08/19/2022

12 Tips To Gain Customers With Tripwire Marketing

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Your conversion rate is not satisfactory. You’re not selling what people want. Tripwire marketing might be the solution.

Tripwire marketing may sound a bit shady. It might seem like you are trying to win one over your customer. This is not true.

Tripwire marketing has been used by advertising and marketing professionals for decades. It works in both online and offline stores. It’s actually more effective than ever because you can easily keep in touch with your customer.

What is tripwire marketing? How does it work? These are just two of many questions I’ll be answering for you today.

You can skip to a specific topic if you are interested. 

What is Tripwire Marketing?

Tripwire marketing is a conversion-acceleration hack that convinces target consumers to buy something small from you rather than a more expensive product or marketing services in Phoenix.

You can convert more customers with tripwire marketing. There are two options.

First, you need to lure customers with low-cost deals.

Think about selling online courses. A monster e-course is offered with dozens of videos, articles and other assets and it’s priced at 1,000.

This is a large amount of money to spend on a company that he doesn’t know anything about. You might not have the social proof to convert customers or overcome objections if you haven’t been in business for a while.

You might offer a mini-course to encourage conversions. You might include a few videos, checklists and articles.

This course is priced at $20, $100 or less to make it more appealing to potential customers. People are more inclined to spend smaller amounts than large sums of money.

Then, you create a tripwire advertising campaign. Your proof of concept is the tripwire, your mini-course. This proves to your customers that what you promise is true. You can market to them via email or other methods to convert them to the larger product once they are a part of your sales funnel.

The second strategy for tripwire marketing focuses on consumer behavior.

Let’s suppose you offer a subscription service that charges $30 per month. Customer A is a loyal customer for six months and then suddenly decides to cancel his subscription.

This is a tripwire.

Email marketing can be used to attract Customer A. You can then reach out to Customer A via email to find out what went wrong and how you can improve your subscription service. You can then offer a deal that is hard to miss, like a one-month subscription for $5, instead of $30. And you have the option of canceling at any time.

Both tripwire marketing campaigns can generate incredible ROI. But let’s look at the reasons for their often-impressive results.

How Tripwire Marketing can help you convert more customers

The percentage of people who accept an offer and take it up is your conversion rate. It’s as simple as that.

Your conversions will rise if you make your offer more attractive, such as by creating a lower-cost alternative to a costly product. It’s up to you to provide enough value to justify additional purchases.

Lead magnets are still relevant. 

Why? People don’t always value freedom.

Business Insider has published an excerpt from Ramit Sethi, bestselling author, ” Your move: The Underdog’s guide to building your business,”

“People value what is paid for…”

Sethi claims that he used to give free copies of his $2,000 course. Sethi just wanted to help others. Most people never logged in.

He points out that if you don’t place a value on your product, prospects won’t either. If you charge even a small amount, it sends the message that you value your product and should be shared with everyone.

Example Tripwire Funnel

Tripwire marketing should be part of your conversion funnel strategy. It deserves its own space.

Depending on how you use it, the tripwire can be placed in several places within your funnel.

Many marketers employ tripwires as a top-of-funnel strategy. They use content marketing and SEO to increase web traffic. Then they offer a huge amount of value at a very low price. This is a great way for people to be converted quickly.

It can be used in the middle of your funnel. Let’s suppose you have an email database of people who downloaded your lead magnet. You can set up a drip campaign, a series or emails that promotes your tripwire offer.

Consider tripwire marketing as a way to retain customers. Offer customers a great deal on something that is extremely valuable, and then slip them into another drip marketing campaign to promote your more costly product or marketing services in Miami.

Your Tripwire Strategy

Tripwire marketing is a strategy. You can’t just throw it together and hope consumers take it. Your tripwire should be an integral part of your business.

Recall the questions that you asked yourself before designing any marketing strategy.

  1. Who are your target customers?
  2. What do they want?
  3. What is stopping them from achieving what they desire?
  4. What can you do to help?

These questions will help you create a tripwire product that you can market effectively once you have answered them correctly.

Use the tripwire to entice customers back to you if they have stopped purchasing from you. Send an email saying, “Hey, this is a super-low priced product that I think you might like.”

Remind the prospect that the original product is still available after they accept your offer.

How to create a tripwire

Let’s dive into the details of tripwire marketing now that you are familiar with it. How can you create a tripwire to increase conversions for your company?

Tripwires that meet specific needs and desires are the best. You can start by analyzing the data you have already based on consumer purchasing habits and other user behavior.

Step 1: Review your product/service line

What products are you offering? What are their prices? These are two important questions to ask when creating a tripwire. You need to understand what motivates your audience.

Consider common objections to your products and services. Perhaps your target market finds them too costly, or maybe you’re new in the industry, and you don’t have enough trust.

You can sell more than one product or service. Figure out which one is most popular. This should be your tripwire, as your most-sold item is already in high demand.

Perhaps you sell hidden object games. Customers can download them and then play them. Your conversions are lower than what you would like, as most games cost about $12.

You should focus on the most downloaded games. It is up to you to decide which games you will be focusing on. These will be the basis of your tripwire in step 2.

Step 3: Create a new version that is cheaper but still has value

I am not saying that you shouldn’t take a big financial hit for your company. Don’t give away online games for free because no one is buying them.

You can either create a new product or service version — think “product life” — or bundle several low-cost items at a huge discount.

This goal is very similar to a lead magnet. Because it is a great deal, you want people to purchase your product.

Step 4: Create an email drip campaign to notify customers who purchase the tripwire product

Don’t stop selling tripwire items once you have sold them. You can nurture your leads through email communication.

These customers should return to your business and spend more. You must remind them about the value they received by using your tripwire products.

Send them to your blog and invite them to follow your social media. End each email with a CTA to purchase your more expensive product. It should be directly related to your tripwire.

If your audience purchased a hidden-object bundle for $1, they shouldn’t be asked to convert on an offer for first-person shooter games. Your target audience is not the right one.

Step 5: Highlight your tripwire product on your website

Your tripwire marketing campaign’s success depends on its exposure. Prospects won’t buy if they can’t find it.

You might consider adding a tripwire to your navigation bar. To grab your visitors’ attention, you could also use a Hello Bar.

Do not forget to highlight the value proposition. It’s not just about what the customer will receive, but also the low price. The following CTA could be used: “Get 4 of our most popular games for only $1!” Offer ends soon.”

A limited-time tripwire can increase conversions. Rotate your offers if there is more than one to take advantage of urgency. 

Step 6: To capture more emails, add a lead magnet on your conversion forms

Email marketing, tripwire marketing, and lead magnets can all work in harmony. You should only focus on one CTA in most cases. Sometimes, giving prospects the option to choose can pay off.

Let’s suppose you have three products.

  1. Huge online course (main product)
  2. Mini course (tripwire product)
  3. A short e-book (lead magnetic)

Tripwire is a happy middle ground between expensive and free.

This strategy is also applicable to other industries, such as SaaS. These are just a few of the options:

  • Primary SaaS product
  • Trial Offer: $10
  • Free Demo

You can limit the features of the demo free, so if your audience is interested in the full package they may choose to pay $10 instead.

It’s not necessary to leave money on the table. You can give the demo to people who might buy your product.

Step 7: Contact tripwire customers for feedback

Do not miss the chance to receive feedback directly from customers. This is something I do all the time.

Recently, I sent an email to my subscribers asking for feedback. This is how it looked:

Notice how I didn’t ask them to answer any polls or fill out surveys. I wanted them to reply to my emails and give me their detailed feedback.

You can also do it. You might need to go through hundreds, or even thousands of emails to get the right feedback, but it will provide valuable insight that you can use to improve your tripwire marketing efforts.

What is a good conversion rate for a tripwire?

Although there is no “good conversion rate for tripwire marketing”, you can still learn from case studies. One example is, which achieved a conversion rate close to 10 percent by using a tripwire that cost $9.95

Their upsell rate, which is the percentage of people who purchased the larger product, was 26 percent. This is quite impressive.

While you might not see the same results as your competitor, you can continue to refine your tripwire marketing efforts until the strategy results in the highest conversions.

Optimize Tripwire’s Conversions using Website Optimization Tools

A key factor in the success of your tripwire marketing campaign is conversion rate optimization (CRO). Although you have a strong strategy in place to attract more customers, the tools to better understand your audience are essential to make it work.

Take, for example, the behavior of your website visitors when they arrive on your site. Which pages do they first visit? What length of time do they spend scrolling? How far can they scroll?

These results can be obtained from user behavior reports such as scroll maps and heat maps. These tools enable you to visualize user behavior and make the most of what you learn.

For example, a heatmap might show high activity in your lead magnet form. You might try replacing this area with your tripwire offering.

However, don’t trust your intuition. To find the best places, continue to test your tripwire offers on the website.

Get started now: 12 Tripwire Marketing Tips

Tripwire marketing is not something you should wait for. Start promoting your offer and generating more sales.

These 12 tripwire ideas might help you get your ideas across.

  1. E-book
  2. Content upgrade
  3. Webinar
  4. 15-minute consultation
  5. Checklist or cheat sheet
  6. Instructional video
  7. Trial period
  8. Email consultations
  9. Partial product
  10. Downloads: X
  11. Get X products at $X

All of these tripwires are possible, but it all depends on the business model.

DesignCuts.com shows tripwire marketing at work. This is an extreme example of how the method works.

DesignCuts offers creative asset bundles at steep discounts, usually up to 97 percent.

It might seem like a standard marketing strategy, but it is not. DesignCuts encourages you to purchase these bundles at a steep discount but also allows you to purchase individual products from its marketplace.

Tripwire marketing, as you can see in DesignCuts and other similar businesses can be used as both a foundational strategy and as an addition to your existing marketing efforts.

Conclusion

What is tripwire marketing?

This is a way for you to convince your audience to purchase a product from your business at a lower price. This action initiates a marketing campaign to convert these buyers to more costly offers.

Tripwire marketing can be used to bring back customers that have vanished into the ether. Remind them that you are still around and that they purchased from you.

These are 12 tripwire marketing tips that I have provided, but you’re free to come up with your own. Then, target your audience’s pain points and offer a product that they won’t resist.

About the author

Kobe Digital is a unified team of performance marketing, design, and video production experts. Our mastery of these disciplines is what makes us effective. Our ability to integrate them seamlessly is what makes us unique.