Following on from the article 10 Simple Hacks to Improve Conversion Rate on a Mobile Phone I wanted to dedicate a Friday afternoon on improving customer retention. This article will focus on hacks that you can done in an afternoon or at least set in motion.
What is customer retention?
Customer retention refers to the ability of a company to retain its paying customers who continue to buy over a specified time period.
Why is customer retention important?
According to a data by KPMG in 2014 a survey of 100 senior US retail executives revealed that customer retention will be the most significant retail revenue driver in next 12 to 36 months.
According to Econsultancy, 70% of respondents from a cross channel marketing report believed it was cheaper to retain then acquire a customer.
A retained and happy customer is more likely to refer other customers to the business, increasing the customer base and further grow the business.
What can we do drive customer retention?
Hack 1
According to a report from RightNow Technologies, 89% of customers begin doing business with a competitor following a poor customer experience. Take the afternoon and sit and listen to the customer calls, read customer emails or visit online review sites that talk about your brand. Make a list of common problems and score them on the impact on the business and the amount of effort required to fix it. Find the sweet spot where effort to resolve the issue is minimal and the impact is greatest, and go resolve those issues or begin the process to resolve them.
Hack 2
Transpomo emails come from the terms transactional and promotional. A transpomo email is when a promotion piggybacks on an existing transactional emails such as order confirmation, shipping confirmation or your account has been created email. Transactional emails have the highest open rates, so it makes sense to piggy back of these.
If you already do transpomo review the results. What can be improved? Can you create a schedule to promote specific events or products. For example in June you could have a banner for the Summer sale, in November Black Friday. Or add a special offer.
If you do not do transpomo email, create a offer banner and get it added to a transactional email and test.
Hack 3
Leverage customer feedback (good and bad). Once a order has been shipping, it is common to ask the customer to leave a review. If the review is positive, send a follow up offer. It could a store wide percentage discount, money off discount, a promotion for a related product or a promotion for a popular product.
If the review is negative, get the customer service team to follow up with the customer to resolve any issues they may have. Once the customer is happy, give them a special discount for their next purchase.
What can be done on a Friday afternoon? You can place an order, follow the process and see what happens over the coming days, arrange a meeting between customer service and marketing or put a plan together how you think it should work and how it can be tested. A simple hack could be to take customers from both pools (those who left a positive review and those who left a negative review but have had their issue resolved) and send out an offer. Measure the uptake on the offer. Test different offers to see what works best.
Hack 4
Provide incentives for the second purchase. Once a customer has made their first purchase it is common to treat the customer no different from a loyal customer who has bought several times from your business. For a first time purchaser, give them the opportunity to leave more about your company, what makes your company special or the values that the company believe in. It could involve giving them a free gift on their second purchase, free delivery/shipping on their next order or a free upgrade. Spend the afternoon defining what you could offer and a way to test to determine the most popular offer.
Hack 5
Social media and TOMA (Top of Mind Awareness). Being in regular communication with your first time purchasers helps develop TOMA, which increases the possibility of a second purchase. A first time purchaser may follow a brand over social media for different reasons (latest offers, for fun, new products or to communicate with the brand). Check if you have a program to introduce social to you first time purchasers. If you don’t, spend Friday afternoon developing a plan how you will to connect to first time purchasers and how it can be tested. Look for a quick and an easy way to test the impact of social on first time purchasers.
Hack 6
Subscription Service. A subscription service allows a customer to select a product and determine how often they want to receive it. The benefit to the customer is convenience and knowing it is less likely to run out. Examples of subscription services include contact lenses, food or beauty products. Not all products lend themselves well for a subscription but being able to identify the rights one can lead customer going from single time purchasers to multiple time purchasers. Spend Friday afternoon identifying what product you can currently sell that could be sold on a subscription service or new products that be sold. Find a quick way to test it (having a product page with the option to sign up to a subscription, just a banner advertising the service and monitor the clicks).
Hack 7
Packaging Insert program. An insert program can be a discount offer, it could include a product sample, a small gift like sweets, a thank you card or a request to share on social media . Creating a delight or surprise with a first-time purchaser can help to generate that second sell. Spend Friday afternoon defining what are the possible options you can test in an insert program.
Hack 8
Loyalty program. Loyalty programs not only can help achieve that second sell, it can also help strengthen the brand affinity and build long term benefits. Make a list of all the loyalty programs that the people in office subscribe to. Identify the characteristics of the most popular programs and how they could relate to your ebusiness. Once you have some ideas run them by the team. See what resonates and develop a way to test it out. For a hack, invite a handful of customers into you office on a Friday afternoon and walk through each of the offers. See which one is most popular and why.
Hack 9
Complimentary products campaign. If I have purchased a pair of jeans, a pair of trainers, an iPhone over an Android device or a book there will be a complimentary good or goods that a customer could be interested in buying. Look at what your competitors offer and compare to your offering for your top selling products. Do you see a gap? Is there something you could add to your product category? Is there something that could differentiate from your competitors? Make a list. Also make a list of how you target these customers? In basket as a cross sell? On the order confirmation page? As a transpomo email? An offer email? Paid social? For a hack, if you have a customer service team who take phone orders, test different complimentary offers when customers call to place an order.
Hack 10
CRMs have a wealth of customer insight if you ask the right questions. For example, what can you learn about your loyal customers that could be applied to first time purchasers? On a Friday afternoon make a list of open ended questions that help you determine the key characteristics of a loyal and regular customer. For example, what are the commonly purchased products for loyal customers versus those single time purchasers. What is the average frequency of purchase for loyal customers? What was the time gap between the first and second purchase? Did they full price for the second purchase or was it discounted? Did they purchased through an offer on email or social? For a hack, if you know which products are commonly purchased by loyal customers determine which ones can be tested over email on first time purchasers. Put together a test plan.
“The world is being re-shaped by the convergence of social, mobile, cloud, big data, community and other powerful forces. The combination of these technologies unlocks an incredible opportunity to connect everything together in a new way and is dramatically trnsforming the way we live and work.” Marc Benioff
The focus of this article is to suggest how we can utilise the convergence between social, mobile, big data, AI and community to build a more profound and deeper user experience. The article will look at the purchase funnel, the impact of the Internet on the flow of information, a strategic model for Microsoft and then propose ideas on how to improve the user experience.
The Purchase Funnel – AIDA
The Purchase Funnel was developed by St. Elmo Lewis in 1898. It is a consumer-focused marketing model that illustrates the theoretical journey that a customer takes towards the purchase of a product or service.
AIDA stands for:
Awareness (A) – the customer is aware of the existence of a product or service.
Interest (I) – the customer expresses an interest in the product or service.
Desire (D) – the customer aspires to own that product or service.
Action (A) – taking an action towards purchasing the product or service.
If there is no awareness of a product there cannot be an interest in the product. Without interest, there is no desire to buy, and without desire, no purchase will be made.
If we can optimise awareness, for example, running a banner campaign introducing a new game, we get visitors into the funnel. If the visitors watch a video or read an article about the new game we can generate interest. We can then run a retargeting campaign over social, web or in-app to generate desire. Once we have desire we can follow up with a direct response campaign to lead to a sale.
Before the Internet
Before the Internet, if you wanted to learn something you would attend a lesson, read a book, visit the library, buy a magazine or talk to someone. Yes, in those day people used to talk.
If you wanted to know about a video game you would buy a computer magazine. Information flowed from the software houses to the magazine writers and then to us, the readers. The information was managed, controlled and in one direction.
The dawn of the Internet
The Internet allowed information to flow in real time to anywhere in the world. Search Engines like Google and Bing crawled the Internet to discover new information that could be accessed in the blink of an eye through a simple search.
Platforms like YouTube or microblogging sites like Twitter gave anyone the ability to express their opinion and be heard globally.
With the Internet, information became accessible for free, models for generating revenue for reporters had to change. One such model of generating revenue was the use of click bait. Click bait is content whose sole purpose is to attract attention and encourage visitors to click on a link. It is a form of journalism that presents little or no well-researched news, rather focuses on eye-catching headlines that exaggerate news events or to cause sensationalism. Katherine Viner, editor-in-chief at The Guardian wrote in How technology disrupted the truth, “chasing down cheap clicks at the expense of accuracy and veracity undermined the value of journalism and truth.” Journalism can take the backseat if it is more profitable to create sensation.
As humans, we all form opinions and they do not always agree with each other. When it is done in person it usually carries a level of understanding and respect. In the online world, someone can easily create an anonymous profile and troll someone else. So rather than encourage an environment of learning and respect it can lead to a witch hunt where differences of opinion is crushed or humiliated.
The Internet has provided gamers with the ability to access a wealth of information but can also contain elements of bias and the distortion of facts.
Starting with Why
Before we discuss how we can leverage the convergence of technology I believe it is important to have a framework or foundation for such a discussion. For this blog post, I intend to use the framework suggested by Simon Sinek in Starting With Why.
The Ted Talk by Simon Senek was published in September 2009 and is the 3rd most watched Ted Talk of all time.
Some organisations and people are more innovative, generate more profit, are able to retain customers and staff longer than other organisations, but why? According to Simon Sinek the way they think, act, and communicate are in line with each and the opposite of what everyone else does. Most leaders talk about WHAT they do – the products or services that generate money. Some leaders talk about the HOW – the process they use that differentiate themselves. Very few leaders talk about (or even know) their WHY – the reason the business exists in the first place (money is a by-product of the WHY).
Simon Sinek argues that when we start with WHY in everything that we do, we inspire action in a way that WHAT does not. That is because WHY engages our emotions, while WHAT engages our logical brain.
As an example, which of these statements is more compelling:
I write code (the WHAT)
I create magical gaming worlds (the WHY)
If you want to inspire others, always communicate your why first. If the why resonates with them, they will be inspired. Simon Sinek said, “people don’t buy what you do; they buy why you do it.” Employees who are inspired by the why are the best resource for any business.
Benefits of Starting with Why?
Organisations live or die by their culture. A toxic culture eventually kills the organisation, the confused culture is like taking two steps forward and one step back. A culture based on a Why where the employees rally around it would lead to several benefits.
Speed– Every decision can be seen in the light of whether it is in line with the objective of the organisation or not. This makes it quicker to make decisions and decision making can be decentralised.
Direction– Everyone within the organisation knows the direction the company is headed towards.
Motivation– If an employee believes and is motivated by the company’s Why they will be more motivated then somebody who is motivated to make money.
Trust– A leader of an organisation whose actions are in line with the Why will generate trust amongst their employees.
Recruitment & Retention – Everyone is passionate about something but we are not all passionate about the same thing. When an organisation takes a stance, and defines its Why some people will be attracted towards that organisation whilst other will not. Those who are attracted will both want to work for the company and want to stay with the company longer.
The External Benefits to Microsoft include:
Microsoft, Nintendo and Sony all make consoles to play video games. Demand is influenced by changing prices, improving technology or adding exclusives. Having an identity (the Why) that resonates with gamers can be a more significant factor in the purchasing decision than price, technology and exclusives.
Starting with a Why establishes trust. If someone trusts a brand they are more confident to invest more time and money with Microsoft.
A mistake or an error of judgment by Microsoft is more likely to be forgiven and forgotten.
Brand advocates. A company with a Why is likely to have a greater number of promoters. And a promoter has two distinct benefits. They can take a detractor and help them so they become either passive or a promoter. Or they can help attract new customers to the brand.
Millennials and identity- By 2015 the millennials became the largest generation in America overtaking the baby boomers.
According to a blog post from Oracle by Michael Svatek, “millennials are particular, easily distracted, and more demanding of brands than any other generation, that is, when they choose to engage with them.” Millennial marketing state over 50% of millennials would be more willing to make a purchase from a company if their company supports a cause, and brands that stand for more than their bottom line receive greater millennial brand love. By Microsoft having a Why it stands a greater chance to be relevant and engaging with a millennial.
Does Xbox need to have a separate Why to Microsoft?
I believe Xbox should share the same Why with Microsoft for the following reasons:
As much as Microsoft Excel is a Microsoft product so is the Xbox. Brands need to speak one language and be consistent, so the customers will view all products as one.
Xbox does not work in a silo, resources sharing works better when the individual has a single and unified direction.
Both Xbox and Microsoft are in the technology business and bring people closer together, so it makes sense to have the same Why..
My Suggestion for a Possible Why?
This is my suggestion for a possible why:
We believe through technology we can bring the World closer together
Microsoft’s 5 key principles are:
Discover Together
Work Together
Play Together
Watch Together
Be Together
Xbox’s 3 key principles are:
Discover Together
Play Together
Watch Together
The Xbox App: the centre of the new AI, Social and Chat Bot Experience
The focus of this section is to show how the Xbox App can leverage AI, user content, user input, and Cortana to create a richer and deeper user experience. This will be highlighted in the following sections:
Guide a user through the pre-purchase funnel.
Setting up the Xbox for the first time.
Extend the current feature set of the Xbox app.
The history of the Xbox App
Xbox Smartglass was originally announced at the 2012 Electronic Entertainment Expo (E3). It was the second screen for the Xbox 360 promising ‘new ways to interact with your Xbox 360.’ With the release of the Xbox One it is simply known as the Xbox App.
The Second Screen – Discovering Together
Current scenario –If someone wants to learn about the Xbox, they can ask their friends, do a search on Google/Bing, read a review on Amazon or search in social media/YouTube. There is no doubt there are lot of positive reviews, comments, videos, and tweets on Xbox but at the same time there is a lot of content that would create FUD (Fear, Uncertainty or Doubt), and for every positive Xbox story, there is going to be another that is negative.
Proposed solution – to create an environment where a user can learn more about the Xbox One console and its family. Using an app, we can integrate analytics, a chatbot to respond to user queries and AI to deliver a highly tailored experience (Discover Together).
Pre-purchase Funnel – DiscoverTogether
In this section, we are going to assume we have a user who is interested in purchasing the Xbox One and has installed the Xbox One App.
Guiding a user through the pre-purchase funnel
Different ways people learn
Before jumping into the app and how we can apply the idea of Discover Together it is worth mentioning the different ways people learn:
Visual. Learning through diagrams, charts and watching videos.
Auditory. Learning by listening through audio files, live transmission or listening to a video.
Experiential. Learning through reflecting on doing. It is a form of active learning.
Kinesthetic. Learning by carrying out physical tasks.
Read/write learning. Learning by either reading or writing.
We should ensure as best as we can to cover as many content types as possible when we put together content for the Xbox App. These could include:
Video interviews
Video reviews
Graphs/Chats
Articles
Podcasts
Ask questions (active learning)
Modelling and predicting the user’s journey
Bryan Eisenberg defines four different personality types:
To be inclusive the user journey must appeal to all four personality types, so, for example, we need pages that:
Have a call to action above the fold (competitive and spontaneous).
Talk about the benefits of the Xbox One (spontaneous and methodical).
Talk about the Why of Xbox e.g. Play Together (spontaneous and humanistic).
Have detailed specifications, FAQs, video, reviews etc. (methodical)
Data mining customer QAs and AI
There is over 16 years of queries from customers, retail, e-tail and online discussions. Compiling all the data together will help determine what are the common questions that a potential customer may have. These questions and answers can be incorporated into the Xbox App to help with the user journey.
Launching the Application
The more we learn about a user, the better we can tailor the experience. Putting too many hurdles in front of the user will result in frustration and then exiting the app prematurely. My suggestion is to ask three simple questions with the option to skip.
Question 1 (Yes, No)
Have you ever owned an Xbox?
Question 2 (Multiple Choice)
What is your prime reason to buy an Xbox?
The new Xbox One X
Playing online with friends
Playing Xbox exclusives
The price
Looking for a gift for friends or family
Question 3 (Textbox)
What would you like to know about Xbox?
Taking the answers from these questions, we can build a personalised experience for that user. If I said I have owned an Xbox in the past, interested in buying the Xbox One X and wanted to know more about 4K games then an experience optimised for me would include content (video, text or auditory) that was centred around:
Xbox One X being the most powerful console
The 4K difference
Xbox One X building upon the Xbox heritage
The biggest franchises in 4K
Xbox live reimagined on Xbox One X
Xbox Game Pass, EA Access and Play Anywhere
If on the other hand, I said I have never owned an Xbox, am interested in playing online and wanted to know about which games I can play online, then an experienced optimised for me would include:
What makes the Xbox unique
An introduction to the Xbox family (S and X)
Xbox Live – the most powerful platform for online gaming
Play the best franchises on Xbox Live
Xbox Live and Games for Gold
Xbox Live in 2018
The home screen should contain the information that could encourage a spontaneous and competitive person to act.
Discover Together
Having integrating analytics would allow us to understand which content resonates (read or watched to the end, shared or upvoted) and which content does not. If I have a user who is interested in getting an Xbox to play Xbox Live who reads an article about Xbox Live – the most powerful platform for online gaming and then watches a video on Xbox Live in 2018, I could offer the user a bundle with an Xbox One and 12 month of Xbox Gold and EA Access to that user. As another example, if I know a user is interested in Xbox Live when they are reading an article on the Xbox Elite controller, there should be a section on how the elite controller is the best controller for online gaming. If they were interested in Fifa 2018 and read an article on the Xbox Elite controller, there should be a section on how the elite controller can be optimised for Fifa 2018.
In addition to answers from the user questions from the original survey, I envisage having multiple tabs with different themes. These could include:
An introduction to the Xbox family.
An introduction to Xbox Live and Xbox Gold.
Playing with younger children and safety online.
Exclusive Xbox games.
The best place to play multiplatform games.
What is 4K, HDR and Dolby Atmos?
Xbox Apps and non-gaming activities
Buying an Xbox
ChatBot
To take the interaction further, having a chatbot who can ask and answer questions could provide valuable insight to the user. For example, after reading an article or watching a video I have a chatbot asking me if I found the content useful and relevant?
If I answer Yes
The chatbot would suggest other relevant pieces of content. For example, if I watched a trailer for The Witcher it could recommend a video about The Witcher running on the Xbox One X and its improvements (especially if I stated I am interested in the Xbox One X) or similar games I may be interested in.
Taking this a stage further, if the Chatbot knows I am interested in Xbox One X, the Witcher in 4K and Rise of the Tomb Raider, it could create a special bundle of the fly and ask me:
Would you be interested in an Xbox One X, The Witcher and Rise of the Tomb Raider for a special price?
If I say yes, it then takes the user to a shopping basket and checkout.
If no, then it needs to understand what is missing – is it the price? The offer?
Use of Push notification
Buying an Xbox could be a single use of the app (competitive or spontaneous), but there are others who will use the app multiple times before deciding to buy an Xbox (humanistic or methodological). To encourage the user, we could use push notifications to highlight relevant pieces of content. The idea is to get the user to use the app on a regular basis to become more familiar with the Xbox.
Purchase and Set-up
In this section, we have assumed a user has now bought an Xbox One and our objective is to introduce the user to the Xbox family.
Setting up the Xbox
Setting up an Xbox for the first time and installing a game can be a long wait, anything we can do to make the experience more enjoyable will help.
Suggested Steps
As soon as the Xbox is on the local network (wireless or wired) it pairs with the Xbox App.
The Xbox App welcome the user to the Xbox family and explains what will happen next (updates, user account login etc.).
The App has a countdown timer and pushes notifications to tell you when the Xbox is ready. This gives freedom to the user to step away from the Xbox.
Any sort of text entry on Xbox can be done using the smartphone keyboard (much quicker than using a controller).
Once the dashboard is ready and the user is logged in. The next steps are all about welcoming the user to the Xbox family.
What We Want to Achieve
Help the user to connect with their friends and family.
Help the user to understand the benefit of Xbox Gold and sign up if they wish to.
Help the user to understand the benefit of Xbox Game Pass and sign up if they wish to.
Help the user to understand the benefit of EA Access and signs up if they wish to.
Help the user understand Xbox clubs and sign up for any relevant clubs.
If the user uses twitter ask them if they wish to connect to the Xbox Twitter Account of @xbox, @xboxuk, @xboxP3, @majornelson, @xboxqwik and @xboxSupport.
Ask the user if they are interested in subscribing to the Xbox YouTube channel.
Forcing a user to sign up to multiple accounts all at once may leave the user overwhelmed. If done gradually using the Xbox Dashboard, push notifications, emails and the Xbox App, there may be a higher chance of engagement and sign up. Taking inspiration from gamification and lead page generation it is all about getting the consent of the user and then rewarding their action.
We could build a program that starts with an email to introduce Xbox Gold – if they agree to learn more, the next time they open the Xbox App or play on the Xbox, they get the option to watch a video on the benefits of Gold. If they do not open the email, then we can use a push notification asking them if they would like to learn more about the benefits of Gold.
As another example, adding friends and family can be time-consuming, but we could leverage the Xbox app to search out friends and family from the phone contact list or social media. We could reward that action with a free 7-day extension to Xbox Gold once we get their consent.
We could use banner adverts within on the Xbox Dashboard or the app advertising the benefit to follow us on Twitter e.g. latest news or win a game of your choice.
What if we could recognise when a user has set up their Xbox for the first time, finished a game or had not played a game for a while and promoted Xbox Game Pass or EA Access through multi-touch points?
We could create an introductory series where each day the Xbox app has a new topic. Day 1 could be adding friends and family, day 2 the benefits of Gold. Opens, clicks and views could all be tracked and follow up emails and Xbox Dashboard banners can be used to facilitate action.
Extend the Current Feature Set of the Xbox app.
The purpose of this section is to suggest some additional features for users who have an Xbox One.
Idea Number 1 – The Second Screen
I am a great fan of watching E3 and Gamescom – what if the Microsoft event could support a second screen (the Xbox App)? Whilst a game is being presented on stage I could get extra information about the game, the ability to pre-order online, save the game in the recommended tab (more later) and the ability to share a screenshot or a trailer on social media.
Idea Number 2 – The Xbox Button
There is a game I really want to buy. I saw at E3 2017, it looks like Blade Runner but I have no idea what it is called or who is making it. I searched for ‘Blade Runner type game for Xbox One’ but I didn’t find anything. I searched on Twitter, I found a tweet that linked to a list of all E3 games on the Xbox news blog. I found the name of the name, but I, unfortunately, have already forgotten the name before I could pre-order it.
What if, whenever I come to an advert or a mention of the game, be that on YouTube, a web page, a live event, a billboard or TV advert, I press a button and the details of the game is stored. The game information can then be stored in the recommendations tab and updated whenever there is more information available (previews, pre-orders etc.)
Idea Number 3 – Email and In-App notification. Talk to me
I have been playing the Xbox since the original OG Xbox so there should be a lot of information about me:
What games do I own?
What games have I played?
Which games have I pre-ordered?
Which games did I get Day 1?
Which games do I buy on sale?
Which games have I finished?
Which games do I delete and which games I keep?
Do I buy digital or physical? Or do I buy both?
How often do I play?
For example, I own Forza Horizon 2 and Forza Horizon 3 but I do not own Forza Motorsport 7. I own Halo 1 all the way to Halo 5 but do not own Halo Wars 1 or 2. There is an opportunity to generate a multi-touch campaign around Forza Motorsport or Halo Wars. What if the game is discounted on the Christmas Sale, it could be beneficial to highlight this to me. What if I installed a demo of Forza Motorsport 7 but never played it? I could get an email about how Forza Motorsport takes what’s best about Forza Horizon 3 and improves on it. What if that email arrived on the day I am most likely to play on the Xbox?
With a little AI, my game preference can be figured out. Or a Chatbot can ask me what my favourite games of 2017 were.
This information can be used in the following ways:
Games that I have yet to buy but may have a potential interest in. Offer free play days, demos, discounted prices or bundle offers. Making it unique and personalised to me.
Games that are coming out soon, let me know the ones I would potentially be most interested in. Create anticipation and excitement.
Predict what type of games should be produced and when they should be released. With enough data and knowing the general schedule for other multiplatform and exclusive games, it should possible to predict the type of games people would want to play and when they would want to play it.
Idea Number 4 – what game should I buy?
There are Indie games, backwards compatible games, AA and AAA games, so sometimes it is easy to miss a game.
Ideas on recommending a game:
List the games my Xbox friends have played that I have not, ordered by popularity or review scores (recommendation tab).
Have Cortana predict what I want to play next or have a conversation with me (see below).
The recommended tab (see below)
The review tab (see below).
Idea Number 5 – Cortana and what game I should buy next?
Cortana or any AI agent is as good as the data available to it. If I ask what is the weather like today, the AI will check my IP address to determine where I am and return the weather in that area. Cortana, given the right level of permission and support from game developers, can easily build up a picture of my gaming preference.
Do I prefer single player games? Do I pay for DLC? Do I play at a professional level? Do I play multiplayer games? Have I watched, read or listened to any content of any upcoming game?
Cortana could ask, have you considered buying Mass Effect Andromeda (knowing that I like Sci-Fi games)? If I say no, the follow-up question is why? If I give a reason why, this information can be used to find a suitable piece of content to read or sent to the developer as feedback.
Cortana could inform me of the latest DLC for Destiny 2 either when I reach a certain point in the game or if I have stopped playing Destiny 2 to re-engage me.
Or I could tell Cortana I am a fan of Portal 2 or Capcom’s Power Stone therefore any game like these could be recommended even if it is two years in the future.
As a final example, I am a fan of Dishonoured but never really played Tom Clancy’s Splinter Cell. What if Cortana could create the association between the games and ask me if I am interested in Splinter Cell? And if said tell me more, it would show me a video, an article, a developer interview etc. If I showed interest, the Xbox backwards compatible team would be informed or even Ubisoft can be told.
Idea Number 6 – The Recommendation Tab and what game I should buy next?
Scenario – Knowing what game to play next can be difficult at times.
How to get games added to the recommendation tab?
Through the Xbox Button.
What my friends are playing or have played.
Cortana’s recommendations.
What information on the game should be available on the recommendation tab?
Video content (previews, reviews, behind the scenes)
Written articles about the game.
People playing the game on Mixer
Images of the game
A link to demo links if available.
How to buy?
What can I personalise?
Whether I am interested in that specific game or not
How much am I prepared to pay for it? if it reaches that price I will get an email, push notification or a dashboard notification.
Share the game details with a friend.
Idea Number 7 – The Review Tab and what game I should I buy next?
Scenario – Spending $60/£45 on a game is a risky affair for some and for others it is the opportunity cost of playing one game over another. What if I could find someone whose experience and taste in games was like mine and see how they feel about a game I am interested in?
Two possible ideas:
I build my own query i.e. I want to see a video review of Gears 4 from someone who prefers single player story games AND has completed all the other Gears games (including Judgment AND Gears of War Ultimate Edition) on the most difficult setting. (it is beyond the scope of this article on how we can generate user content, but I have a couple of ideas).
What if you took my preference in games, my Gamerscore and what I have unlocked and apply some AI and then look for similar patterns with other gamers/reviewers? Cortana could get my feedback on reviewers (things like watching the review from start to end, or whether I follow the reviewer or unfollow, comments left could all help to build up a picture of what I like) and then improve its recommendations based upon this. What if I could use the Xbox button to tag a reviewer on YouTube I like. Their content, assuming permission is granted, is now available for me for on the review tab. What if a friend of mine likes a specific reviewer – could that not be recommended to me as well?
Idea Number 8 – help me get into a game
Scenario – I buy a game based on hype e.g. it’s a Microsoft exclusive. I install it, play it for 5 minutes, get stuck/confused or face a bug then move onto another game.
Impact – The games developer and Microsoft have my money but the possibility of future investment including DLC or microtransactions is uncertain.
A possible solution – track where I have reached in a game, understand what achievements I have not unlocked (micro-conversions) and the time I have not played the game. If the time not played is above average or usual for my usual gaming preferences send me a notification (an email or Cortana asking me a question) guiding me on what to do next. Imagine a conversation with Cortana for example:
Cortana: What do you think of Destiny 2? (instead of Cortana asking me I see you have not played Destiny for 7 days, 8 hours and 10 seconds and did not pass the first mission, are you stuck?)
Me: This light score thing does not make sense to me.
Cortana: I know an excellent guide to light score in Destiny written by one of your favourite reviewers:
Me: Please show me.
Play Together
The purpose of this section is to focus on playing together. Usually, when we talk about playing together we think about multiplayer games, but I want to focus on how we can play together on single player games.
Single Player Games
Why would we want to play together on a single player game?
Competitive – adding the element of competing against a friend can make the experience more enjoyable
Working with friends to get through a tough section of a game.
Competitive Single Player
A single player game is usually played by one person, so running a competition between friends is either ad-hoc or post-event. What if Xbox Live allowed developers to build competitive elements into the game with minimum effort? Microsoft would do the heavy lifting and the developer and ultimately the user would benefit. Every game is different but there are common features that could include:
Real-time updates when you are playing against a friend (they have just unlocked an achievement and you have this much left to do, they have 90% accuracy with a rifle vs your 72% accuracy with your rifle, you just defeated the boss, whilst they just died or they just unlocked a hidden feature which you have yet to find). The idea is having real-time updates so there is always competition. We can even take it a step further and set up tasks, the first person to defeat x number of zombies, or keep possession of the ball for more than a minute etc.
What about creating a video of shared gameplay e.g. this is me jumping and landing safety vs my friend falling off the cliff and falling to his doom.
End of level section updates compared to your friends. Your friend did this section in X minutes, 2 attempts and 4 headshots. Here is a video of them doing it.”
I am Stuck – Help Me Out
There are times when you are stuck in a game and do not know what to do next. Usually, that means figuring it out or leaving the game and finding a solution on YouTube or online. What if you could ask a friend? Xbox would need to be able to determine who could help me in my circle of friends and help me connect with them. Once connected I would want to share my screen and have the option for them to take over my game and either commit their action into my game (once they get through the bit I am stuck on) or let me redo it myself. I may want them to guide me on what to do, or I may want them to do it for me. The idea is I have the option.
Co-operative – Team Battle
Microsoft clubs are a great way to organise a meetup, but it does it still involve organising a number of people to agree a time to play together. What if we could add some AI with an understanding when I play and access to my diary/calendar? I can create a simple query:
I want to PLAY Halo 5 with my friends (A, B and C) Cortana to set TIME and DAY.
Cortana would have to understand my day/time preferences and my friend’s day/time preference, offer options that are localised to each user. For example, my friend A gets a notification: are you free to play Halo 5 on Friday night @ 11 pm GMT, B at Friday evening @ 6 pm EST and C @12pm CET. Once we have reached an agreement a calendar appointment is created and a reminder is set. Taking this a stage further, Cortana would have to manage cancellation, lateness and no-shows. For example, finding last-minute replacements if needed. By Cortana managing the event the gamers can focus on what they enjoy. Let’s say for example we agreed to play at 2 am – I would want Cortana to set my alarm on my iPhone just in case I fall asleep.
As another example I can ask Cortana who can I game with now? Cortana would understand who I game with usually and who is online now. It could send invites for me and provide options of what to play. I could be on the bus and be asked, would I be free at 8pm to play with X, they are interested in playing Destiny 2 or COD.
Who can I challenge? Getting better at gaming
To improve your skills involves playing people who are better than you, so they stretch your capability. We could analyse user performance on a game to create a global ranking system. For example, I want to get better at Killer Instinct, I would want to be able to identify who would be the best people to play based upon the characters I use or the experience I want to gain (I want to practise fighting against Character X). It would return a list of users and invite them to play Killer Instinct even if they are playing a different game at that time.
By having a ranking system, you have regional champions, for example being the best Killer Instinct player in London. Having such an award and the ability to defend it would take the game to another level.
Watch Together
Watching a movie or a TV show can be a solo experience or at least shared with the people in the same physical location as you. What if you could watch a movie or TV show with friends at the same time but in different locations?
Examples of how it would work
I rent a movie from Xbox with the option to allow for one or more of my friends to watch it at the same time as me. I pay a higher price (but still lower than each one of us renting it), but can share the payment between the users and we can watch the movie at the same time.
Xbox could then facilitate text chat on screen or in the app or allow us talk to each other. The idea is to allow people even if they are 1000s of miles away to share the experience of the movie/show together. Taking it a stage further what if you could add gameshow/quiz elements during or post the show or movie?
I really hope you have enjoyed reading this article and found at least some of the ideas useful. If you want to discuss this with me further, please drop me an email, leave a comment or DM me on Twitter.
It may just be me, but there are times when I look at Google Analytics or look at an A/B test and the page in question does not convert. So I rack my brain looking for ideas, the page loads fast on a mobile device, the call to action is clear and above the fold, the audience is relevant but no one wants to buy. I Google, I look at competitor sites and I even consider changing the colour of the button but nothing seems to works.
Then one bright sunny day (ok it wasn’t that sunny or that bright) something changed. A clever algorithm recommended that I buy a book. Not just any book but a book that The Economist reviewed as:
“Profound . . . As Copernicus removed the Earth from the centre of the universe and Darwin knocked humans off their biological perch, Mr Kahneman has shown that we are not the paragons of reason we assume ourselves to be (The Economist)
The book is called Thinking, Fast and Slow by Daniel Kahneman
Before I explain the link between the book Thinking, Fast and Slow and why visitors may not convert, we should first discuss how classical economics views the rational man.
Homo Economicus
Homo economicus, or the economic man, is the concept found in economic theories that portray humans as rational and narrowly self-interested/self-focused agents who pursue their subjectively defined ends optimally. If any decision is sub-optimal then over time, the economic man will learn from his mistake and choose better. In other words, humans are intelligent and self-benefit focused.
How to sell to Homo Economicus
If Homo Economicus are rationally motivated, then the following factors will impact conversion:
Price – the lower the price or the bigger the discount, the higher the demand for a product.
Quality – if the quality of a product is better then a competitor’s product it will sell more.
The greater the features or benefits that a product has, the more it will sell.
Delivery – if delivery is fast and reliable, it will sell more.
Introducing Behavioural Economics
Behavioural economics postulates the idea that man makes ‘irrational’ decisions because they are influenced by psychological, social, cognitive, and emotional factors. Behavioural economics is therefore primarily concerned with the limits of the rationality of economic agents.
There are three prevalent themes in behavioural economics:
Heuristics (is a mental short cut to problem-solving or learning that not guaranteed to be optimal based on previous experience): Humans make 95% of their decisions using mental shortcuts or rules of thumb.
Framing: The collection of anecdotes and stereotypes that make up the mental emotional filters individuals rely on to understand and respond to events.
Market inefficiencies: These include mispricing and non-rational decision making.
Introducing Thinking, Fast and Slow
In 2011 Nobel Memorial Prize Daniel Kahneman published the best sellerThinking, Fast and Slow. It was winner of the 2012 National Academics Communication Award for best creative work that helps the public understand science, engineering or medicine.
A Summary of the principles within the Thinking Fast and Slow
There are two different systems for thinking. Daniel Kahneman called them System 1 and System 2. Each has their own unique characteristics and each has unique advantages and disadvantages.
System 1
Automatic System – is a fast, automatic response system based on intuition, past experiences and it is commonly impulsive. It’s the decision making and recognition you do every waking moment, even though you may not be aware of it. System 1 drives your car while your thoughts wander. It’s how you recognise a friend’s face from afar in a crowd. System 1 is effortless in its management of these tasks. Other examples include:
Locate the source of a specific piece of sound.
Determine which one of two objects is further away.
Answer questions based upon memory e.g. 8 times 5 is 30 (eight fives are thirty).
Read a car number plate.
Understand simple sentences.
System 2
The Effortful System – is slow, calculating, takes energy, factors in restraint over impulse. System 2 is what we call deep thinking or mathematical calculations. System 2, corresponds to our idea of rational reasoning, it is slow, deliberative and effortful.
Daniel Kahneman has said, “thinking is to humans as swimming is to cats; they can do it but they’d prefer not to.” Humans default to using System 1 over System 2 as it requires less effort and energy.
A human may believe that they have made a rational decision but often, the conscious mind is merely post-rationalising decisions that have already been made using System 1. This can be a problem if you are trying to understand why your customers took a certain action as they don’t have full introspective insight into their decision making process and what they claim motivated them to take action could be inaccurate.
Illogical decisions can occur choosing System 1 over System 2 or vice versa.
Heuristics – are simple, efficient rules which people use to form judgments and make decisions. They are shortcuts that usually involve focusing on one aspect of a complex problem and ignoring other aspects. System 1 thinking associates that aspect to an existing pattern or thought rather than develop a new pattern for a new experience. An example of this would be to consider every tool in a tool box to be a hammer because they all have flat edges. The resulting errors are known as cognitive biases.
Anchoring – influenced by irrelevant numbers. Most people, when asked if took over 200 litres to fill a bathtub would give a much larger estimate than those who were asked if would take over 35 litres of water.
Availability – judging the probability of something occurring based on how easy it is to think of examples of it. In other words, the easier it is to recall the consequences of something, the greater we perceive these consequences to be. If someone has read news reports of a recent fire, they are more likely to believe a fire will occur then a flood.
Substitution – if you were to be asked the question, “how popular will the Fidget Spinners be six months from now?” You may have thought about it, you may have even researched into the topic, but usually, an answer will appear in your mind straight away. Even though there are uncertainties about the future and without considering them at length, you have reached a conclusion. What has happened is you have substituted the question to how popular is the Fidget Spinner today?
Optimism and Loss Aversion – this bias generates the idea that we have substantial control in our lives. That is, people overestimate their ability to control events and dismiss the chance of loss. System 1 also responds more strongly to losses than to gains. This is called loss aversion. For example, losing a penny/cent is more important than gaining a penny/cent.
Framing – involves processing the same piece of information in different ways, depending upon the context it was presented in e.g. as a loss or a gain. Amos Tversky and Daniel Kahneman explored how different phrasing affected participants’ responses to a choice in a hypothetical life and death situation.
Participants were asked to choose between two treatments for 600 people affected by a deadly disease. Treatment A was predicted to result in 400 deaths, whereas treatment B had a 33% chance that no one would die but a 66% chance that everyone would die. This choice was then presented to participants either with positive framing, i.e. how many people would live or with negative framing, i.e. how many people would die.
Treatment A was chosen by 72% of participants when it was presented with positive framing (“saves 200 lives”) dropping to only 22% when the same choice was presented with negative framing (“400 people will die”).
Sunk Cost – throwing good money/time/effort after bad, because of the belief that one is already too committed at this point to change direction.
How to apply the lessons of Thinking Fast and Slow to m-commerce
Don’t make me think – use simple language and keep things easy to understand. Less mental effort means greater buy in.
Don’t confuse me – confusion leads to doubt and doubt requires System 2 thinking to resolve. So rather than resolve the confusion, a visitor may visit a competitor site.
Don’t make me speculate – if I have a question about a product, I know I have to put effort in to find the answer, so it may be easier to go to a competitor site. Ensure all relevant information about the product is available and easily accessible.
Giving too many options – have multiple options on a product page can lead a drop in revenue, as choice requires System 2 thinking. Reducing the options available can lead to an increase in conversion rate as the decision is easier. Taking this a step further, offering upsells and cross-sells is a way to increase the value of the basket (AOV). Test to see if conversion rate improves by reducing the number of options in the cross and upsell or eliminating it completely.
Running limited offers can lead to impulse buys. Many people do not like losing out on an opportunity to save money. You can tap into their FOMO (Fear of Missing Out). Voucher codes with expiration dates also tap into user emotions of FOMO. Daniel Kahneman writes about Loss Aversion and how the fear of loss is a much stronger driving force in human behaviour than the evaluation of gain and this can lead to irrational behaviour.
Consider limiting product availability. Both McDonalds and Nintendo do this.
Providing solutions to problems that are currently trending – these are more likely to sell than solutions to problems that are less known about.
If selling a product requires thinking, simplify it. Uber simplified moving from A to B.
If there is uncertainty buying a product (will it be suitable?), leverage trust. Providing expert advice, independent reviews or being in the field for many years builds trust. Generating trust reduces the need for System 2 thinking. In order to build trust in their products, Zappos use 365-day return to eliminate the fear that the shoes they sell may not fit.
If you found this article useful, please share it. Every tweet, every post and every link helps 🙂
The purpose of this article is to look at the how we can create emails that convert whilst on the go, in the bathroom or in bed. Sometimes it is easy to forget an email which you spent days creating can be simply ignored or deleted because of a football match or the constant message notifications being delivered.
Before we look at strategies to get the conversion on a mobile device it would be beneficial to state some facts on email marketing.
Facts on email marketing:
Email remains a significantly more effective way to acquire customers than social media—nearly 40 times that of Facebook and Twitter combined (McKinsey).
Email has an average ROI of $44 for each $1 spent (CampaignMonitor)
75% of all Gmail users access their emails from a mobile device (TechCrunch).
About 53% of emails are opened on mobile devices. (Campaign Monitor)
One out of every three clicks within an email occurs on a mobile device. (Campaign Monitor)
57% save the email for later and 48% bear the information in mind for later. 47% go to the website via another route (#EMD17)
Adobe surveyed more than 400 US-based white collar workers, 18 and older, about their use of email and this is what they discovered:
70% of those surveyed checked emails whilst in front of the TV, 18% whilst driving and 42% whilst in the bathroom; it would be fair to say customers may not be fully focused on your emails.
How to Create Emails that Generate Attention
Attention grabbing subject lines
Did you know that just under half of email recipients open emails based only on the subject line ? This shows the power a subject line can have, it can make or break your email marketing campaign.
Some simple tricks to get someone to open your email.
Keep it short and sweet. Make it easier for your customer to understand what they will receive if they open your email.
Ask a question. Questions create curiosity, and curiosity can lead to engagement.
Make it personal. If the subject is relevant to the person reading the email it will grab their attention.
Surprise. A surprise grabs a person attention and interest.
Avoid spam words where possible. Spam words include buy, save, help, % off. To learn about spam word I recommend reading this article.
Test subject lines. Your customers are the best judge of what works and what does not. Test different subject and measure which results in the highest open rate.
Attention grabbing content
Once you got someone to open your email the next step is to ensure that they engage with your content. Here are some tips on achieving this.
Headings should contain two to more of the following characteristics: be unique, specific, useful and convey a sense of urgency. With being unique it should stand out from the other emails in their Inbox. With urgency, It should include something that compels the reader to continue reading. The sense of the possibility of losing out can be sufficient to keep the reader engaged.
Useful: if your content is identifiable as relevant it will read, kept and even forwarded or shared. To understand what is useful survey your readers.
Personalise. Personalisation from a user perspective includes giving the user the choice on how often they receive your emails and what the email should contain. From m-commerce perspective, it means delivering content based upon the reader interaction with your m-commerce platform. Using your mobile/web analytics and ERP you can develop an understanding of their order history, what categories and products they have looked at, what items are in their basket. With this information, you can develop emails which relevant and personal to the user.
Be brief and concise, less is more.
Use white space to focus attention.
Use colour to draw attention to what is important.
Have a clear call to action and ensure it is above the fold. Repeat the call to action before the footer of the email.
Communicate your value proposition. What makes your offer unique?
Getting the timing right
Sending an email at the right time can lead to a higher probability of a sale. The opposite is also true. Should you send an email before work? At lunch time? In the evening? During the weekends? Below is a tongue in cheek response to the question by Silverpop know known as IBM Watson Campaign Automation.
To answer the question to boils down to two elements. What does your data tell you? And what have you tried? Using your analytics what day and when do you have the highest sales volume? When do you have the most visitors to your app/website? This will give you a picture of when customers are most likely to purchase.
Have you tried sending at different times of day and different days of the week? If not set up a test. If you have tested in the past, test again.
Remember every industry is different and every website is different.
Tying email to m-commerce
An email will grab someone attention and if it relevant they are likely to visit your landing/product page.
Here are some tips to take someone from the click on the email to the final purchase.
Loading times is king, especially on a mobile network. Look at the speed at which the landing page loads and the time it takes to take payment. To improve the speed performance look at using a CDNs, ensure images sizes are optimal, removing unnecessary images and code, try minification of HTML on live servers and reduce the number of steps it takes to make a purchase.
Be consistent. Use the same images, same facts between email and landing page. Confusion leads to doubt and doubts lowers the chance of a sale.
Make sure your value proposition is not only consistent with the email it is clear and visible on your product page/landing page.
Where possible ensure all relevant information (such as sizes, colour, warranties, guarantees, FAQs or any USPs) are easily accessible on or from the product page. If a customer has a doubt or a question that is not answered it will impact the likelihood of a sale.
Provide credibility, be that customer feedback, independent reviews or guarantees of security/data protection.
Create a sense of urgency or scarcity. If an offer is limited by time or quantity this may induce a person to make a decision to buy and not delay any further.
If are there any special offers make sure they work and it is clear and simple for the customer to use. Consider auto applying the discount so that is one less thing the customer has to remember to do.
Allow guest logins, Paypal or Amazon Pay to speed up the checkout process.
Can you find a way to allow the customer to save the item to buy later?
If it the item is out of stock offer an alternative.
Offer an upsell and a down sell of the product but ensure the decision is easy to make. If someone cannot distinguish and decide which version of the product to buy you may lose the sale.
Email and Retargeting
If you already using retracking on your website have you ever considered incorporating your email offers into your retargeting banners?
A simple update could see your email offer follow your customers over the Internet and Social Media.
Email and Facebook Marketing
Have you considered using custom audiences on Facebook to amplify your email campaign? Facebook gives you the ability to import your email database which then matches the email addresses against its own database. In my experience, I have seen Facebook identify over 65% of the email addresses you import. You can then use Facebook advertising to target these customers with your email offer.
I hope you found this article useful if you could share it that would be fantastic. Every tweet, every post and every link helps 🙂
I love Fridays, it’s my favourite day of the week it’s even better than Saturday and that is saying a lot. But Friday, especially Friday afternoon, is usually associated with being lazy so I thought wouldn’t it be cool if I could put together 10 simple hacks to improve conversion rate on a product page that you could do on a Friday afternoon. The idea is to make an immediate change or be simple enough to encourage you to begin a cascade of changes. As they say from small beginnings, come great things.
Hack 1:
This is my version of the Grandmother test. To do this you need a product page, the physical product, two volunteers and a pad of paper (yes you can use a digital device but, I recommend writing on paper). For this to work, the volunteers cannot have seen the product before or be able to communicate or see the other volunteer.
Give the first volunteer the product, and let them spend a few minutes with it. Then ask them the following questions; describe the product and what are the benefits? Make notes on what they say.
Give the second volunteer a print off, of the product page (so that they are not tempted to Google it). Ask them to describe the product and what are the benefits? Make notes on what they say.
Now compare the two descriptions of the product; ask the question what changes can you make to the product page to improve the product description?
Rational– there is one thing to be given the physical product and another to understand something by reading about it.
Hack 2:
The higher your advert ranking in the SERPS (Search Engine Results Pages), in general, the more traffic you will receive. An important factor to consider is the CTR (Click Thru Rate) this is the percentage of clicks relative to the number of impressions for that search term, or in simple terms does you advert gets lots of people to click on it. It is possible to have a lower position in the SERPs but, still get a higher number of clicks compared to someone who is higher on the page than you.
Google has a really cool tool that lets you preview what your mobile snippet looks like on Google.
Pick a product page you wish to optimise. In one browser (PC or mobile) have the mobileserps tool open and on a mobile device search for the product page that you wish to optimise . Have both browsers viewable so it is easy to compare the results. In the mobileserps tool type the title, meta description and the URL of an existing product page . In the browser search for the exact same product. Review your competitor’s results. Is there something missing from your snippet compared to your competitor? Does any snippet stand out from the others? What is unique about it? What can you change to improve the CTR? Edit your snippet until you are happy with it. Once your editing is complete, change the Meta Title and Description on the live site.
Rational – the more relevant and customer-focused your snippet is, the more clicks it will generate.
Hack 3:
Not everyone uses their phone in portrait mode for every task, some people use their browser in landscape mode. Yes, they hold their phones sideways when they use an Internet Browser.
Hold your phone in landscape mode and look at your product page. How does it render? Did you get an OMG moment? Did something break? Is it easy to find the add to cart/basket button? Compare your page to your top competitor, can you see something they do better than you? Go around the office show people, see their reaction, create a conversation. Do you use Basecamp? Teams? Slack? Take a snapshot of the page, upload and begin a conversation. Sometimes you do not need to have the answer you just need to initiate the conversation. Or find someone in the office who can make the change.
Rational – people use mobile phones in ways you would never expect, so sometimes it helps to consider about possibilities.
Hack 4:
Not everyone has access to super-fast WiFi or able to benefit from 4G/LTE. You may hate me for asking you to try this, switch the WiFi off and change the connection speed on your phone to its lowest connection speed. On my iPhone it is 2G. Now your phone is on super slow model; go to the homepage of your website and try and buy a product.
Before you scream in frustration, take note of the areas of the website that you feel are super slow. You can use tools like Google testmysite or Pingdom to independently test your site.
Once you have identified a possible culprit ask the question; what change can I make today? An example of a change you can make immediately is to compress the sizes of the images on the page. There are online tools available to do this or use Photoshop and the save to web function.
Rational – Sometimes it is easy to miss very heavy page(s) because of a fast Internet connection. People use phones on the train, in big metal buildings or in crowded areas . In these situations, speed plays an important part of whether to buy now from you or buy later or from someone else. And we know buying later can mean don’t buy at all.
Hack 5:
Wear a pair of gloves and use your website to place an order. To make this work it cannot be just any pair of gloves (even the ones that your grandmother knitted) it must be a pair of touchscreen gloves. Extra tip; the bigger the Touchscreen gloves the more you can learn.
What did you learn when placing an order? Were the buttons too close to each other? Were the search boxes easy to use? Make a note of an improvement you can easily make.
Rational – people can have a disability or use a phone whilst simultaneously doing several other things at once. Reducing the chance of making a mistake improves conversion rate.
Hack 6:
There are two ways you can do this hack.
Open a product page on your smartphone and then hold the phone at arms length. If you have a super large phone (Phablet) you may have to step away from the phone. The other way is to borrow the smallest screen smart phone in the office.
What can you see on the page? What should you be able to see? Is the price visible? What about the add to Basket/Cart button? Does the product image do justice to the product? Make a note of what you should change.
Rational – If there is anything that can a cause a distraction or if the most important elements on the page (price, description, image or add to cart/basket) are hidden, it can lead to a lower conversion rate.
Hack 7
Pick a product and, now, search for the same product on a search engine. Can you find it cheaper elsewhere? Can you get free or cheaper delivery? If you can find it, on then your potential customers can do the same. Ask the question what should I change on my product page to combat this potential loss of revenue? Dropping prices isn’t always the best answer.
Rational – The Internet gives you the freedom to check multiple sites easily. Knowing that you are in a marketplace helps you remember; what may have worked yesterday may not work today.
Hack 8
Find a product page where sales volume is low and ask the question if six months from now sales for this product were to be tenfold higher, what did I do to cause this today?
Rational– These types of questions open the mind to think of a place of plenty and a belief that it did and can happen as opposed to scariness and a belief that it may never happen. That positive shift in focus will lead to different answers than just asking what can I do improve sales.
Hack 9
In some way similar to Hack 1 but different enough to be its on hack 🙂 Open you product page on your mobile and read out aloud every thing on the page. Does something sound strange? Odd? Could something be improved? Does it flow?
Rational
By reading out loud it is much easier to identify mistakes in punctuation, spelling and things that do not make sense or are missing.
Hack 10
A study by VWO showed better image selection can improve conversion rate. With the phone in hand, open a product page and this is where the fun starts. Find people in the office or in the street you don’t know and ask them, if I were to re-shoot the product shots, what could I improve or add? Brownie points for you if you can find people who are your target audience. Once you have enough data, brainstorm ideas on what images you need. With a little determination and maybe Photoshop or a camera person, you can have something ready in a short space of time.
Rational– a picture is worth a thousand words. Conveying more information or a better quality of information in a picture can ignificantly improve conversion rates.
Xbox Smartglass was originally announced at the 2012 Electronic Entertainment Expo (E3). It was the second screen for the Xbox 360 promising ‘new ways to interact with your Xbox 360.’ With the release of the Xbox One it is simply known as the Xbox App.
There is a game I really want to buy. I saw at E3 2017, it looks like Blade Runner but I have no idea what it is called or who is making it. I searched for ‘Blade Runner type game for Xbox One’ but I didn’t find anything. I searched on Twitter, I found a tweet that linked to a list of all E3 games on the 
There are Indie games, backwards compatible games, AA and AAA games, so sometimes it is easy to miss a game.
To improve your skills involves playing people who are better than you, so they stretch your capability. We could analyse user performance on a game to create a global ranking system. For example, I want to get better at Killer Instinct, I would want to be able to identify who would be the best people to play based upon the characters I use or the experience I want to gain (I want to practise fighting against Character X). It would return a list of users and invite them to play Killer Instinct even if they are playing a different game at that time.
Homo economicus, or the economic man, is the concept found in economic theories that portray humans as rational and narrowly self-interested/self-focused agents who pursue their subjectively defined ends optimally. If any decision is sub-optimal then over time, the economic man will learn from his mistake and choose better. In other words, humans are intelligent and self-benefit focused.
An email will grab someone attention and if it relevant they are likely to visit your landing/product page.
