As you know, I am continually on look out for innovative marketing ideas that bring a high return on investment. This one is truly creative! Thanks to Roosevelt Best of UK-based Naturally First and Astrology First for sharing his ingenuity – and his results – with us.

KARON: Hello Roosevelt. Thank you for taking time to give us some details about this unusual (and highly effective) marketing idea.

ROOSEVELT: Good afternoon, Karon. Certainly – always a pleasure.

KARON: Tell me about what you’re doing, and how this “package” works.

ROOSEVELT: Oh yes. It began approximately four years back. I was approached by “Woman’s Own” [a British magazine]. They inquired as to whether I would be willing to make a free offer to their readers. It sounded like an idea with potential so I devised a way to make it worth my while! The layout was to be a full-page, editorial style reader offer. After a little negotiation, it was agreed that magazine would use first 1/4 of ad space to promote free offer, and I would use remaining 3/4 for up selling items.

KARON: So, magazine would give you a full page of advertising space free if you would provide something free to their readers. And you received 3/4 of spread to offer paid, up sell items as well, right?

ROOSEVELT: Yes, exactly.

KARON: Did it work?

ROOSEVELT: Yes, it did. The response was excellent. However, I had some tweaking to do to make up sell offer more appealing.

KARON: What was free offer? Was it an expensive item?

ROOSEVELT: The free offer was a one-week’s supply of a natural energy vitamin supplement I sold on one of my sites at http://www.naturallyfirst.com. It was valued at around £6.95 (approximately $10.50US.)

KARON: Ahhh! So as long as free offer holds value to reader, it need not be extremely expensive? That’s good to know. Now, how did you tweak offer to perform better for you?

ROOSEVELT: I decided to change two aspects of offer. I added several up sell items, and I narrowed gap between free offer and first product offer. So, for example, week’s supply of vitamins was free, first product up sell was just a few pounds more, second product was just a few pounds above that, and last offer was a “bundle” with a substantial discount off cost of all products.

How many times a day do you see them as you surf Web? Pop-up and pop-under windows have become a widely used marketing tool. But do they work? Are they just a nuisance, or are they really gold mine that all “gurus” claim?

After doing a good deal of research, I’ve discovered some pretty interesting facts. After implementing my own pop-up campaign, I’ve had some enlightening moments. Allow me to tell you what I’ve discovered, and you can make up your own mind.

I started by looking to one of my favorite marketing research resources, http://www.marketingexperiments.com. They actually spent over $4,000 testing pop-up windows and compiling results. Their experiment included using pop-ups for a biweekly ezine publisher and a computer products retailer.

The results were astounding! The ezine publisher got 100 more subscribers during a one-week period WITH pop-up window than WITHOUT. The computer retailer received over 3,700 new subscribers by using a pop-up window. That was enough to convince me to look further into using pop-ups on my own sites.

(NOTE: One thing experiment was careful to point out is that copy plays an enormous role in success or failure of pop-up. I wholeheartedly agree!)

Using my KT & Associates site (http://www.ktamarketing.com) as guinea pig, I added a pop-up window (to show on exit) giving information about my copywriting course. Then I waited and watched. Success didn’t take long!

While I do not conduct “controlled” experiments that MarketingExperiments.com does, I do have some basic data to offer you. After an 11-day period, I checked my site statistics and was very pleased! I had gotten a number of page views (not “hits” - “page views”) using pop-up window. I had also seen a 50% conversion rate. (Meaning that 50% of those who clicked to my copywriting course site purchased product.) The pop-up was working great!