Sunday, July 31, 2016
CardioBrief: Eminence-Based Medicine and Cardiac Surgery
Saturday, July 30, 2016
The Costs Of The Pulse Nightclub Shooting
Researchers are taking a look at the economic costs of shooting in the Orlando nightclub. Meanwhile, those affected personally are fretting about their bills.
Friday, July 29, 2016
3 Tips to Improve Marketing Accountability
Marketing accountability can be a challenging endeavor – and conquest-for organizations. While it can be incredibly exciting for an organization to make the decision to introduce technology platforms to assist in the improvement of marketing accountability, it's critical to understand the management and measurement implications that will support success.
Even when an organization has processes in place to leverage technologies, refinement and optimization strategies must continually evolve in tandem with marketing goals.
Whether you're a marketing leader or a boots-on-the-ground pro managing marketing technology daily, here are some key considerations to enhance your marketing accountability:
1. Position your marketing for programmatic success. To employ a necessary cliché, it has to be said that programmatic marketing and advertising is the wave of the future. According to eMarketer, programmatic digital display ad spending is projected to reach $26.78 billion by 2017. That's up from only $10.32 billion in 2014. This means that marketing professionals and hiring managers should consider programmatic knowledge a core skillset. That requires an organizational commitment to the development of programmatic thought leadership and marketing application.
You don't want to miss out on the opportunity to monetize core inventory. The entire programmatic category is seeing increased spending across the board due to its predictive yield and ROI for marketers and publishers alike, not to mention easy insertion processes and lower barriers to entry for most advertisers.
2. Develop data “Dos” and “Don'ts” that support meaningful marketing. You need to encourage your customers and the modern marketing community to “Think beyond the transaction.” In other words, consider the treasure trove of data available to you that can be leveraged to create rich, meaningful buyer profiles that help you better target, as well as understand the attributes of your ideal customer. Invest your time and team resources into a strategic blueprint of data “Dos” and “Don't's” relevant to your business goals, and consider the benefits of implementing a data management platform (DMP) to support your strategic goals.
Organizations previously focused on their known marketing channels-for example email data stored in a familiar place: CRM systems. But now the focus has shifted to anonymous channels. Offline and online data-or known and unknown-is important.
Presenting valuable and compelling offers hinges on the ability to develop creative and content that aligns with audience browsing habits and patterns. All of this insight needs to be matched with channel insight to ensure relevance and maximize the interaction, and the DMP helps marketers achieve that.
3. Test your tech stack accordingly. To ensure that you're maximizing your budgets and resources from an investment perspective, consider which tools will help you achieve your goals and position your measurement strategy for success, as well as the technologies that will support your existing technology infrastructure. The DMP can collect rich behavior data and attributes such as website actions, product engagements, or demographic information. From there, it can pass that data into a cross-channel marketing solution to build a more comprehensive, actionable customer profile to inform that holy-grail customer experience previously discussed.
Ready to seize the opportunity to reinvent your marketing function as a core part of your company's revenue engine? For more insights on how to maximize your data and accountability strategies, Download The Guide to Advertising Accountability.
Online Marketing News: Critical Personalization, Social Strategy Research & Marketers on Reddit
Why Creating a Personal Online Experience for Your Visitors Is Critical [Infographic]
Did you know that 87% of companies that have implemented web personalization have seen an increased return in key metrics? There is certainly a strong case to create a personal experience for visitors to your website or blog. This handy infographic explains why one size doesn't always fit all. MarketingProfs
What 51 Million Pieces of Content Say About Your Social Media Marketing Strategy [NEW RESEARCH]
TrackMaven analyses "the social media content from over 40,000 companies across 130 major industries on four major social networks -Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and LinkedIn - to provide businesses with relevant benchmarks for social media audience size, posting frequency, and engagement at an industry-specific level" in this new report. TrackMaven
Reddit Intros New Ad Offering, 'Grows Up' and Says It Can Be as Big as Facebook
Reddit announced that they're allowing marketers to sponsor user posts on the popular social platform. AdAge reports "On August 4, Reddit will debut a new ad offering called Promoted User Posts, which will give marketers the ability to sponsor user generated posts on Reddit's platform." While the benefits to the users are unclear, this could make huge headway for influencer marketers and consumer brands trying to reach a tough-to-reach audience. AdAge
Google launches imported call conversions
Google is now allowing advertisers using their AdWords platform to import call data, so they can better attribute leads and revenue driven by their ads and connect that to their return on ad spend. This has been available in a rudimentary form previously, but this new ability will step up visibility into ROI and user behavior. ClickZ
Spotify Is Now Letting Brands Target Listeners Worldwide via Their Playlists
Last week, Spotify announced that the music streaming service will be offering programmatic advertising to its user base for marketers, with targeting based on demographics like age, gender, location and listening habits like playlist and genres. AdWeek
Google rolls out expanded text ads, device bid adjustments & responsive ads for native in AdWords
According to Search Engine Land, "Google has officially launched expanded text ads. The extra-long ads with double headlines began rolling out across devices Tuesday morning." Google is also now allowing advertisers to start setting base bid adjustments by device, and announced the upcoming responsive display ads that will be served across the GDN. Search Engine Land
Facebook Reports Seeing 2 Billion Searches Daily
MediaPost reports that on Wwednesday, Mark Zuckerberg said that on Facebook, "people are doing more than 2 billion searches a day between looking up people, businesses, and other things that they care about ... One of the big growing use cases that we're investing a lot in is looking up the content in the ecosystem, and that is an area that we're very excited about, which helps people find more content." MediaPost
ACSI report: Customer satisfaction increases for e-business despite dips in social media
The American Customer Satisfaction Index has released their findings on how social media, search engines and news websites have impacted consumer perceptions of e-businesses. While satisfaction with e-businesses is continuing to improve, satisfaction on social media -- attributed in part to the rise of social customer service -- has dropped. Marketing Land
Financial Times: People find mobile ads 'intrusive' and 'distracting'
Financial Times released findings from a study of 1,300 readers, of which Digiday reports: "Half of respondents to a survey the FT conducted with Quantcast said mobile ads are more intrusive than desktop, although 37 percent of them said they'd be more influenced if the mobile ads they saw were more creative." Digiday
What were your top online marketing news stories this week?
I'll be back in two weeks with more digital marketing news! The lovely and talented Ashley Zeckman will be filling my spot on camera and on the blog next week with the latest and greatest in the world of digital marketing.
The post Online Marketing News: Critical Personalization, Social Strategy Research & Marketers on Reddit appeared first on Online Marketing Blog - TopRank®.
Google revenues climb 21 percent to $21.5 billion, powered by mobile
Please visit Marketing Land for the full article.
Thursday, July 28, 2016
DNC: Pro-Life Dems Want More Inclusion
Apple sells 1,000,000,000th iPhone but Samsung gains market share
Please visit Marketing Land for the full article.
Doctors Need A New Skill Set For This Opioid Abuse Treatment
Practicing surgery on a piece of pork - that's how some doctors are learning to implant a new drug that curbs opioid cravings. It's not a skill set typically used in addiction medicine.
Amazon revenue up 31% YoY for Q2 2016, climbs to $30.4B for the quarter
Please visit Marketing Land for the full article.
What Does 'Mobile-Friendly Content' Really Mean?
If you're a 90's kid, you likely have fond memories of Saved by the Bell and its star, precocious Ferris Bueller type Zack Morris.
You could tell Zack was unique among the students at Bayside High. For one thing, he could stop time and address the camera directly. But more importantly, he had a cellular phone. Sure, it was the size (and probably weight) of a brick. But it wasn't connected to a landline! That big rubberized antenna didn't connect with a corded receiver nearby-it pulled connectivity out of thin air. Magical.
Fast forward to today, and kids who were born after Saved by the Bell went off the air are now entering the workforce. If they met Zack Morris, they would probably make fun of his hair, his clothes, and his giant phone.
Image via YouTube
Mobile phones aren't reserved for cool kids with time-stopping powers anymore. Whether we're old, young, or middle-aged and trapped in a nostalgia loop, smartphones are our constant companions.
It's high time for marketers to catch up with this reality. Over a year ago-an eternity in Internet time-Google announced that more searches take place on mobile devices than on computers. That fact has led Google to include mobile friendliness as part of its ranking algorithm. They know more people are on mobile than ever before. And they are invested in providing a better experience for mobile users.
Being on Google's good side isn't the only advantage to being mobile friendly, though. The only reason Google prioritizes mobile friendliness is that it's what users want. That is, it's what your audience wants.
So, how is your mobile experience? Sure, you already have responsive design, but is your content actually optimized for people to consume it on a mobile device? Or is reading your site more like trying to catch Pokémon on Zack Morris' phone?
Here's how to make different types of content more mobile-friendly.
Optimize Video Content
Video is the rising star of mobile content. Thirty-five percent of viewers watched more video last year than they did the previous year. And 36% said they watched videos that last five minutes or longer every day.
If you want your audience to spend their precious data allotment on your video, it's important to make sure the experience is a pleasant one:
- Use a service that automatically optimizes the tech stuff. Don't fiddle with bitrates and compression on your own. Go third-party with YouTube or Vimeo for a seamless user experience. If you want to host your own video, use Apple's HTTP Live Streaming. It can adjust the video quality on the fly to match bandwidth capability, just like Netflix does.
- Make sure text is readable. Mobile screens are small. Even the big ones are small. Don't make your viewer squint to see the fine print.
- Make it make sense without audio. Eighty-five percent of video on Facebook is played without sound. And even if your viewer has their headphones in, odds are they're in an environment that makes listening difficult. Try watching the video on mute to make sure it still gets your points across.
Optimize Images
Load times are a major factor in someone engaging with your content or bouncing back to the search results. So it's important that your content gets in front of them fast. At the same time, though, visual interest is another major factor in staying versus bouncing. So you have to have both a responsive site and one with visual appeal. To do that, make sure your images will load fast and look great:
- Create images in a pre-optimized format. Use a tool like Canva to create images the right size and resolution for social media and email.
- Use smart compression. You can compress .jpg files a bit without compromising their appearance. But too much compression leads to ugliness. Tinyjpg is a neat tool that compresses by reducing the color depth in ways invisible to the human eye. It's downright spooky.
- Use a tool for responsive resizing. If you have web development wizards on your side, they can help with responsive resizing from the server side. If you have to go it alone, a service like ly Display can do the heavy lifting.
Optimize Text Content
Yes, Virginia, people do still read text on mobile. It's not all videos and images and virtual-reality roller coasters. But they're reading for shorter periods of time and with much greater potential for distraction. So a wall of text will be even less effective than it is on a laptop screen. Here's how to guide a reader through your text content without losing them:
- Serve content in snack-friendly chunks. Think short sentences and short paragraphs, broken up by visual assets, video, embedded content from Vine, Instagram, or Snapchat, or at least white space.
- Use headers for navigation. Make sure readers can skim the post and get a good idea of what you're talking about. Think of the headers as the “trailer” to entice people to take in the whole post.
- Include the main points in your conclusion. If your article starts to look like a time commitment, mobile readers might just swipe to the bottom and see how it wraps up. Make sure the relevant points and call to action are waiting for them.
Mobile Friendly is People Friendly
Regardless of where they encounter your content, you want your audience to have a positive experience reading or watching it. So make sure your brand is putting its best face forward for the 50% who will encounter you first on mobile. Give them responsive video content that makes sense even if their headphones are off. Make sure your images look great, display properly, and load quickly. And make sure your text is snackable, navigable, and skimmable.
What are your top tips for creating mobile-friendly content? What did I miss? Let me know in the comments.
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Hit Gold with Paid Advertising, Understand the Landscape, Solve Problems, and Create Staying Power
It's already the last Thursday of the month, can you believe it? In the past four weeks we have heard from Katrina Munsell, Group Manager, Content Marketing at Microsoft; Lauren Goldstein, VP of Strategy & Partnerships at Babcock Jenkins; Jesse Noyes, Senior Marketing Leader at Kahuna; and Michael Brenner, CEO of Marketing Insider Group. If you haven't listened in, you still have a chance to catch up on this month's Content Pros guests.
Hitting Subscriber Gold with Paid Advertising
Michael Brenner is a strong proponent of using paid advertising to drive your content to broader audiences that may not otherwise go to your site. He is experienced in making a strong case to CMOs that paid is the best use of marketing dollars to elevate your content game.
Using his tips on how to frame the conversation, where to pull money to support the effort, and which platforms to approach first, even the most timid of marketers can change the mind of a stubborn CMO.
On this podcast, Michael shares the following with us:
- How the rise of ad-blockers leads to reframing the conversation around content
- Why a campaign mentality means focusing on short-term and hindering your content growth
- Why measuring the ROI of paid activity means looking more closely at your subscribers
The Staying Power of Email
It's easy to get caught up in focusing your time on learning the newest trends and apps. However, there is a familiar old friend out there sitting idle that, when harnessed correctly, can convert leads for you at a rate higher than just about any of those other social platforms.
Email, the stalwart of internet communication, is that best friend of content that you didn't know you had. Katrina Munsell's approach to crafting the perfect email has led to conversion rates of up to 50% and open metrics that are 11 times over rates from last year.
A few highlights from my conversation with Katrina:
- Why email can be the best vehicle for your content
- How focusing on the design of an email leads to better click through rates
- How multiple clicks can lead higher conversions than single clicks
Content That Solves Problem
There is such a drive to produce content these days that it's easy to get lost in the weeds and focus only on the content at hand with hardly a glance toward what's next. However, in order to really move a business forward, its content needs to serve a purpose and solve a problem.
With over 15 years of experience, Lauren Goldstein has the skills and knowledge to help B2B marketers recalibrate their content to be more effective and engaging. She has helped businesses change the conversation and define the art of what is possible for their business buyer.
Learn from Lauren about:
- How visuals lead to fulfilling content
- Why great content and storytelling means keeping the business outcome front and center in your mind
- Why bringing content to life means having a diverse set of viewpoints on your team
Understanding the Content Landscape
There is a new wave of multi-talented marketers entering the workplace and their arrival is fundamentally changing how marketing departments work from the bottom to the top. This rippling effect is requiring everybody to rethink their approach to marketing and organizational collaboration.
Jesse Noyes has experienced the evolving CMO first-hand, created departments that draw on the multi-disciplinary strengths of his employees, and mapped the origin of content throughout organizations.
Join Jesse to gain insight on:
- Why the diversifying abilities of marketing professionals means a shift in the background and focus of CMOs
- How good organizational structure leads to high velocity content
- How collaboration between marketing operations, analytics, and sales leads to a decrease in departmental contention
Clinton vs. Trump: 18 CROs Tear Down the Highest Stakes Marketing Campaigns in US History
Let's start by getting one thing straight: this is not a political article.
As tempting as it might be to enter the fray… by “tear down” I don't mean a smear campaign, ill-tempered mudslinging or anything quite that provocative.
What I mean is a detailed examination of the two US presidential nominee's online “sales” funnels and their overall presidential marketing tactics.
Why?
Because no matter which side of the political aisle you're on, these could very well be the highest stakes online funnels in the history of the world.
In the wake of Barack Obama's second presidential win, Kyle Rush - former Head of Optimization at Optimizely and now Hillary Clinton's Deputy CTO - pulled back the curtain to reveal how their approach to conversion rate optimization raised a historic and record-breaking $1.1 billion in total funds, $690 million of which “came through our various web properties.”
For anybody doing the math, $690 million is 62.7% of the campaign's total fundraising efforts.
As Kyle himself told me when I asked him about the role CRO plays in Clinton's campaign today:
It's something we are very focused on.
Our teams are data-driven and we act on data. We have run over 100 A/B tests in the past year. Some of the tests resulted in over 200% increases in mission critical metrics.
The monumental role CRO plays in presidential success is why digging into each step of each current candidate's funnels - screen by screen - offers a wealth of insights on how to optimize your online funnels and marketing campaigns.
But first - lest things get bloody - let's set some ground rules.
Ground rules for the teardowns
Here's how this is gonna work.
First, I'll show you a step-by-step, visual walkthrough of the candidates' online funnels: from their homepage, to their pop-up or splash page, to their email signup page, to their donation process.
Each visual will be color coded: green boxes for “The Good”… red boxes for “The Bad”:
After each visual, we'll examine why the color-coded elements work from a CRO perspective (or why they don't).
Third - and this is where things get really amazing - I'll hand the teardown off to 18 of the world's top CRO experts and let them weigh in.
Ready?
Don't have time to read this post?
Donald Trump
Step 1: Homepage
The Good:
Love him or hate him, Donald Trump is a brand. And a massively recognizable one at that.
In contrast to Clinton - who shares her header spotlight with President Obama (see below) - Trump is front and center, taking full advantage of his brand recognition.
Likewise, he's the only candidate with a recognizable and emotionally charged tagline, which he wisely displays prominently: “Make America Great Again.”
The CTA below the hero section - while not as emotive as the language above it - is nothing if not clear. It presents the visitor with two simple choices: “Join Us” or “Donate.”
Also positive are the social media widgets towards the end of the page. While Clinton buries her social links in the header and footer, Trump's site features live social media updates, which makes sense given his dominance on all things social. Rather than just soliciting visitors to follow him, he gives them a preview of what they can expect.
The Bad:
From a design perspective, Trump's site is crowded and noisy. The dark colors pile on top of one another around the hero section, and the smorgasbord of clickable options in the body of the page is paralyzing. Instead of leading visitors along a path of action by creating a clear visual or written hierarchy, everything comes barreling toward them at once.
The navigation bar is likewise crowded. There are 10 visible options and if you count up the drop-down menu options, that number jumps to 22.
Finally, the “Text TRUMP” box is a questionable choice, because rather than prompting visitors to simply enter their number on the page itself, it asks them to cross one of the most difficult conversion bridges: changing devices.
The Experts:
 | Neil Patel: |
|---|
Typically, when you use call to action text that is related to the problem you are solving, your clicks and conversions are higher than if you used generic verbiage like 'join now.'
Also the website copy isn't telling a story.
If his big pitch is to make America great, then all of the surrounding elements - such as news clips and videos - should reinforce that message. This will help create an emotional connection between the website visitor and Trump, which should help him gain more votes and donations.
Lastly, some of the headlines for his press releases don't encourage you to click. If you're lucky, eight out of 10 people will read a headline, and two will click through. With a headline like, 'Donald Trump's Campaign Draws Dedicated Followers,' you're not likely to get many click-throughs because it doesn't highlight the benefits of clicking through.”
 | Oli Gardner: |
|---|
If the goal of the page is to get people to donate, it could use a little more focus to make it happen. And if they'd done a better job with their responsive design, the primary donate button would be above the fold.
The navigation could be simplified if they did a better job with targeting. To participate based on your state, you need to go to the States page, find your state, click on your state and then fill in a form. With proper targeting the secondary CTA, “Join Us,” (which leads to the same type of form) could be renamed to something like “Get involved in Kansas” or “Join the movement in Kansas.” A Kansas resident would be far likelier to be inspired to click if that was the case.
At the bottom of the page, the tweets weren't handled in the best way. The first was an incongruent mention of a book by someone other than Trump and the second a link to a Washington Post article about Hillary Clinton that takes you off-site. If you want people to part with their money, don't send them away.”
 | Valentin Radu: |
|---|
Fun fact: If we analyze the hand signal Trump is using, Wikipedia states that in American sign language this actually means 'number two.' I trust Wikipedia.
As for the menu, I would A/B test it by simply inverting the colors to make the Donate button red.
Going further, the buttons 'Join us' and 'Donate' are actually competing - they're the same size and color and they're positioned together. One should be more important than the other and therefore given more credit via more space and prominence.
The paragraph font size may also be too small for some visitors, and there are no links connected to the various media and press releases to 'Read More.' I can't argue too much with the multi-column format, although a single-column layout would be worth testing.
Another thing that I would test is Donald Trump's facial expression. On both video thumbnails his face is showing that he is ready to fight.
But… maybe that's what Americans want: a wealthy fighter that will share his prosperity with them.”
 | Michael Aagaard: |
|---|
All the main functionalities are easy to use. The logo and tagline confirm you're on Trump's presidential website and both the 'Sign Up' and 'Donate' forms work well.
While the donations themselves are handled by a third-party tool, there's a good match both visually and message-wise, so you get the feeling of an uninterrupted experience.
The header doesn't quite line up on a 15-inch screen, and you can't see the bottom of the hero shot that contains the two main CTAs. But other than that, most of the UX is on point. Likewise, the mobile version works well. In fact, I'd say it works better than the desktop version.
Only negative thing is that there are quite a few navigation points in the burger menu, which makes it a bit overwhelming:
In my experience, people who come to a website like this have already made up their minds, so the website doesn't need to do much persuading. But it has to be real easy to use, so you can do what you set out to do with little or no friction.”
Step 2: Join Us
The Good:
The subhead on Trump's email opt-in leverages a personal connection to the candidate. Instead of inviting supporters to join the campaign or “Get updates,” this opt-in invites them to “Receive updates from Donald J. Trump” directly.
The Bad:
Unfortunately, that's the main positive. To sign up, a supporter would have to enter information into five required fields. Compare that to Clinton's dramatically simplified sign-up process, requiring only two fields.
All told, there are 13 form fields and checkboxes. Too many options is the hallmark of low-converting forms.
In addition, the text on the CTA buttons - from (1) the homepage's button “Join Us,” to (2) the form's headline “Sign Up,” to (3) the form's button “Submit” - creates a disjointed user experience (not to mention that “Submit” is a notoriously lame and low-converting CTA).
The Experts:
 | Kristi Hines: |
|---|
While I think the form does have a lot of fields, I believe those fields are necessary, especially the state and zip code.
Why? Because it allows each candidate to email and text supporters about upcoming local events and voting rules. Plus, if supporters enter their full address, that also opens the door to some direct mailing opportunities.
The use of a CAPTCHA field doesn't bother me. Considering the amount of spam most online forms receive, this is probably the easiest way to at least bypass the automated spam. I'm sure their marketing team is already fighting a lot of fake submissions from Trump haters.
The only disconnect for me on this form is not requiring the mobile number - which is smart - but then having the 'Yes, please send me periodic text messages…' box automatically checked.
Finally, I think they should try testing some different messaging on the 'Submit' button. I'd bet a button that said 'Let's Make America Great Again' would get some smiles from Trump supporters.
Overall, the form may seem lengthy, but it gets the information the candidate needs and works well on desktop and mobile. In any case, no one is going to switch their vote just because the other candidate has an easier form to fill out.”
 | Chris Goward: |
|---|
Since Donald Trump is already a master at gaining free press mentions, and he apparently has plenty of funding, one would assume his goal is to gain direct access to voters to mobilize them on voting days. That means his 'Join Us' call to action is very important.
If his transactional goal - the bottom end of the funnel - is to maximize subscribers, he could test some improvements:
- The Join Us pop-up form seems complicated at first, with 13 fields preceding a big red 'Submit' button. Hmm… does Trump want us all to 'submit' to him? Especially for mobile, this is a very long form for a seemingly simple CTA.
- Form fields broken into two columns make scanning difficult. This isn't an issue on mobile, but I certainly wouldn't stick around to fill out a mobile form with that much scrolling required.
- Why am I being asked for a mailing address when that's not needed for the messages I'm subscribing for? What else is my information being used for?
- Right before completing the form, there are two big barriers: (1) an 'I am not a robot' field, which seems unnecessary, and (2) an opt-in warning.
If Trump isn't testing, he should get started. Based on Clinton's website, she's got a more effective conversion optimization team - her simple signup form reigns supreme in comparison.”
 | Sean Work: |
|---|
Moving on to the signup page, sometimes collecting a lot of information is a smart thing to do. It might not convert as well, but the benefit of collecting more info sometimes outweighs total conversions. I've heard of cases where more form fields actually converts better!
We could ax the mobile number field. It's not a required field so why let it get in the way? However, having supporter phone numbers might be incredibly valuable when election day is near. You might want to call your base supporters to make sure they know where they are going to vote and inform them of any last-minute details.
If we are going for just pure sign ups and nothing else, I would simply have first name, last name and email. I would remove all the checkboxes and the comment field. I might consider keeping the CAPTCHA because I can see the opposition trying to flood the form with bogus entries.
My final words on this: It really has to do with Trump's strategy and goals.
They need to be nailed down first. What do you want to achieve? Then you work backwards.
You create your hypothesis, build the page, test it, measure it then repeat the cycle.”
Step 3: Trump's Donation Process
The Good:
Unlike Trump's previous pages, the donation process is clean and visually minimalistic. It includes an image of the candidate that - thanks to the blue hue - drives home the personal and patriotic connection mentioned earlier. At the same time, the imagery doesn't distract from the action.
The Bad:
Unfortunately, the white text on light-grey background makes the buttons hard to read. Adding some visual clarity in the form of affordance could be valuable. Also hard to see is the fine print. And, as opposed to Clinton's donation pages, there isn't even a note to expatriates who might want to contribute.
Lastly, the trust factor on the page is low. Trump doesn't include anything about where the money goes and - outside of the generic word “SECURE” and the image of a lock - the page doesn't provide security measures to assure donors their payment information is actually secure.
The Experts:
 | Ben Twichell: |
|---|
“Copy is one of the most vital elements of a landing page.
My recommendations would be to include and test three sections: (1) a prose style emotion-evoking paragraph, (2) a bullet-point list of his platform stances and (3) social proof.”
 | Shanelle Mullin: |
|---|
“Going back a step, Trump's site misses a huge opportunity.
If someone selects the 'Join Us' call to action instead of the 'Donate' call to action on the homepage, the site asks for a lot of the same information.
Why not ask for a password during that process to make the donation process easier for those who are, presumably, the most likely to donate? It would also make mobile donations easier.
In the same vein, there's a login option on the Trump donation page, but it's well below the fold. If someone who has donated before returns to this page, intent is high. Make it easier for them.
Overall, the UX is fairly standard for a presidential campaign site. However, there are a few little things that could be improved:
- On mobile, when you advance to Step 2 of 3, you're automatically scrolled down to the 'Continue' button. All that's visible is the button and the start of the fine print, so you have to scroll back up.
- Also on mobile, if you don't immediately choose the “Scan Credit Card” option, it disappears.
- In the fine print, it says the maximum individual contribution is $2,700 per election. So why am I able to select '$1,000' or '$2,700' and then 'Make this a monthly recurring donation'? Furthermore, how many months am I signing up for here?
- There are in-line error messages, which is great, but the form still accepts obviously false information. For example, a zip code that is not in the state selected and an invalid email address.
- There's no confirmation of how much you're donating (and how frequently) before clicking the final 'Donate' button.
- Another big issue is donation amount. Why the big jump? Why so many small amounts? Maybe the Trump optimization team did their conversion research and found that most people donate smaller, recurring amounts. But why not have 'Make this a monthly recurring donation' selected by default then?”
Want more awesome content to help you crush your marketing goals?
Hillary Clinton
Step 1: Pop-Ups
The Good:
From the jump, Clinton's site kicks things off with a bang. The first pop-up takes aim directly at her opponent:
Making Donald Trump our Commander-in-Chief would be a historic mistake.
And the second leans on social proof, with a quote from President Obama:
I don't think there's ever been someone so qualified to hold this office.
Clicking “I agree” on either immediately presents the visitor with the option to join Clinton's email list:
On top of being laser-focused, the CTAs are written from the perspective of the visitor.
The Bad:
It's difficult to say whether or not the themes of Clinton's pop-ups “work.” Instead of defining herself proactively, the visitor's first impression is directed toward either who she's against (Trump) or who supports her (Obama).
For a candidate who regularly gets lambasted on Saturday Night Live for being unrelatable and aloof, this worries me from a conversion perspective.
Moreover, both pop-ups make the assumption that her visitor will be a “party” voter. The first message - being anti-Trump - is probably a safe bet. However the second is riskier given that the most recent polls put President Obama's approval rating at 50%.
The Experts:
 | Henneke Duistermaat: |
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“You can see two interesting persuasion principles at work here. The first is what psychologists call the consistency principle, also known as the foot-in-the-door technique: once you've agreed with one small request, you're more likely to agree with a bigger request.
This is exactly what's happening with the two-step sign up: first agree with a simple statement (small commitment) before submitting your email address (slightly larger commitment). Of course, this flies in the face of conventional advice on making the sign-up process as easy as possible. I assume they've tested both options and the two-step process worked better.
The other point to note are the two different phrases: one portraying Trump as commander-in-chief as a mistake (avoiding a risk) and the other agreeing with Obama that nobody is better qualified than Clinton (gaining a positive benefit).
The question here is: do people want to avoid Trump as president or do they want to support Hillary Clinton as president?
Many of us are risk-averse. We prefer avoiding problems rather than gaining something. It's a great test to run for any business.
For instance, do your customers want to avoid internet downtime or are they looking for consistent internet access? Or, imagine you're selling bikes: do your customers want to avoid a sore butt or are they looking for a comfy saddle?”
 | Bryan Eisenberg: |
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“There are all kinds of challenges with these pop-ups. However, when we are dealing with political websites versus business websites the intrinsic motivations are completely different. Why people do and don't do things radically changes. Political websites can add additional friction points - like extra clicks - and people's motivations will still provide the momentum to convert.
Why?
Because we are not dealing with an exchange of money (at least not primarily) but rather a reinforcement of an individual's values. The key thing about these pop-ups is how they fit the candidate's brand narrative.
Both tell the same story and appeal to the same values. In that sense, they're 'selling' a consistent vision… one that visitors to this site would no doubt connect with.”
 | Danielle Devereux: |
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“Great design is one of the most crucial aspects of user experience on your landing pages. Design relates to many critical components such as navigation, layout, colors, font choices, text and videos. You want users to have an easy and pleasurable experience navigating these elements of your site.
To accomplish this you must reduce friction. Friction is anything visual, technical or logical that gets in the way of a user completing your landing page's desired goal.
Clinton's pop-ups create a point of friction, because the first non-essential pop-up - 'I Agree' - gets in the way of the essential CTA pop-up - the email signup form.
The goal of the quote design is to present an attractive invitation to subscribe to the Clinton campaign newsletter. So why ask your users to click on an extra pop-up? This creates friction by adding an unnecessary click and weighing down the interaction.
To solve this problem, limit your signup process to as few steps as possible. One or two steps works really well. Show them one pop-up with a compelling CTA and as few form fields as possible.”
Step 2: Homepage
The Good:
Setting aside Obama's struggling approval rating, using the header image to make a powerful and joyous announcement is a smart move. As opposed to the negativity of the first pop-up, Clinton's homepage copy and imagery is decidedly positive.
The area below the header then offers two clear options for people who want to participate in Clinton's campaign. Both options include the first steps to completing the desired action right there on the page. They're also presented in a logical order: join first… then donate.
The menu options are elegantly lined up and not as crowded as Trump's. The red “Donate” button on the top-right leaps off the page. And Clinton cleverly sows elements of her progressive logo throughout.
The Bad:
While not as overwhelming as the body of Trump's homepage, Clinton's homepage lacks focus, direction and a clear visual hierarchy. After the initial CTAs to either join or donate, there are no follow-up boxes to engage visitors once they leave the header section.
Instead, the majority of the screen is dominated by text-heavy article excerpts.
My first thought was that the articles would link to outside resources, something that Trump does well. Instead, they're internal links to pieces on Clinton's own site. While internal linking keeps her visitors on-site, the downside of this is it doesn't offer objective or outside validation (i.e., social proof) to back up the claims being made.
Even the so-called “Get the Facts” box links to another of Clinton's own pages:
Lastly, because her social icons are presented in the footer only and obscured by light-blue text on dark-blue background, they might as well not even be there:
The Experts:
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