site through personalization with the Head of Partnerships from Optimonk, Eric Melchor.
Website Personalization is the human-centric approach to CRO that focuses on the customers’ needs first. It is about creating more relevant customer journeys that are unique, remarkable, and meaningful on a personal level. A journey that starts with a personalized welcome message, which is improved by relevant product messaging, and ends with an irresistible offer, tailored to each customer.
In our Personalization Bootcamp, I’ll give you a deep dive into the art and science of website personalization. I’ll show you how to use website personalization to grow your subscriber list, get more leads, and boost the ROI of all your marketing activities – all at the same time!
Transcript
[00:00:00] Track 3: Welcome to the using the Whole Whale podcast, where we learn from leaders about new ideas and digital strategies making a difference in the social impact world. This podcast is a proud production of Whole Whale a B Corp digital Agency. Thank you for joining us. Now let’s go learn something.
[00:00:27] Track 1: This week on the podcast we have Eric Melcor from OptiMonk. And as I understand, OptiMonk helps brands sort of personalize create, custom experiences on this site so that they can, uh, make more relevant content. And he is the partnerships and personalization ambassador. Beyond that, uh, Eric, uh, is big in, uh, European startups as a podcast host.
[00:00:57] He is a self-proclaimed mediocre tennis player and also, uh, passed founded fly movement.org. Uh, a nonprofit focused on, uh, I guess youth health and, and tracking them. And this was based in Texas. So Erica, welcome to the podcast. Thanks for.
[00:01:16] eric_melchor: Hey, George. Pleasure to be here. Thanks for having.
[00:01:20] Yeah. And I will say it was, uh, you know, it’s interesting how various guests find their way here, and in this case, I have to hand it to you. Uh, you wore me down on email.
[00:01:29] email.
[00:01:29] honestly, and the way I’ll say this, the way you did it was very clever because, you know, after a number of these, I’ll just be honest, they get a lot of random, Hey, look at our software.
[00:01:39] George: Look at our software. , you actually did the homework. Listen to a podcast and then ask me, uh, the following
[00:01:45] eric_melchor: following
[00:01:45] George: how does
[00:01:46] eric_melchor: does
[00:01:47] George: moon cut his hair? To which I had to see the answer and it was, he eclipses it. Um, perfect. I mean, it’s just per, I was like, damn it. He has my attention now. Ah, and clearly that’s your job, getting people’s attention and then moving that toward a goal, a conversion.
[00:02:07] Track 1: Can you tell me a little bit. Your work and your approach.
[00:02:13] eric_melchor: Yeah. Well, George, I, I guess a question for you. Have you ever gotten a handwritten letter before?
[00:02:19] George: I have gotten a handwritten letter before from not
[00:02:22] eric_melchor: not
[00:02:22] George: mom, but I have gotten handwritten runs from my mom as well.
[00:02:26] eric_melchor: And it pro, you probably felt delighted, right? You probably, it gave you a sense of importance. Right, that feeling. And so with Opti Monk, uh, we try to give marketers the tools that they need to give that feeling of delightfulness and importance to their website visitors in real time. like you mentioned, we are a website personalization platform, uh, that allows you to create different messages for different segments, and those segments can be. like your v i P donors, maybe they are new visitors to your website who, uh, you know nothing about. Maybe they’re visitors from a specific channel, maybe like a, a volunteer website or maybe somebody who just made a donation. And so what we do is, uh, give marketers the opportunity and the tools. Very easy to do. By the way, it’s mostly a drag and drop interface, and you don’t need to have any coding experience, but to just take a step back and, and, and ask yourself, okay, if I was in this visitor’s shoes and if I was a person that didn’t know about my ngo, what is a good experience for that person? Or if I just made a donation, what would be a. experience for a post donation. and once you have the answers to those questions, then we give you the, uh, the ability to craft that experience, uh, in real time for your website, for those, for your audience, for those visitors.
[00:03:50] Track 1: and I’m curious. We’ll be shifting our, our conversation to how, how we get those conversions and different tactics, uh, for, for doing that. I’m curious though, how, how that’s achieved, given the clamp down on third party cookies and the ability to like, understand who someone is, right? When someone shows up to the site, like, I go there, you don’t know that I am George, you know that I am maybe coming from California because of my IP address.
[00:04:15] What are the ways that I am beginning to customize somebody? Who they are versus what.
[00:04:23] eric_melchor: Yeah. It’s all dependent on the type of browser they use. Um, so it’s, it’s really based on cookies. If they’re using Safari, we will recognize that data for. Unfortunately for maybe just seven days, but if they’re using Google Chrome, then we can actually know who they are and recognize ’em for up to about a year. so it’s dependent on the browser that, the browser that’s somebody using, and it’s all based on cookies.
[00:04:48] Track 1: Gotcha. are, I mean, do you have concerns? We actually just released an episode of how the, you know, cookie apocalypse as we’re joking and how cookies are just gonna get mowed over by updates. You know, obviously we’ve already seen it in Apple and the land of Apple, uh, but they could be coming for browsers like Chrome, you know?
[00:05:10] eric_melchor: How
[00:05:10] How.
[00:05:11] do you view that as, you know, a shift in the landscape of personal.
[00:05:16] landscape, uh, we kind of welcome it because we are investing a lot in zero party data and it’s, it’s really actually, and lemme just take a step back. What is zero party data? Zero party data is the data that’s actually based on directly from your visitor. And so if, if you have somebody that comes to your website, you know nothing about them, maybe you just have like a, a nice message for them that just says, Hey, we wanna make this experience as pleasurable as possible for you, can you just let us know?
[00:05:47] Are you somebody interested in volunteering? Are you an individual donor? Are you maybe a corporate donor or something else? And once they, they make an answer, then you already know a little bit about that person. and you could probably take ’em to the part of the website that’s most valuable to them. But you can also, once they made that answer, you kind of tag them and then put them into a segment that can also be carried over to your email marketing programs and initiatives as well. And so a lot of our, the brands who use Opti Monk really take advantage of our, um, what we call conversational message. And you know this, like I mentioned there, there’s different ways to start that conversation, but one of the most popular ways is just have a message that appears, uh, when somebody goes on your website, and again, it’s asking. What are you interested in? You know, can you tell us who you are? You know, it’s, it’s, it’s basically like a welcome and, and really trying to hold that person’s hand and just take ’em to the part of the website that makes sense for them. And so we’re not relying too much on. level data because a lot of this shift has been over towards how do you start that conversation? How do you get that engagement? How do you start those micro engagements so where you can start letting the person know that you’re there to educate them, provide value, and ho their hand?
[00:07:06] And that’s where we’re seeing a shift toward a lot of the top e-commerce brands. Start doing that at the very beginning,
[00:07:13] Track 1: Gotcha. So it’s a chat interface or it’s a popup, or it’s a form somewhere that says, what are you up to?
[00:07:21] eric_melchor: Yeah. Yeah. And I think there’s a big opportunity for NGOs because NGOs, in my opinion, most of them are focused on that. Do donate now button. think 99% of NGOs you go to, that’s the main call to action. It’s donate now and you really have to look for, uh, where to sign up for the newsletter. I, I mean, I was doing a little bit of research this morning, for example, world Wildlife Dot. Had a hard time finding out where to subscribe to. The newsletters. You gotta go at the very bottom and there’s like a little text link that says subscribe. Same thing with charity water.org and another, uh, NGO called st baldricks.org. Right? It’s like they’re hiding it. For some reason, they’re hiding that, that part of what could be a really good experience because not everybody just like in the, in the for-profit. everybody is purchase ready. And when it comes to NGOs, not everybody is ready to make a donation right there and then. so I think they’re missing out on the opportunity to collect or basically try to get somebody’s email so you can continue that conversation, tell them your story, tell them more about you, so when they are ready to make a donation, they can go back to your website and do just that.
[00:08:32] So it it. there’s very easy things that NGOs can do now to actually grow their subscriber list. Uh, and I could share a few of those, you know, with you during our conversation.
[00:08:43] Track 1: Well, that’s great. I think we are on the same team when it comes to believing that the, the, the smartest ask the lowest friction, highest yield play for social impact organizations. is around getting that email, that permission to communicate, to borrow from Seth Code. And that permission to communicate list is that first and most important asset because again, not just for the purposes of donation, but for awareness, identity alignment, for social change, you need that communication bridge.
[00:09:19] And it’s one that you own, you know, as, uh, as far as it goes. You don’t own that Twitter. , you don’t own that LinkedIn, like you don’t own anything built on somebody else’s.
[00:09:35] eric_melchor: Yeah. Do you know how powerful that email is? And so years ago, God, it’s been almost 10 years, but I created an NGO back in Houston, uh, and I ran it for five years. Ended it in 2018, and, um, when I ended it, I stopped sending out emails or updates about the initiative. I, I went back into MailChimp and I looked at my list and I, I was doing something that was related to, to that NGO years ago, and I thought it’d be great to just kind of let people know what I was doing. I sent in a campaign out, literally four weeks ago to that list that I have not communicated with in over five years, and my open rate was above 30. And so it is so powerful where just like you said, it’s like those people, they’re not necessarily following you on Instagram or maybe Twitter or TikTok, or maybe they are, but whatever you own that, that is like an asset that even if you don’t use it, you know, on a consistent basis, you should.
[00:10:36] You definitely should, over time you could actually send out a campaign with a thoughtful headline, you know, good educational, valuable content, and you’re, you’re still gonna get eyeballs. So it’s very important. It’s the, it’s the most important thing you can do, as you said.
[00:10:54] All right, So
[00:10:55] let’s jump into it. Uh, and maybe we can go
[00:10:58] can
[00:10:58] back and forth with ideas. Cause I really wanted to, to generate a little bit of value for the folks listening in terms of what they should be doing. And I love talking about this in q1, where you should be building your list, you know? Planting, planting the seeds before the tree, digging the well before you’re thirsty.
[00:11:16] Track 1: Insert metaphor here for here. Give me one of your more clever ideas for acquiring emails as a social impact organization. What do you got?
[00:11:28] eric_melchor: Yeah, I mean, this one, this one to me is a no-brainer, and it’s called, we call it sort of an exit intent popup. so e-commerce brands use this. If somebody’s trying to leave the website and maybe they had something in their cart and it’s like a little popup message that reminds them, Hey, you know, these, these are the items that are in your shopping cart, or, Hey, before you leave, you know, here’s like a 10, 10% off coupon or something. But if you’re a, a nonprofit, can use the same tactic. I mean, anybody. When they leave your website or they hit the uh, uh, the back button on the brows button, uh, just have like a little popup message that just says, Hey, do you wanna stay in the know and get our emails? And just have that little message there, appear when they are trying to leave your website.
[00:12:13] And we see on average that that will give you email subscribers anywhere in the range of eight to 12%, which is actually much higher than trying to get somebody’s email at the very. When you really don’t know anything about them and they haven’t even started browsing your website or clicking around. Um, so that’s like one thing that I would highly recommend that NGOs start testing or experimenting with.
[00:12:38] Track 1: and I love the fact that you put the caveat exit intent. Uh, I get very nervous when I see nonprofits throwing a popup in the, uh, time to first screen and interrupting the content, uh, layout and risking content layout shifts of the site load, which is a fancy way of saying it. Don’t. Piss off Google with your pop-ups cuz you’ll be hurting more than you are helping.
[00:13:03] So yeah, I’m, uh, I’m on board with the exit 10.
[00:13:06] eric_melchor: Yeah. Yeah, absolutely. Um, another idea,
[00:13:11] Track 1: Go. Oh yeah. What I.
[00:13:12] eric_melchor: Okay, another idea. And I’m on, I’m, I’m on the same page with you. I do not wanna show any popups during this entire experience what, what we have in this, in, in, in, in this platform. And I’m sure other platforms have the same thing as, as what we call a teaser. And a teaser is just like a little message that can fit like in the lower left-hand corner of your website.
[00:13:33] And it’s like a little message that just says, Hey, get our emails to stay in the know, you know? And it. It doesn’t, it doesn’t really stand out, but it does catch attention. Um, and if somebody wants to, if somebody’s curious and they wanna click on that to see more information than they can, and once it’s clicked on, then obviously, uh, like a pop-up would appear and it says, you know, you know, get our newsletters to stay in the know.
[00:13:59] Please enter your name and email address right there. So that’s probably the second thing that I would recommend. After the x and intent popup message,
[00:14:08] George: I like it. Uh, well, I think I like it. I want to, I wanna see it, see it in
[00:14:12] eric_melchor: For
[00:14:12] George: know, it, I feel like there can be a bit of a, , um, malaise that sits in with layout based email asks, right? They’re like, oh, just stick it in your foot or stick it in your head or stick it in the sidebar. You know, that that sort of basic block and tackle of like, are, is it around there?
[00:14:28] And then like, eventually the, the person that’s amazing, they can just sort of have screen blindness to these things. Uh, and so, you know, I feel like some things can get lost.
[00:14:36] eric_melchor: screen.
[00:14:37] George: Um one I really like that I kind of go to is, uh, uh, various ideas framed around a content locker being. Here is a bit of information for free, but here is the entire list of 101 dma, and if you want the entire list of 101 DMA, hand over your email and we will give it to you right here.
[00:14:57] eric_melchor: email. Yeah, I, I mean if that works, then great. You can probably, you know, continue using that. I didn’t think of that, of that one for NGOs. Um, but what’s important though, I think no matter what is that you have the right message for the right target, right? And so if you have specific landing pages and you know that, hey, on these landing pages, uh, it’s probably a good opportunity to try and capture somebody’s email address for somebody who is not yet ready to make a donation. but we don’t wanna lose them. Um, and so on those specific pages, then you. know, present some sort of content, that could be very appealing, such as, hey, if you wanna get the a hundred list of 101 dalmatians, you know, sign up here and we’ll, we’ll get it to you.
[00:15:41] So I think there’s key landing pages that maybe are appropriate for that.
[00:15:45] Track 1: All right. What else?
[00:15:47] eric_melchor: Um, well, I mean, to be honest, I mean, those are the two tactics that I would try. First obviously donate. Now is, is the main call to action for NGOs, but the exit intent, the teaser pop up, and then the right message will be the other thing that I think is very, very, uh, important and the right message. If an NGO is doing any sort of like paid me to advertising maybe on Facebook ads, and so you have traffic come into your website and you. these people never heard of you and they didn’t come in through, you know, organically, but they came in through a paid ad. Then on that landing page would be another opportunity to where you could have very targeted messaging for those visitors dependent on the ad. And so if that ad. That messaging that was on the ad itself make it very appealing and make sure that it’s, it’s the same sort of messaging or value proposition that’s on the headline of that landing page. And I think once you have that, then it’s, it’s, it’s much easier to try and get the, um, the email, uh, the email ask, uh, once you have your ad aligned with your landing page headline. And so that would, that would be the third tactic
[00:17:00] Track 1: I’m glad you mentioned the value proposition because along the way you, you mentioned you, you have a new, uh, a newsletter pop up saying like, get the newsletter from us. And that’s one of those like, sort of like triggering things for me when I see an organization trying to make their unique selling proposition, Hey, their user.
[00:17:20] George: Would you like another email in your in. , do you know? Are people, if you walk around being like, you know what? Do you need me to hit you in the hand with a hammer? Cuz I have one. I’ll do it.
[00:17:32] You need another email in your inbox?
[00:17:33] eric_melchor: inbox.
[00:17:34] George: So I like that you said value proposition. Can you tell me
[00:17:39] eric_melchor: compensation about
[00:17:41] George: approach?
[00:17:41] Anything maybe the product does, or what you’ve seen for message testing
[00:17:45] eric_melchor: investing
[00:17:46] George: getting away from? I will say the dreaded, like you need another.
[00:17:51] eric_melchor: Yeah. Um, humanizing the copy, the brands that we work with, those that tend to have the higher conversion rates in terms of getting email subscribers are the ones where the copy is, uh, is humanized.
[00:18:06] And what I mean by that, like off the top of my head, I think really good emails.com, they’ve gotta. And it says something like, hey, sorry to be an AHO and interrupt your experience here, you know, But I mean, it’s just, it’s just a really good copy that captures your attention you end up reading the entire message and, uh, you know, it’s got this, it’s got this humorous component, human touch, you know, that it wasn’t like standard copy and paste corporate type messaging.
[00:18:36] So if you can do anything. Maybe could put a, make somebody laugh and, uh, you know, that, oh wow, this person, you know, or this organization, uh, they’re trying to, you know, human humanize a this approach, this human-centric approach, uh, that works well too.
[00:18:55] Track 1: There’s a term in, in marketing, communications and copywriting. Um, grabbing a, a swipe file and creating a swipe file. And this is just a, a funny way of saying like, , you should go around and shop for anytime you see something like that, something clever, a good framing in and around, adjacent or even not adjacent communication and, and, and save it and sort of prime your mind with ways of doing that because I think you’re, you’re right, you need to have something that breaks the third wall.
[00:19:29] Something that stops the normal train. Consume and move. Uh, and so, you know, I dare say interrupt, but rather entertain is a, a good framing and a good approach. And, and too often just because a nonprofit works on serious issues doesn’t mean they always need to be serious. There, there’s a line there. Um, and I think it’s possible to skate on both sides.
[00:19:59] and you know, your point, I don’t know, would work on a, you know, world animal protection being like, sorry to f and interrupt here. You know, we were busy with this tiger, but get on this email. Uh, you know, you wanna be careful. But, uh, when it comes to, when it comes to AB testing though, because we’re gonna come up with a clever idea.
[00:20:18] Cool. Does it work? Can you tell me a bit about your approach to AB testing messages?
[00:20:26] eric_melchor: Yeah, I mean, that’s what we recommend for all brands to do. It’s very easy, e very easy to do within our platform. Uh, I’m not sure if you knew this, George, but Google is suning Optimizly. I think
[00:20:38] George: Ah, don’t
[00:20:39] Track 1: get me started on the number of things. Google is sunset. That has me infuriated number one, universal analytics, number two. Is optimized like number three is just the fact that they’re rebranding Data Studio as Looker, cuz they got Looker and now they’re just getting rid of Data Studio. But it’s like pretty much the same functionality.
[00:20:56] But I’m, you know what, Google, just stop it.
[00:21:00] eric_melchor: Yeah. It, yeah.
[00:21:02] George: Rant.
[00:21:02] Track 1: End. Rant. Continue.
[00:21:05] Before I interrupted.
[00:21:06] eric_melchor: Yeah, but that, that’s the main thing that you should be testing. You could test headlines, you know, with AB testing. With the messaging, like for popups, asking for an email subscriber. You can test different popups that have a different image, different copy, or maybe even the different popup itself, maybe an exit and 10 popup versus another side message popup.
[00:21:24] There’s all kinds of ab testing that you can do within our platform, and, uh, you can see, you know, the results in real time also with the degree of statistical. Uh, significance as well. You know, if it’s at least 90% or better, we show that too. Um, as as well. But, uh, the humorous approach, I mean, how did I get your attention, George?
[00:21:45] You know, y I sent an email and I don’t think I got a response and I followed up with, uh, with the joke, right? And so it works if that is your person. You know, if that is, if you’re being authentic and you’re being genuine, it works, right? And so if you’re an, or if you’re an organization and you’re very professional and very corporate, like it’s probably not gonna work If you, you tr first of all, it’s not even gonna get past compliance and legal.
[00:22:14] They’re not , they’re not even gonna allow that. But it really works. If that is your personality type, and I, I would say that I’m able to get a response back to more than 90% of people that who don’t know who I am, but I end up sending them, you know, a code email or something, and I add a touch of humor, because. people under, people wanna work with people they like. And if you can make somebody laugh, then you’re, that’s, that’s half the battle already. They’re like, oh wow. You know, this guy put a smile on my face. And it’s the same thing works with, we’re trying to get somebody’s email, maybe even trying to get somebody to donate.
[00:22:51] Right. And it’s engaging, it’s like a fun micro engagement that I don’t see brands take advantage of, enough in this day. And.
[00:23:03] Track 1: Well, certainly in, in your approach, like look, you’re, you are proof, proof to that statement right now, right? You got through I’d say a fairly high barrier of me ignoring the heck out of everything that comes in, uh, to my attention, the. Point though also as, as a tactic, you know, if you are doing that type of cold outreach, which, you know, fundraisers and communications folks do, when you’re trying to get the attention of the c s r director at so-and-so, when you’re trying to get Yeah, just a conversation at maybe the, the, the grant manager at what you callit trust, I think going back to what is your value proposition and how are you positioning who you are and what it is like humor has.
[00:23:47] Um, and it communicates more than maybe we, we realize what I enjoy talking with this person. Does this person both see the cause, see the issue, see the world. And you know, how, you know, how humans really do orient around humor. And I think is, is undersold in, in what I see around social impact communication and certainly just as a tactic.
[00:24:09] I think there’s a lot to borrow. I think there’s a lot to borrow here from, you know, I’ll, I’ll see this, this tactic more from, you know, folks that are, we’ll call it SMILE dialing and emailing
[00:24:21] George: for,
[00:24:22] Track 1: for attention, but there’s a lot I think nonprofits could borrow. What do you think about that?
[00:24:28] eric_melchor: Absolutely. Um, when I was at Bonura and people would come on board for like a free trial, you know, all of us, we would try to send, uh, a personal video. And I found that once I started telling people jokes, specifically like cheesy dad jokes, like, Hey, when does a joke become a dad joke? When it becomes apparent, 20% of people would respond with a video of their own and tell me a dad. You know, and , it just, it just really, it just really broke down Barriers started the conversation and the conversion rates compared to just sending anybody a personal video and just saying, Hey, hi, welcome to have you on board. Um, it blew those, you know, through the roof. I mean, significantly higher when you, when you try to add humor.
[00:25:14] And I do the same thing on LinkedIn too. When I connect with somebody and it’s somebody that I do wanna engage with, you know, if I just send them, uh, a really nice message, even with a little dad joke or whatever. I actually get a lot of responses back. People are sending me jokes as well. So, uh, I think it, if you could put a smile on somebody’s face, um, it just really opens the door for further communication, just as it did with you, you and myself here. Um, and that kind of clever, that kind of humorous approach. Really works well for any sort of organization that is trying to start that conversation, that initial conversation, uh, whether it be a customer, a potential donor, maybe somebody that they just wanna continue that communication with in the form of a newsletter or email.
[00:25:57] And it works, you know, it, it works. It’s been working for me over the past three, four years. And, uh, I’ve had nothing but great, you know, great results from it and created lots of different friendships, relationships, and contacts, uh, because of that.
[00:26:14] Well there you have, we had, we had to get you to minute 26 of this podcast.
[00:26:18] podcast.
[00:26:19] but there it is. There’s the gem for you. You can stop listening. Dad jokes. Dad jokes convert. Simply put, you could stop listening now, or maybe there’s more, but there’s probably not, uh, I, you’re, you’re just talking to somebody who has taken great pride in the fact that we index, I think,
[00:26:35] think.
[00:26:35] positions, whatever, one, two, or three in the top, top few for non-profit jokes.
[00:26:42] George: Um, because I thought it was funny and I just put a bunch of dad jokes as non-profit. Simply because, uh, simply because, but getting back to
[00:26:52] eric_melchor: getting
[00:26:52] George: idea of AB testing, I think this is critical, uh, because just setting it and forgetting it,
[00:26:57] eric_melchor: it,
[00:26:57] George: uh, is betraying the point of doing the work in the first place. Do you have any stories or anecdotes or testimonies of being like, you know, I did
[00:27:07] eric_melchor: I
[00:27:07] George: thing and then suddenly the conversion rate doubled.
[00:27:10] eric_melchor: Right? That dream of like two x it, because here’s the power. and I don’t think we, we get it.
[00:27:16] it.
[00:27:16] When you double a conversion rate, you have doubled your effective ad spend. You have doubled the efficacy of all of the hours of work you put into writing content. You’ve doubled the downstream net income that comes from the value per email.
[00:27:35] Track 1: It, it is so. and it takes sort of so little time, but it is so overlooked and I like, I try to frame it in different ways, but do you have, what is your stump speech on this? Do you have any stories?
[00:27:47] eric_melchor: Yeah. Uh, I remember when, again, back to the personal video and welcoming somebody that, that was coming for free trial for Bonura. I, um, I started experimenting with after I said the dad joke, right, where we could tell if it was like a SaaS company or if it was an ngo. Or if it was an e-commerce, uh, company, uh, or if it was like an agency or something else. if we were, if we knew that information, um, we would see it before we would send out the video. And what I would do is the call to action would be specifically for. That specific industry. And we had case studies. So for example, uh, if you were an agency, we had case studies about agency owners who started using bargi and they were able to get more clients and more demo calls, uh, because they were sending out personal videos if you were in the education space.
[00:28:42] We had case study on a university that started using uro and uh, they saw that application rates started. Went up like 25% because they were sending out personal videos to potential new students, uh, at the university. And so once I started including a specific call to action that was tied to that industry in the, in the video that I was sending out. the conversion rates, but more than double, I mean, we were seeing clickthrough rates go from, on average, from like 15% to like over 35, 40 5%. And we knew that we had a winner right there just because we recognized who they were. and once we knew, were able to recognize who they were, then, you know, we could insert content that was most appealing for them.
[00:29:26] In the case of a. Right. AB testing, you know, different headlines or different value propositions for the different, uh, visitors that are coming in from different segments. And so with a platform, with the personalization platform, it should have the ability to trigger a different headline, a different copy, a different image, or a different graphic.
[00:29:50] Based on the source. So if you want to, if you’re doing, you know, a lot of visitors, you have a lot of visitors from Instagram or maybe Facebook, you can actually show them a different message, um, on that landing page. But even better do an AB test where you have two different messages trying to appeal to visitor visitors.
[00:30:08] Or maybe you don’t even want to a ab test the headline. Maybe you just have a regular experience. But for 50% of the visitor, visitor. you’re asking them a survey. And on that survey you have a few questions that you’re asking them so you can do different things, um, uh, based on the source of where they’re coming from. Um, also, you know, based on, um, Uh, the type of visitor. So maybe it’s a returning visitor, maybe it’s a v i p customer. You already have them in your C R M and you already know who they are. and then also, you know, new visitors as well. You can also ab Tess, um, with those visitors as well, so starting to get carried off there.
[00:30:46] But yeah, it’s a fun approach. I always, my, my philosophy is you can’t really call yourself a marketer if you don’t do AP testing. Point, point, break.
[00:30:56] Track 1: Well, you can call yourself whatever you want. Can’t call yourself a good marketer.
[00:31:00] eric_melchor: Yeah.
[00:31:01] Track 1: Uh, I think also with, with nonprofits, they have access to other other means, including now limited to the Google Ad Grant, which is 10 K a month in kind of search advertising. now you can tune and fix all day on the top of that funnel and get, you know, after a certain point diminishing returns on, on that traffic.
[00:31:21] But looking at the landing pages, looking at what you do with that traffic once it’s on your site, like you can then look down the marketing funnel and then remember when you get those improvements, it magnifies the value of that attention because you’re converting it, turning it into the permission to talk to somebody.
[00:31:39] But it’s only through that, that activity. Of AB testing.
[00:31:43] George: Alright.
[00:31:44] eric_melchor: Yep.
[00:31:44] George: Yeah.
[00:31:45] eric_melchor: bringing back memories. I remember when I started my nonprofit, I didn’t find out about that program till like over a year. And when
[00:31:51] George: Oh gosh.
[00:31:52] eric_melchor: like, why didn’t anybody tell me about this? You know? Yeah.
[00:31:58] Track 1: Well, I mean, whole whale. We have, uh, free resources on how to set that grant up to maximize it and what you can get out of it. We spend a lot of time trying to give away that information. Um, we even have a, a trained cohort coming up where, um, you know, that. Nonprofits limited. 25 of ’em can, uh, can be a part of it, uh, because it’s such a powerful tool.
[00:32:19] But it’s also, you know, it, it’s important because all that glitters is in gold. There’s a diminishing return after maximizing it, and then it’s just about managing it efficiently for, uh, what it’s good for. So before you run off, if you’ve never heard of this before, be like, oh my gosh, I’m gonna start a nonprofit just to get this grant and I’m gonna take over the world.
[00:32:36] Like, read the article first.
[00:32:38] eric_melchor: yeah. Yeah, absolutely.
[00:32:41] Alright, Eric, anything else that you wanna leave with our audience as a, a tip or guidance
[00:32:47] Guidance?
[00:32:48] on the upside of personalization?
[00:32:51] Yeah. Website personalization is a bit like Google Analytics and everybody thinks that, oh, I know how to use Google Analytics because they figured out, figured out how to create an account. And get it working. Um, but the thing is, is that you really want to try to go to. Get as much education as you can.
[00:33:08] Maybe go to our workshop. We have free workshops, free website, personalization boot camps. I actually conduct those and we walk you through our process we actually show you a lot of, uh, the best practices that top companies do, small and mid-size organizations on how they use website personalization.
[00:33:27] And we provide free resources along with like a checklist. And based on that checklist, you actually will uncover, um, top ideas and experiments that you can do that are going to give you the biggest ROI based off the reach, the impact, and um, the expected effort. And so once you have that, then you have an idea in terms of what should be the priorities of what I should focus on next.
[00:33:51] And then we also have like playbooks and how you can implement those for, uh, for your website. So, um, that URL. Optum munk.com/bootcamp and that that’s the what I highly recommend. That if you wanna learn more about website personalization, then check that out.
[00:34:08] George: Well, we normally end our show with rapid fire. I’m going to cherry pick some out of there because typically we’re talking to non-profit leaders and focused conversations. But I, I’m gonna throw some random questions at you. Uh, please keep your answers super short and here we go.
[00:34:23] eric_melchor: Okay.
[00:34:23] George: is one tech tool that you have started using in the past year?
[00:34:27] Track 1: We cannot say optimum. What is it?
[00:34:30] eric_melchor: One tab.
[00:34:31] Track 1: One tab?
[00:34:32] eric_melchor: Yeah. Have you heard of this, George?
[00:34:35] Track 1: No. What?
[00:34:36] eric_melchor: No. So, you know, every marketer has like 50 or 60 tabs open and it makes your website, you know, your, your computer run slow anyway. Um, Uh, for, it’s for Google Chrome and you can use it in basically just kind of hides and, and saves in the back, keeps it, keeps it in the back, all those tabs and you can very quickly, uh, find them.
[00:34:57] But it just saves a lot of me memory. Um, you know, while you’re using Chrome and you don’t have to have 50 tabs open, you can just have one or two. It’s called Onet tab.
[00:35:07] Track 1: what is one tech Dragon Tech problem issue that you are currently battling with?
[00:35:13] eric_melchor: Uh, text Expander. This is another third party tool. Um, it’s a great tool that allows you to just to type a few different keys in and it’ll auto-populate the rest of the message.
[00:35:23] George: this a G
[00:35:23] Track 1: P T three game?
[00:35:25] eric_melchor: no, the problem that I found out is that if you have LinkedIn open at the same time, LinkedIn, um, thanks that you’re using it as sort of an automation tool to try and connect with people. Autom messages people on LinkedIn. And so I actually have my LinkedIn account like, like pause for like 24 hours because of this thing. so that’s the thing that I’m currently battling. It’s called Text Expander. It’s a good tool but just can’t have LinkedIn open or can’t have it open. When you’re using LinkedIn,
[00:35:57] Track 1: Okay. Uh, what advice did your parents give you that you either followed or didn’t?
[00:36:03] eric_melchor: uh, I would say the advice, it was not so much like words, the advice, but more of actions and, uh, my dad, when we were kids, he had this like mini Mitsubishi truck and I remember the windshield wipers and stop working and he never replaced them. And so it’d be like raining and he would, you know, be trying to drive out there in the middle of the night. Couldn’t see. Couldn’t see. And I’ve always just, it’s not necessarily advice, but it’s one of those things that you learn from and you, you learn like what not to do as a parent. And now that I’m a parent, it’s like that’s something, you know, stupid things like that I would never do.
[00:36:47] Track 1: Who is the most important mentor that you’ve had, and how did you come across?
[00:36:52] eric_melchor: Oh, uh, my most important mentor would be secondary mentors. And so that’s just a lot of different books, everything from, oh God, Napoleon, to, uh, God, I mean even, even and, and different coaches like Pat Summit, Vince Lombardi, um, did a lot of reading when I was younger. I just didn’t really have a lot of access to good mentors, um, or people in my family. Um, you know, I’m first college graduate in my family, so, uh, secondary mentors were just a lot of books that I, that I read so many
[00:37:30] Track 1: What is something you think you should stop?
[00:37:37] eric_melchor: mm. You know, I’ve, I’m really happy with my life right now and the person that I am, the parent that I am, the father, that I am, the husband that I am. I think of one thing that comes to mind is, um, I haven’t written any handwritten letters to my family, I think in over a year. And so that’s something that I should start doing, but that’s like the first thing that comes to mind. oh, I know what I should stop doing. Eating, eating candy and junk food when I go to. It’s 10:00 PM I go to bed and I go grab some, a candy bar, and I’m eating that. That’s, that’s what I should stop doing.
[00:38:11] Track 1: Yeah, you gotta put the Gremlin law into effect. No feeding after a certain period of time.
[00:38:15] eric_melchor: Yeah. Yeah. My wife is, uh, to blame for that one.
[00:38:19] Track 1: Well,
