I started on a new sales funnel that I’m using paid traffic ONLY with.

Mostly solo ads (try Udimi if you want to get started with solos. They have a buyer rating system that works well)

And as you can see from the screenshot the numbers look crap.

I’m only getting a 32% opt-in rate. This means I’m losing 68% of every visitor that hits my site.

I’ve been trying since last year to improve this opt-in number (and still have the same information on the squeeze page) and I’m still trying.

Looks crap on the surface but is it all bad?

Well no it’s not and here’s why.

I’ve found by being totally transparent about what my free offer is (it’s a free sample of my newsletter) that the quality of the person who opts-in to receive the sample is VERY responsive to signing up for a full subscription and for my other offers.

And I’m making a PROFIT on my sales funnel so although I’m only getting a cruddy 32% opt-in rate I’m building my list not only for free, but for a small profit which is the holy grail of paid traffic as far as many marketers are concerned.

I did manage to increase my opt-in rate for the same offer last year by changing the wording on my squeeze page but found that the increased subscribers weren’t nearly as responsive to the rest of my funnel and I ended up not only losing my small profit, but now each new subscriber cost me to acquire.

There are of course other factors and variables to be taken into account such as lifetime value, retention rates, speed at which I build my list and so on…

…but I think this is a good lesson in how you can assume an opt-in rate is crap until you know the numbers behind it.

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