The 2-for-1 Basketball Strategy applied in Web Marketing to Boost Conversions
In a meeting recently a client and I had a discussion about how much analytics can tell you about how to create something on the web for the best possible yield. We are beginning a test of multiple landing pages and tailored messages. The client was concerned that some landing pages would not perform at the same conversion rate as the current single page system. So I had to explain that even if a particular page underperformed, because of the increased engagement of visitors coming down the funnel, the overall yield is still beneficial. In nearly all engagements I have had every tailored page has had and improved conversion rate. Seeing all the Boston Celtics memorable on the wall I felt it was more than appropriate to use NBA and the end of the game 2 for 1 scenario as an analogy for what I would be doing in this test.
The basic situation sets up like this. If there are approximately less than 45 seconds left on the clock at the end of the period of a game, a team has an option of electing to use its entire 24 second clock for one shot, leaving their opponent with 16 seconds on the clock.
The alternative is the 2 for 1, where the team can elect to push up the court for fast shot leaving 30 seconds left of the clock. Pushing the ball up court like that guarantees the team originally with the ball a second possession of the ball to score.
On the surface it may not seem like the cautious team’s (or organizations) way to do business. So let’s dig into the numbers a little deeper. Or better yet let Houston Rockets GM Daryl Morey explain it:
From the Sloan Sports Analytics Conference, BS Reports with Bill Simmons Podcast
“A 2-for-1 is really a scientific thing now; if you’re not doing it you’re making a mistake. Two bad shots are better than one good one no matter who’s doing it.”
What does this mean in terms of web conversions is, two qualified visitors is better than one really qualified visitor. It is time for organizations to open up their sales/conversion funnel with multiple landing pages, and tailored messaging. If there is a single landing page for everybody, that organization is missing the opportunity to convert all of the other visitors.
I will take a moment here make a note that everyone taking a shot in a NBA game is qualified. So assuming all the traffic an organization is getting is qualified then the 2-for-1 holds true. Some agencies have been known to buy poor traffic, which is tremendously unqualified. I performed an audit of a smaller but well-connected Boston Agency and caught them essentially red handed using traffic from China, to improve their CPC ratio, essentially making it look like the traffic was quality.
Granted a 2-for-1 goes against conventional wisdom, but much of the webs conventional wisdom was formed well before the Internet became the true powerhouse commerce and information ecosystem it is today. Much the same way multiple landing pages break from what some consider being best practices, it works and if you are not trying to increase engagement of visitors then your organization is missing out.
![longreads:
How the TED conference exploded in popularity—spawning a host of competitors, copycats and aspiring TED talkers:
Until recently, the universal self-actualizing creative ambition was to write a novel. Everyone has a novel in them, it was said. Now the fantasy has changed: Everyone has a TED Talk in them. There are people on YouTube who upload webcammed soliloquies about whatever and title them things like “My TED Talk.” There’s now even a genre of meta–TED Talks. For a TEDActive talk in 2010, Sebastian Wernicke, a statistician, crunched the data of extant TED Talks to reverse-engineer both the best- and worst-possible talks. Elements common to the most popular TED Talks, he determined good-humoredly, included using certain words (“coffee,” “happiness”), feeling free to “fake intellectual capacity and just say et cetera et cetera,” and growing your hair long. He created an app, the TEDPAD, a kind of TED-omatic that can generate “amazing and really bad” TED Talks.
“Those Fabulous Confabs.” — Benjamin Wallace, New York magazine [Not single-page]
See more #longreads by Benjamin Wallace](http://24.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_m0dc1uypvp1qf4hl5o1_400.jpg)
