Sharing this information and your thought processes is great, so thanks for doing that. Looking at your website, it's still not clear to me why I would want to sign up - there's no call to action on the homepage saying what I'd be signing up for, just a tagline, a slidehow with a cryptic headline and a find out more, and an advert (and some blog links below the fold).
Why not put "spend 10 minutes, everyday, being taken on a journey around the world" front and centre on the homepage? (I found that text on the why sign up page only after the slideshow got to the last slide, then it moved, then I found the buttons to get back to that slide, etc etc, gah!)
I like the concept, although I'm not sure I want to read 1000 words a day on a random location – on the one hand, 1000 words can be skim-read (and the pretty pictures admired) in ~5 minutes; on the other, if it was a little longer and did take ten minutes, would I want to read it every day? Probably not, and if I'm not going to read it I probably don't want it in my e-mail inbox.
The advantage of a weekly digest is that I can read the ones that I'm interested in. I really look forward to my Quora digest for example. Daily engagement is something I give to my wife, not a travel blog.
Not everyone wants to go around the world and experience everything, but most people would be interested in, say, 10-30% of your destinations. I think your target audience of people who want to go everywhere and experience everything is too small and I almost wonder if its (not trying to be rude here, but can't think of a better word for it) snobbery on your part - I'm guessing you have all travelled a lot and see a lot of value in experiencing things from other cultures and places, even if they are not to your taste. Most people aren't like that.
Thanks for your time and input Robin, greatly appreciated.
Re: Call to action, I've made a minor tweak so the slide you mentioned is now front and centre. It can be improved, and will be - super valuable suggestion.
We can definitely do something differently around your "read 1000 words a day" thoughts. The emails are generally 3-4 photos and 150 words, which can be clicked through to the long article by the fraction of readers specifically interested in that location (or bored that day). That fact isn't clear from the site, and may be putting people off.
Your snobbery point is well made. I don't feel we're targeting people who want to go everywhere - more people who are entertained by varied travel stories, even if the story merely confirms that they never want to do that themselves.
Lastly - if we end up changing the whole business model from daily to weekly, I'm voting for Daily engagement is something I give to my wife, not a travel blog. to be the new company tagline. Thanks again.
Ah, I hadn't signed up for the e-mail I'm afraid so I hadn't seen the daily e-mail is just a section of the blog entry. That makes more sense and does enable the sort of filtering I was thinking of.
Best of luck, glad the input was helpful – I should get on with some real work now :)
Just throwing in my vote as another person who doesn't want this daily but would happily receive it weekly. I have enough happening in my inbox without adding another message every day - but once a week would be fine.
Thanks for taking the time to write this all down - Jacob and I really appreciate the feedback.
I absolutely agree with your points about the call to action - it's funny how often you can't see something that you've built from a different perspective when you've spent hours working on it.
We've also been given a lot of feedback about providing a weekly digest option, and that's something we're planning to put in place.
Why not put "spend 10 minutes, everyday, being taken on a journey around the world" front and centre on the homepage? (I found that text on the why sign up page only after the slideshow got to the last slide, then it moved, then I found the buttons to get back to that slide, etc etc, gah!)
I like the concept, although I'm not sure I want to read 1000 words a day on a random location – on the one hand, 1000 words can be skim-read (and the pretty pictures admired) in ~5 minutes; on the other, if it was a little longer and did take ten minutes, would I want to read it every day? Probably not, and if I'm not going to read it I probably don't want it in my e-mail inbox.
The advantage of a weekly digest is that I can read the ones that I'm interested in. I really look forward to my Quora digest for example. Daily engagement is something I give to my wife, not a travel blog.
Not everyone wants to go around the world and experience everything, but most people would be interested in, say, 10-30% of your destinations. I think your target audience of people who want to go everywhere and experience everything is too small and I almost wonder if its (not trying to be rude here, but can't think of a better word for it) snobbery on your part - I'm guessing you have all travelled a lot and see a lot of value in experiencing things from other cultures and places, even if they are not to your taste. Most people aren't like that.