• Conduct usability testing to optimize customer activation • Match metrics to business types • Create a customer oriented culture and build a vibrant community • Increase referrals among current customers and use social media graphs to increase virality

1. Activation, Retention &
Engagement Strategy
@eric3000
@eric3000

2. Where You Can Find Today’s
Slides
http://www.bit.ly/emetelka
@eric3000

3. Introductions
☐ Name
☐ Where you work/what you’re working on
☐ Goals for today
@eric3000

4. I'm Eric Metelka, founder and CEO of Full Stack
Marketing, a full featured digital marketing
consulting firm for startups. I am a former
management consultant and the former digital
marketing manager at BestVendor.
@eric3000

5. My Goals for Today
You know how to choose the one metric
that matters to your product or brand
You are able to guide and construct a
usability test
You can align user behaviors and
motivations to create engagement
You understand the tactics to increase
referrals in your product
@eric3000

6. What I Am Going to Cover
☐ Introduction & Definitions – 30 mins
☐ Matching Metrics - 30 mins
☐ Activation – 30 mins
☐ Engagement – 30 mins
☐ Referral & Virality – 30 mins
☐ Recap/Evaluation/Questions - 15 mins
@eric3000

7. Definitions
@eric3000

8. Acquisition – noun /ˌækw ɪˌzɪʃ(ə)n/
• The process of buying something or
obtaining it in some other way
• When a customer comes to the site from
various channels or downloads an app
@eric3000

9. Examples of Acquisition
(note: not actuals)
Category User Status Conv % Est. Value
Acquisition Visit Site 100% $.01
(or landing page, or external widget)
Acquisition Doesn't Abandon 70% $.05
(views 2+ pages, stays 10+ sec, 2+ clicks)
@eric3000

10. Activation – noun /ˌ æktɪˌve ɪʃ(ə)n/
• Making a piece of equipment or a process
start working
• Starting the use of a product, often by
creating a login
• In ecommerce, starting the shopping process
by completing at least transaction
• In Mobile, using the basic features of the app
• Customer enjoys 1st visit: "happy" user
experience
@eric3000

11. Examples of Activation
(note: not actuals)
Category User Status Conv % Est. Value
Acquisition Visit Site 100% $.01
(or landing page, or external widget)
Acquisition Doesn't Abandon 70% $.05
(views 2+ pages, stays 10+ sec, 2+ clicks)
Activation Happy 1st Visit 30% $.25
(views X pages, stays Y sec, Z clicks)
Activation Email/Blog/RSS/Widget Signup 5% $1
(anything that could lead to repeat visit)
Activation Acct Signup 2% $3
(includes profile data)
@eric3000

12. Engagement - noun /ɪnˌ ɡeɪdʒmənt/
• The feeling of being involved in a
particular activity
• The period of time during which a user
such stays involved with your product
• Customers come back and visit site
multiple times
@eric3000

13. Examples of Engagement
(note: not actuals)
Category User Status Conv % Est. Value
Acquisition Visit Site 100% $.01
(or landing page, or external widget)
Acquisition Doesn't Abandon 70% $.05
(views 2+ pages, stays 10+ sec, 2+ clicks)
Activation Happy 1st Visit 30% $.25
(views X pages, stays Y sec, Z clicks)
Activation Email/Blog/RSS/Widget Signup 5% $1
(anything that could lead to repeat visit)
Activation Acct Signup 2% $3
(includes profile data)
Engagement Email Open / RSS view -> Clickthru 3% $2
Engagement Repeat Visitor 2% $5
(3+ visits in first 30 days)
@eric3000

14. ɪ
Virality- noun /vʌɪˌral ti/
• The tendency of an image, video, or piece
of information to be circulated rapidly and
widely from one Internet user to another
• Customers like product enough to refer
others
@eric3000

15. Examples of Virality
(note: not actuals)
Category User Status Conv % Est. Value
Acquisition Visit Site 100% $.01
(or landing page, or external widget)
Acquisition Doesn't Abandon 70% $.05
(views 2+ pages, stays 10+ sec, 2+ clicks)
Activation Happy 1st Visit 30% $.25
(views X pages, stays Y sec, Z clicks)
Activation Email/Blog/RSS/Widget Signup 5% $1
(anything that could lead to repeat visit)
Activation Acct Signup 2% $3
(includes profile data)
Engagement Email Open / RSS view -> Clickthru 3% $2
Engagement Repeat Visitor 2% $5
(3+ visits in first 30 days)
Virality Refer 1+ users who visit site 2% $3
Virality Refer 1+ users who activate 1% $10
@eric3000

16. Matching Metrics to Your Business
@eric3000

17. Types of Metrics & Measurement
• Qualitative: Usability Testing / Session Monitoring
– Watch what users do, figure out problems & solutions from small # of
users
• Quantitative: Traffic Analysis / User Engagement
– Report what users do, track usage & conversion %'s for all or empirical
sample # of users
• Comparative: A/B, Multivariate Testing
– Compare what users do in one scenario vs another, see which
copy/graphics/UI are most effective
• Competitive: Monitoring & Tracking Competitors
– Track competitor activity & compare against yours; if possible compare
channels, keyword traffic, demographic targeting, user satisfaction, etc.
@eric3000

18. Measurement Tools
• Qualitative: Usability Testing / Session Monitoring
– Qualtrics (surveys), CrazyEgg (heatmap), TechSmith Morae / UserVue
(ux recording), RobotReplay, TapeFailure.
• Quantitative: Traffic Analysis / User Engagement
– Google Analytics (free), Mixpanel, Kissmetrics, Flurry, MyBlogLog,
ClickTracks, Index Tools, Visual Sciences / Webside Story, Omniture,
WebTrends.
• Comparative: A/B, Multivariate Testing
– Google Website Optimizer, SiteSpect, Optimost, Offermatica, Vertster,
Kefta.
• Competitive: Monitoring & Tracking Competitors
– Quantcast, Compete.com, Alexa, Hitwise, Comscore, Nielsens.
@eric3000

19. Customer Funnel
@eric3000

20. Metric Funnel
@eric3000

21. Your Business Model Your Business Stage
(Monetization) (Lifecycle)
• Ecommerce • Empathy
• 2 sided market • Stickiness
• SaaS • Virality
• Mobile app • Revenue
• User-generated content • Scale
• Media
@eric3000

22. E- 2 Sided Mobile User-gen
commerce Market SaaS app content Media
Empathy Interviews, qualitative results, quantitative scoring, surveys
Loyalty, Inventory, Engagement, Downloads, Traffic, visits,
Content, spam
Stickiness conversion listings churn churn, virality returns
CAC, shares, Inherent WoM, app Content,
SEM, sharing Invites, sharing
Virality reactivation virality, CAC ratings, CAC virality, SEM
(Money from transactions) (Money from active users) (Money from ad clicks)
Transactions, Transactions, Upselling, CAC, CPE, affiliate %,
Revenue CLV Commission CLV
CLV, ARPDAU Ads, donations
eyeballs
Scale Affiliates, whit Other verticals
API, magic #, Spinoffs, publis Analytics, user Syndication,
e-label marketplace hers data licenses
@eric3000

23. What metrics would you want to
look at? What direction do you
want the metric to be going in?
@eric3000

24. E- 2 Sided Mobile User-gen
commerce Market SaaS app content Media
Empathy Interviews, qualitative results, quantitative scoring, surveys
Loyalty, Inventory, Engagement, Downloads, Traffic, visits, re
Content, spam
Stickiness conversion listings churn churn, virality turns
CAC, shares, Inherent WoM, app Content,
SEM, sharing Invites, sharing
Virality reactivation virality, CAC ratings, CAC virality, SEM
(Money from transactions) (Money from active users) (Money from ad clicks)
Transactions, Transactions, Upselling, CAC, CPE, affiliate %,
Revenue CLV Commission CLV
CLV, ARPDAU Ads, donations
eyeballs
Scale Affiliates, Other verticals
API, magic Spinoffs, Analytics, user Syndication,
white-label #, marketplace publishers data licenses
@eric3000

25. Choose one actionable metric to
follow
Understand your product market
and stage
@eric3000

26. Activation
@eric3000

27. Customer Funnel
SEO Campaigns,
SEM PR Contests Biz Dev
Social
Networks
Blogs Affiliates
Apps & Direct, Tel,
Widgets Email TV
Domains
1. ACQUISITION
Website.com
@eric3000

28. Customer Funnel
SEO Campaigns,
SEM PR Contests Biz Dev
Social
Networks
Blogs Affiliates
Apps & Direct, Tel,
Widgets Email TV
Domains
1. ACQUISITION
Marketing Channels:
•Largest volume (#)
•Lowest cost ($)
•Best performing (%)
Website.com
@eric3000

29. Customer Funnel
SEO Campaigns,
SEM PR Contests Biz Dev
Social
Networks
Blogs Affiliates
Apps & Direct, Tel,
Widgets Email TV
Domains
1. ACQUISITION
Homepage / Landing
Page
Product
Features
Website.com
@eric3000

30. Customer Funnel
SEO Campaigns,
SEM PR Contests Biz Dev
Illustrative Activation
Social
Networks Criteria:
Blogs Affiliates
Apps & Direct, Tel, • 10-30+ seconds
Widgets Email TV
1. ACQUISITION • 2-3+ page views
Domains
• 3-5+ clicks
Homepage / Landing • 1 key feature usage
Page
Product
Features
Website.com
@eric3000

31. Customer Funnel
SEO Campaigns,
SEM PR Contests Biz Dev
Illustrative Activation
Social
Networks Criteria:
Blogs Affiliates
Apps & Direct, Tel, • 10-30+ seconds
Widgets Email TV
1. ACQUISITION • 2-3+ page views
Domains
• 3-5+ clicks
Homepage / Landing • 1 key feature usage
Page
Product Do LOTS of landing
Features page tests & A/B tests -
just make lots of dumb
guesses & iterate QUICK
Website.com
@eric3000

32. How to Test Activation
• Performance - an objective measure of
how well a particular website works. It is
strictly utilitarian, and it is concerned
primarily with effectiveness and efficiency.
@eric3000

33. Performance Metrics
 Task Test - observing the
steps testers take to
complete task actions
@eric3000

34. How to Test Activation II
• Satisfaction - a subjective measure of
how users feel while interacting with a
website. It is concerned with how the
information looks, how the content is
organized, and how the user feels
navigating around the site.
@eric3000

35. Satisfaction Testing
 Open-Ended Test –
monitoring tester
exploration of the site
without specific instructions
@eric3000

36. Implementing Testing
@eric3000

37. Diagnosing Your Site
@eric3000

38. Activity: Google “Jeans”
@eric3000

39. @eric3000

40. Raise your hand when you bounce
from the page
@eric3000

41. Testing is crucial to activating new
customers
Understand the difference between
performance goals and satisfaction
goals
@eric3000

42. Engagement
@eric3000

43. Customer Funnel Campaigns,
SEO
SEM PR Contests Biz
Social
Network Dev
Blogs Affiliates
s
Apps & Direct,
Widgets Email Tel, TV
Domains
1. ACQUISITION
Homepage / Landing
Page
Automated
Emails
Product
Features
System Events & Time-
based Features
Blogs, Content
Website.com
@eric3000

44. Customer Funnel Campaigns,
SEO
SEM PR Contests Biz
Social
Network Dev
Blogs Affiliates
Automated emails are simple & s
Apps & Direct,
easy retention feature. Lifecycle Widgets Email Tel, TV
emails @ +3, +7, +30d Domains
1. ACQUISITION
Homepage / Landing
Page
Automated
Emails
Product
Features
System Events & Time-
based Features
Blogs, Content
Website.com
@eric3000

45. Customer Funnel Campaigns,
SEO
SEM PR Contests Biz
Social
Network Dev
Blogs Affiliates
Automated emails are simple & s
Apps & Direct, Tel
easy retention feature. Lifecycle Widgets Email , TV
emails @ +3, +7, +30d Domains
1. ACQUISITION
Homepage / Landing
Page
Event-based emails Automated
Emails
as they occur Product
Features
System Events & Time-
based Features
Blogs, Content
Website.com
@eric3000

46. Customer Funnel Campaigns,
SEO
SEM PR Contests Biz
Social
Network Dev
Blogs Affiliates
Automated emails are simple & s
Apps & Direct,
easy retention feature. Lifecycle Widgets Email Tel, TV
emails @ +3, +7, +30d Domains
1. ACQUISITION
Homepage / Landing
Page
Event-based emails Automated
Emails
as they occur Product
Features
System Events & Time-
based Features
Blogs, Content
Email newsletters
weekly/monthly Website.com
@eric3000

47. Community Building - Yelp
@eric3000

48. Citysearch had a 28-month head
start and had collected more than
112,000 restaurant reviews by the
time Yelp had its first restaurant
review
@eric3000

49. Yelp Members Write More Reviews
@eric3000

50. How Did Yelp Build Community?
Tie Identity &  Yelp members have a public profile page that
Reputation to records their activities
Product
 Member reviews rated as intelligent, fair,
Encourage Quality knowledgeable, public- spirited, and cool
with Signals
 Members rewarded with “elite” status in profile
On-line and Off-line  Exclusive access to offline parties and events
Rewards
 Some members are hired as community
Empowering Users managers
 Discussion forum for further adding to the site’s
social aspects
@eric3000

51. @eric3000

52. Rewards
@eric3000

53. Notifications of New Content
@eric3000

54. Email Newsletters Curate Content
Interesting
Personalized
Timely
@eric3000

55. Lifecycle Emails Re-engage Lapsed Customers
@eric3000

56. Align user motivation, behavior, and long-
term value
Reward members for their contribution
Re-engage your customers via the
appropriate channel (Email today)
Listen to your customers and understand
how they are using your product
@eric3000

57. Referral & Virality
@eric3000

58. Customer Funnel
SEO Campaigns,
SEM PR Contests Biz
Social
Networ Blogs Affiliate Dev
ks
Apps & s Direct,
Widgets Email Tel, TV Campaigns,
Domain
1. ACQUISITION Contests
s
Homepage / Landing
Emails & Page
Alerts
Emails &
Product widgets
System Events & Time- Features
based Features
Blogs, Content
Website.com
@eric3000

59. Customer Funnel
SEO Campaigns,
SEM PR Contests Biz
Social
Networ Blogs Affiliate Dev
ks
Apps & s Direct,
Widgets Email Tel, TV Campaigns,
Domain
1. ACQUISITION Contests
s
Homepage / Landing
Emails & Page
Alerts
Emails &
Product widgets
System Events & Time- Features
based Features
Blogs, Content
Only encourage users to
refer *after* they have
“happy” user experience;
Website.com avg score >= 8 out of 10
@eric3000

60. Calculating Growth
Conversion
K = i X
%
@eric3000

61. Calculating Growth
Number of
Invitations
Invitations
Accepted
Viral Sent
coefficient = X
(K) Number of
Number of
Invitations
Users
Sent
@eric3000

62. Calculating Growth
Invitations
Accepted
Viral
coefficient =
(K)
Number of
Users
@eric3000

63. Math
You have 2000 customers
Those customers invite 5000 of their
friends
Of those invitations, 500 are accepted
@eric3000

64. Math
You have 2000 customers
Those customers invite 5000 of their
friends
Of those invitations, 500 are accepted
How fast are you growing?
Are you viral?
@eric3000

65. Math
You have 2000 customers
Those customers invite 5000 of their
friends
Of those invitations, 500 are accepted
How fast are you growing? K = .25
Are you viral? No
@eric3000

66. Trend to Zero
2700
2600
2500
2400
2300
2200
2100
2000
@eric3000

67. Math
You have 2000 customers
Those customers invite 5000 of their
friends
Of those invitations, 2500 are accepted
How fast are you growing?
Are you viral?
@eric3000

68. Math
You have 2000 customers
Those customers invite 5000 of their
friends
Of those invitations, 2500 are accepted
How fast are you growing? 1.25
Are you viral? Yes!
@eric3000

69. Viral Growth
92000
82000
72000
62000
52000
42000
32000
22000
12000
2000
@eric3000

70. How to Increase K
Conversion
K = i X
%
@eric3000

71. How to Increase K
Conversion
K = i X
%
 Make invites central to the product
 Network effects
 Reward for invites
 Dropbox
 Gamification
 Make sending invites easy
 Social sharing
@eric3000

72. How to Increase K
Conversion
K = i X
%
 Test invite creative
 Test invite format
 Social?
 Email?
 SMS?
 Test sign-up incentives
 Dropbox
@eric3000

73. The Actual Formula Is a Bit More Complicated…
@eric3000

74. The Actual Formula Is a Bit More Complicated…
TIME!
@eric3000

75. How to Increase Speed
@eric3000

76. So Should I Put Like Buttons Everywhere?
@eric3000

77. So Should I Put Like Buttons Everywhere?
How can a customer create content that
reaches non-customers?
@eric3000

78. So Should I Put Like Buttons Everywhere?
How can a customer create content that
reaches non-customers?
How does a customer’s experience get
better when they are connected to more
users?
@eric3000

79. So Should I Put Like Buttons Everywhere?
How can a customer create content that
reaches non-customers?
How does a customer’s experience get
better when they are connected to more
users?
How does a customer benefit from
reaching out to a non-user?
@eric3000

80. So Should I Put Like Buttons Everywhere?
How can a customer create content that
reaches non-customers?
How does a customer’s experience get
better when they are connected to more
users?
How does a customer benefit from
reaching out to a non-user?
What percentage of growth comes from
this channel versus others?
@eric3000

81. Conclusion
@eric3000

82. Choose One Actionable Metric to
Follow
@eric3000

83. Testing is crucial to activating new
customers
@eric3000

84. Align user
motivation, behavior, and long-term
value
@eric3000

85. Determine if and how viral growth
aligns with your value proposition
@eric3000

86. Questions?
@eric3000

87. Digital Marketing Reading List
 Kissmetrics Blog -http://blog.kissmetrics.com/
 Andrew Chen – http://andrewchen.co
 Rand Fishkin – http://moz.com/rand
 SEOMoz blog – http://SEOmoz.org/blog
 Inbound – http://inbound.org
 Conversion Rate Experts -
http://www.conversion-rate-experts.com/blog/
 Slideshare - http://www.slideshare.net/
@eric3000

88. Email: e.metelka@gmail.com
Twitter: @eric3000
LinkedIn: /in/emetelka
Facebook: /e.metelka
Download Slides:
www.slideshare.net/emetelka/
Please fill out evaluation forms
@eric3000