How to Optimize Your Current Marketing Platforms

Yesterday, an e-commerce client asked how to increase site speed without losing their marketing tracking. Here's our approach. This client is a $100M+ online retailer with a complex channel mix. Thus, they have lots of marketing pixels onsite. Our recommended approach: 1.) Remove libraries and pixels no longer needed. Audit your existing pixels and events. Disable any pixels/events that are no longer needed. Check for errors and fix any broken pixels. 2.) Tag Managers Move all 3rd party javascript (libraries/pixels) into a tag manager. Tools like GTM, Tealium, Adobe Launch benefit primarily help with data governance and standardization. However, tag managers can also minify and cache 3rd party libraries, reducing page load times. Additionally, they often have OOTB capability to set the priority (sequence) of the tags, more on this below. 3.) Server-side tagging Many ad platforms can receive events server-side vs. clientside (through javasript in the browser). Examples include Meta, Google, TikTok. This can take some of the load off the browser. There are good 3rd party tools for this, including Blotout and Elevar. Server-side tracking has the added benefit of restoring signal to the ad platforms. More conversions to the ad platform will result in better optimization and reduced ad spend. 4.) Sequencing Less-important libraries This is a biggie. If pixels aren't required for the page render, have your web-dev team defer them later in the page. This can also be done in the tag manager. Most tag managers load tags asynchronously by default. That means they load in parallel and won't block other resources from loading. Full-service performance optimization tools like Yottaa can automatically sequence the libraries and calls (very good but not cheap). In summary, I'd tackle in this order: - Remove any pixels/libraries you no longer use/need - Move all 3rd party pixels to a tag manager (GTM) - Fix broken pixels - Optimize the load order of the libraries (sequencing) - Setup server-side tracking for ad platforms if available What else would you add? #measure #digitalanalytics #marketinganalytics #ecommerce

Typically, I see growth teams focusing on the biggest funnel drop, but this is usually not the biggest opportunity for growth, and unproductive. Let me explain by going deeper into a more holistic approach to managing growth funnels. Most of the analytics tools available today offer limited funnel metrics: funnel drops and completions. It’s therefore understandable that teams focus on the biggest drop. The truth is - most users won’t complete your funnel anyway. Your product probably wasn’t built for them, there’s no product-market fit, and changing their low intent is unlikely. Optimizing might keep them 1-2 more stages, but they’ll likely churn at the next. Move on! Your best opportunity lies with high-intent users who don’t complete the funnel. They have a good product-market fit and should complete. First identifying this group is crucial to understanding why some don’t succeed. How to identify High-Intent Users: Try changing up your analytics approach, put the dashboards, #correlation, and lengthy #abtesting aside for a minute. Here are a few ways to help you identify your high-intent users. Search for the signals of intent: Shorter time to complete steps, differences in onboarding questions and responses, permissions etc. Group users into segments, such as the marketing received, localizations, user properties, and behavioral groups. Calculate the likelihood of users in a sub-segment completing the funnel. Then, upon aggregating all the sub-segments together, you understand the quality and intent of the segment. Users with the most signals of intent are your high-intent users. Find high-intent users automatically. Consider leveraging a causal model. Loops, for example, automatically identifies high-intent users, by looking at the sub-segments and finding intent signals. It can otherwise be a very manual process when you are limited to funnel drop and completion metrics. How to Identify the Biggest Opportunities: Once you have identified your high-intent users, you need to size the opportunity before starting to form hypotheses. Opportunity size is based on the questions: Assuming this segment completed this step of the funnel, what would be the effect on the total funnel completion rate. Loops automatically presents you the biggest opportunities to improve your funnel. It calculates what would be the impact on the total funnel completion rate, if you improve a specific step of the funnel. Action the Insight: By identifying high-intent users and their pain points and motivations you can better shape the top of the funnel and increase completions. Armed with the confidence and impact insight of your biggest opportunity, you can turn your attention to the specific actions needed for funnel completion, as expected. Remember, most users will drop. Invest your time in identifying and understanding high-intent users. Causal inference models can help you find the answer, with less time, effort, and stress. #productledgrowth #causalml #growth

Ever feel like your Meta Ads just fell off a cliff? You're not alone. Inconsistent performance is a significant pain point for DTC brands and performance marketers. (We've all seen the frustrated posts on Reddit and Slack marketing communities!). So, what can be done? There’s no magic bullet, but creating a monitoring system can help. More so, creating one that mirrors the customer journey. Let me explain. 1. The first step in a customer's journey is the ad impression/view. In Meta's world, this depends on targeting, campaign structure, budget, and technical setup hygiene. While much is written about the first three, technical setup is often surprisingly overlooked. Many accounts we audited had issues such as multiple pixel firings, CAPI issues, or out-of-sync catalogs. These are quick wins, and should be subject to regular monitoring. 2. The second step in the customer journey is clicking on the ad. This is a function of the quality of the ad creative. At the risk of sounding cliché, creative is indeed the new targeting! Consider how your social media consumption habits have changed. Previously, you curated who you followed and received content from them (detailed interests). Now, your Insta feed is more like a hyper-personalized TV – you don't control what it shows, but the algorithm serves up what you like. Similarly, you have to use an ad creative that resonates with your intended audience. Key metrics to track include CTR, CPM, CPC at the creative level, and spend distribution across different formats (static, video, carousel). 3. The final step is customer finally reaching the landing page to browsing and complete the purchase. Ads drive traffic, but landing pages make the sale. Monitoring your funnel metrics is crucial. High-quality product images, social proof elements, and a seamless checkout flow convert hard-earned traffic into paying customers. Track metrics such as clicks -> views -> add to cart -> checkout initiation -> purchase consistently. We’ve built these metrics into an intuitive dashboard in the self-serve audit tool we've built. If you're interested in early access or want to know more, feel free to reach out! #MetaAds #DigitalMarketing #DTC #PerformanceMarketing #AdAudits

A lot of brands focus all their energy on the ad—but drop the ball completely in the post-click experience. This is a great way to light your ad spend on fire. To maximize performance and cohesion in the customer journey, you’ll want to use test these three 3 strategies: 1) Build 5-Reasons Why Listicles 2) Create Comparison Articles 3) Correlate Your Upsells To expand on each… 1) Build 5-Reasons Why Listicle You should absolutely test a 5-Reasons Why Listicle after your customer clicks on an ad. This is where the purchase decision gets made. You should serve key information necessary to convince your customers to buy immediately upon landing. Think of it as a PDP masked as an article: You need to enable the person to purchase inside of that article because they are not reading the ‘5 reasons why article’ and then saying, “Oh, I really need to read the PDP now.” 2) Test Comparison Articles This is where you service shoppers a comparison between your product and a popular competitor. When highlighting the key differences, remember that you are creating the shopping moment there and then. Be as informative as possible, covering what might’ve been most vital in a PDP. Don’t make customers read both, or they’ll fall out of the funnel. 3) Correlate your upsells Your upsells should correlate to the primary product flow that originally engaged a customer. Don’t drive customers away by pushing products that don’t meet their preferences. Finally, the hierarchy of upsell products you are promoting matters just as much. Test this order regularly to see which variables create a material change in conversions. I continue to see these crush for brands using FERMAT, and just in general looking across the ecom space. If you want advice on multivariable experimentation, head over to my page and check out my Whiteboard Wednesday video from March 14th! PS: if you have any questions, feel free to drop them in the comments!

You can build all the new things. Do all the latest trends. Try all the growth tactics by the gurus But….if you are missing looking at the journey of how a prospect becomes a customer and how a customer becomes a fan, you are missing the entire point. I made a living on the side for a long time doing one thing for some people: optimizing their funnel. You build an amazing campaign 💪 it has the right message 💭->the right offer 💸->the perfect digital experience 👌-> amazing content throughout 🤩 but you forget to do basic things: Have you tested the handoff to sales and how they take it through to revenue? Does your BDR team know how to use the content or let alone do they even know about what your doing while they do what they do? Have you tested your conversions on the pages to make sure your automations are working? Or worst if your tracking is even tracking? Is your lead routing working? Is the booking page you use in HubSpot working and does it allow for people to book outside one person’s availability? The list goes on. Trust me efficiency in your funnel could be your problem and not necessarily the next big idea.