In my last email, I shared a case study of a language school that can take registrations and payments on its website, but didn’t get many signups.
There were a number of elements in the journey that were confusing, and I pinpointed them in an audit.
After a few rounds of changes and reviews, we managed to straighten the process out so it became a lot clearer for prospective students.
Then I included this sentence:
“And while it’s too early to tell, I’m confident that they’re going to multiply the number of students who register directly.”
I didn’t really like doing it that way, but at the time of writing, there simply wasn’t any real data yet.
Now there is, and you’ll see it below.
The purple line tracks the “old” registrations. In the 14 days prior to the improvements, 7 (unique) people registered. Daily average: 0.5
The blue line tracks registrations after the improvements. In the period of 5-12 February (the area in between the peaks – which are due to testing), 14 people registered. Daily average:2
So with a few fairly simple tweaks, we managed to raise direct registrations by 400%!
When I share posts like this on LinkedIn, I often get a lot of engagement … from consultants and people at marketing agencies. Not from the audience I intend to reach – marketers at schools who could engage me.
Still I think the message bears repeating more often than I usually do. And since you’re on my newsletter, I believe you may be a little more open to hearing it.
Achieving results is often not about doing more or spending more, but about knowing where the bottlenecks are and being methodical about fixing them.
Don’t get me wrong, it isn’t always the website or the sign-up process, as it was in this example.
– Perhaps your advertising isn’t showing up to the right people
– Your messaging might not be compelling enough
– There could be an affordability issue
– And lots more.
But it pays to always be looking for what’s the most important thing for you to improve on right now, rather than what vendors and even fellow marketers are talking about at events or on LinkedIn.
Yet figuring out what to prioritise can be painful and far from obvious. It’s natural to get attached to your past work. I know I do. And colleagues may be more willing to act on the advice of an external expert than on what a colleague says, even if it’s the same thing.
If you’d like an outside eye, you can engage me for a website + campaign audit.
While I can’t promise you a 400% improvement, I promise I’ll be candid and crystal clear about what is going to make the most difference for you, and I’ll hang in there with you until you’ve actually made the improvements work.
