The Yes Ladder And Your Marketing
Let’s talk about social media.
We’ll also talk about what is called the “Yes Ladder.”
What Is The Yes Ladder?
In marketing and sales in particular, there is something called a yes ladder. I imagine everyone is familiar with the term, but for those of you who aren’t, the yes ladder is basically a set of compliance tests that you get your reader or audience to go through.
Essentially, it relies on the idea that you can’t just ask a person to spend money with you. On the other hand, a person is more likely to say yes to whatever you ask them to do if they have already said yes before.
The yes ladder idea suggests that if you get a person to say yes to something very simple then they are more likely to do something more complex. Buying something is a more complex, more trusting action than, for instance, giving you their email address.
When we talk about most direct marketing funnels, we are essentially talking about a yes ladder. We know that person probably isn’t going to buy straightaway, and so we get their email and contact them regularly in the hopes that they are going to buy in the future.
However, one big mistake that a lot of businesses make is that they forget about the yes ladder. They know intuitively that subscribers are good. They know that if you have a mailing list and you regularly email your customers, they are more likely to buy.
Finally, they also know that they should have social media profiles and a presence wherever the customer base and target market is.
But what do you do once you’ve gotten those things? How do you get a person from A to B. The mistake people make is that they don’t connect the dots.
You do that with a Yes Ladder.
You Can Segment Each Rung Of Your “Yes Ladder”
Even the most rudimentary of email marketing software – be it aWeber, Mailchimp or any other cheap and easy service – registers the following:
- It sends the email out
- It notifies you when the email is opened
- Finally, it notifies you if a link inside has been clicked
In essence you can find out your open rate and your click-through rate. You can also find out – and this is the important bit – who opens up and clicks through.
This means you can segment your list. In terms of this conversation, you can split your email sequence up into rungs and then you can segment people on each rung.
Not only does this allow you to check up on your list to see how many of them are responders versus people just looking for free stuff to pass the time, but it also allows you to gradually escalate your yes ladder with people on an almost individual basis.
This also gives you the opportunity to make your social media efforts useful.
Social Media And The Yes Ladder
There are people who find your business because they want to buy. You should give them the opportunity to do that. Preferably the first opportunity you get.
But what do you do with all the other people who don’t want to buy right away?
You test them with your yes ladder.
So let’s say you have a bunch of people who open your emails every time you send them, but they won’t buy.
You send them an email saying, “Hey, I’m on Twitter. If you follow me there, you’ll get [some benefit.]
Then you segment the list between those who followed you on Twitter and those who didn’t. At the very least, you can see who clicked through to your Twitter.
So you’ve split your list in two: People who follow you on Twitter and people who don’t.
You know that the Twitter followers are more responsive, because they’ve done two rungs of the ladder. (Subscribed and followed.)
Now, you can and should send to the Twitter list a new sales page. It doesn’t have to be immediate, but don’t you want to know if following you on Twitter is more likely to make someone buy?
Well, now you can find out.
3D Yes Ladders
Of course, the sensible thing is to take the non-responders for Twitter and then see if they’ll do something else. You’ve got a Facebook, Instagram or Pinterest, so you can do the same for those platforms. You can segment.
The yes ladder in marketing isn’t just an ordinary ladder though.
You can say:
Email subscriber>Sale
Email subscriber>Twitter>Sale.
Email Subscriber>Not Twitter>Other Platform>Sale
But you can have your subscribers do this too:
Email>Twitter>Attempt Sale>Facebook>Get Sale>Leave Review>Attempt Second Sale>Etc.
This is the sort of thing I notice others doing when they want reviews.
Incentivised Ladder Climbing
If you want, you can also create specific opt-in goodies for every single action. Want a top ten resources list?
- Follow me on Instagram and send me your username.
- Please leave us a review on Amazon, and you’ll get an exclusive short story.
- Join our private Facebook group and get a free cheat sheet
The crazy thing is – if you want to make your 3D yes ladders four-dimensional, you can use the rewards from some opt-ins as bait for the other offers.
You can even use some parts of the yes ladder as rewards.
It seems complicated, but how many times have you seen something like, “You’ll get access to our Private Members Facebook Group if you download this ebook.”
What’s the reward there and what’s the opt-in?
Final Thoughts
I went on a bit of a tangent with the possibilities above, but I’ll bring it back around.
If you get an email subscriber, then that’s great. But it’s not exactly time to retire. You have won a contact and you need to test their willingness to purchase. If they purchase, great. If they don’t, then they are on a lower rung of the yes ladder.
But in both cases, you are giving them an opportunity to move.
After the purchase, you say, “Now you’ve said yes to giving me your money, how about you go out and spread the word?”
Before the purchase, you say, “Hey. I know you’re not ready to purchase, but here’s some information about why you’re missing out. By the way, Jim over on Facebook had a great story to share… why don’t you come and follow us over there?”
Each time, you can segment your list and get more information.
Do people who follow you on Twitter buy at a greater rate than people who don’t?
How many actions before someone buys hits the sweet spot?
Can you ask people to do too much before they unsubscribe or disappear forever?
These are all questions you can answer with a simple system.