Why Your Opt-In Plugin Isn’t Working

by John McIntyre

Since the release of OptinSkin and Welcome Gate, the web is alive with chatter about opt-ins and software to get more subscribers.

While both of these WordPress plugins work, I think a lot of people are missing the point.

The most important thing is your offer. 

It’s not OptinSkin or Welcome Gate. It’s not a lightbox pop-up. It’s not a 30-second delayed pop-up. It’s not a sidebar opt-in box.

The late Gary Halbert, probably the world’s best copywriter said:

“Know this: Strong copy will not overcome a weak offer but..In Many Cases, A Strong Offer Will Succeed In Spite Of Weak Copy Written By Marketing Morons!”

Now, this applies when you’re trying to make a sale just as much as when you’re trying to get someone’s email address.

If your offer sucks (and most do), you’ll struggle to get a significant opt-in rate, regardless of what software you use.

Wondering what the hell I’m talking about?

Here’s an example of an offer:

  • You give me $X dollars and I’ll give you X product or service.

To see it in action, the following bullet points are an offer an development:

  • Give me $37 and I’ll show you how to train your dog.
  • Give me $37 and I’ll show you how to train your dog to do party tricks.
  • Give me $37 and I’ll show you how to train your dog to do party tricks, in less than one week. You’ll also get the Magic Dog Training DVD, plus 3 tickets to the upcoming Dog Training conference. Oh, and it’s all covered by my 100% 60-day, money-back guarantee.

See what I mean?

The idea is to take your offer that currently sucks and make it whiz-bang fantastic.

When you apply this to opt-ins, you’ll start to understand.

How could you sweeten your offer?

Could you offer a free report? Could you give people free training videos? How about free access to one of your products?

Next Steps

  • Review your offer and sweeten the hell out of it.
  • Read the rest of Gary’s newsletter here – you can thank me later

8 thoughts on “Why Your Opt-In Plugin Isn’t Working”

  1. 1 Simple Thing You Can do Right Now to Improve your business’ bottom line.. It won’t even cost you a cent! 

    Sign up to the Drop Dead Copy mailing list now – for FREE!

    How was that?

    This is sweet, you whiz-Bangin’ m0-fo!

    Can you hear that noise? 
    I believe it’s a stampede of people literally throwing cash at your door to get you to write their copy!

    All jokes aside. Your copywriting is ace. People are literally throwing money away by not signing up to your list. I’ll say that again for anyone reading this – but not quite taking it all in (You perhaps?). You NEED to sign up to the Drop Dead Copy list now!

    -Better copy = more $$$ -More $$$ = More dancing, learning, fun , etc + Less Stress -Less Stress = More 🙂 and less :(I don’t know about you. But I (along with most people) definitely want more :)Go now!-Brett “Copy-mofo” FoxPS: We should start a competitive copywriting club off the back of all this. PPS: Always have a PS.

    Reply
    • Hahaha. Dude. Totally right. 

      I like this idea of a copywriting comp. 

      And great copy. You had me at “stampede of people literally throwing cash” at my door.

      Only… I don’t have a mailing list.

      I better get on that… now.

      BRB.

      John

      P.S. Check back soon and sign up to the mailing list… You’ll receive the one-page checklist that will create a stampede of people literally throwing cash at your door… 

      Reply
  2. Hey dude,

    Awesome new post, great opt-in offer by the way I might take you up on it!

    I’ve been struggling with taking my opt-ins to the next level for some time now. Trying to think out of the box of the “here get this e-book” trap that is so easy to fall into.

    Take it easy,

    Stop working so hard sometimes and drop by on skype sometimes! haha.

    Peter.

    Reply
    • Cheers dude!

      Yeah, I know what you mean. What most people do online is what everyone else does. The blogging community is notorious for it. Very few people are thinking outside the box.

      What you really gotta do is define your customer, or your market. Who’s your ideal customer and what do they want? For juicing, your audience, most will probably be interested in weight loss, so something related to that could work. Get yo’ creative juices (pun not intended) flowing 🙂

      Reply
  3. Thanks for the mention of OptinSkin!

    I agree that the offer is important, that’s exactly why we allowed people to split-test what it is they’re promoting (you can split-test the heading text, eBook covers, etc).

    Anyways, I don’t want this to seem like a promo comment. Just wanted to thank you 🙂

    – G

    Reply
    • No worries man!

      Yeow, split-testing is cool, but my point is that most people just throw something up there without spending much time thinking about whether anyone wants what they’re offering. You can split test two bad offers and well, you’ll get a bad result. But split test two good offers, and you have a winner.

      Reply

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