One of my favorite ways to learn and get new ideas for conversion rate optimization comes from reading detailed case studies. 

I’m not talking about the kind of vague “case studies” that tell you about one minor change to a page they made and how it increased sales by 450%.  I’m talking about detailed walkthroughs. The kind of case studies that share the entire process from A-Z and give you the whole picture so you can draw your own conclusions and then test that approach on your own. 

That’s why I’m excited to share this full emotional marketing example in the form of a case study breakdown. It’s the complete step-by-step of how we helped PowerUp Toys increase their sales. I’m giving you the process so that you can feel empowered to do it yourself. 

This isn’t “a copy and paste it” kind of case study. I’m not going to just introduce the headline we optimized and tell you to try it yourself. I’m going to break down the process and the steps we took so you can apply them to your own audience and funnel. 

First, let’s talk about PowerUp Toys

Powerup Toys is an eCommerce business that sells its products on both its own website AND Amazon. They create devices that turn standard paper planes into incredible, remote-controlled flying machines. 

What stands out about PowerUp Toys is that it started out as a small family business back in 2012 (when they launched their first Kickstarter campaign) and has since grown into a great business. 

Why Powerup Toys Hired Getuplift

Shai Goitein, Founder of PowerUp Toys, and his team know how to get traffic to their e-commerce website. They use a mixture of organic search and social media advertising to pull people in. People were coming to the website in droves. But there was a problem.

The Problem: Despite all these people visiting the website, few of them were converting into buyers. 

In addition, PowerUp Toys was getting ready to launch a new product and had to make sure everything on the website and supporting funnels was working toward a successful launch. 

It was a few months before the launch that Powerup Toys hired us to do a deep dive into their funnels and customers’ needs so we could optimize their website and increase sales dramatically.

The Conversion Optimization Process

The GetUplift team conducted a month-long period of in-depth, customer-focused research that began with extensive customer interviews. These customer interviews helped the team identify:

• What Powerup Toys was doing well
• Areas of improvement
• Friction points
• Emotional triggers that were driving purchase decisions

The interviews were one of the most successful parts of our research. 

We asked past customers:

“What was going on in your life that made you search for a solution like Powerup Toys?”.

An important question that is often neglected (oftentimes the question is: “Why did you purchase X / sign up for X?” instead of focusing on the pain they were experiencing). 

Most people replied to this question with a standard:

“I was searching for a present or something to do with my kid or something to play around with myself.” 

But we didn’t stop there. The next question we asked was a simple “WHY?” 

Such a simple question that can lead to the real, underlying reasons behind a purchase. 

Pro Tip: When interviewing, never settle for the immediate reply. Always ask WHY. 

You’ll be amazed at what great answers you can get and how deeper you can dig. 

The answers we received to our question were a gold mine: 

• “I love DIYing and tinkering with products to make them work”
• “Was excited to figure out how to make it fly!”
• “Brings me back to my childhood flying paper airplanes in the classroom”
• “Our older son loves paper airplanes, we had trouble finding the floor for all the planes he’d made”

Thanks to this research, we uncovered two clearly defined archetypes of customers that were buying from them:

1. DIYers/inventors who are happy with a product that’s not fully baked, aren’t afraid of making mistakes, and want to discover how the product works for themselves, without lots of guidance and information.
2. And the Hobbyists who want a fully baked product with clear step-by-step instructions and expect that if they do exactly what they’re told, everything will work. 

With this knowledge, we could evaluate the website and funnel in a whole new way and clearly answer the questions: 

• Are we speaking our prospect’s language? 
• Can they clearly understand and see that our products are for them? 

The answers were no. 

PowerUp’s website wasn’t speaking to any of their ideal target audiences, it was sending mixed messages:

1. Anyone that expects instant gratification would be disappointed. 
2. DIYers – couldn’t figure out if the product was for them, or if it was a gimmick. 

The feedback we collected clearly showed that: 

Hobbyists described their post-purchase experience as… 

• “It was harder than I expected”
• “Trickier than the video” 
• “Couldn’t get it to work!”
• “My niece was disappointed”

The DIYers described their experience as:

• “It’s the crashes that teach you!”
• “Kept asking myself – how far can I push this??” 
• “WOW, We did it!”
• “We spent hours and days trying to put it together, it was brilliant”

PowerUp Toys have the PERFECT product for each of these prospects. We just needed to guide them toward the product they would enjoy the most. 

And that’s exactly what we did with all of our messaging, design, UX and navigation. 

Shai embraced this customer-first approach because it provided a fresh understanding of his customers. He was able to use the data to improve multiple areas of the business. Opening the doors of communication with customers allowed them to freely share their opinions and provided data that was used to create high-converting copy and a new website design.

Other Data Helped Support These Changes

Customer research was only the beginning. The GetUplift team also conducted a detailed website audit that included:

• Data analysis using heatmaps
• Google Analytics insights
• Conversion-design analysis
• Heuristic analysis
• UX analysis

This additional research provided key information about user behavior and helped the team clearly identify holes in PowerUp Toys’ sales funnel. 

What We Optimized On The Site

Following this research we optimized key pages on the site:

1. The homepage 
2. The main category page (where people see all the products)
3. The product pages 

Each of these core pages was optimized to include the right messaging, design, visuals, flow, and content that will help prospects easily find the product that was right for them, and checkout. 

Homepage header before

New homepage treatment

A header that clearly spells out where they have landed and who the products are for. 

While many e-commerce sites have a main CTA that sends prospects to one specific product, we decided to send them all to our “All Products” page, so they can clearly see there are different offers for different people. 

New sections added to the homepage for the different types of customers:

The Result? 95% Increase In Website Sales And 10X Signups 

Following the success of our original CRO project, we then continued to work with PowerUp Toys on all their email marketing sequences:

• Lead nurture 
• Cart abandonment 
• Post-purchase nurture sequence
• A “bring back” sales sequence that goes out to existing customers 3 months after purchase, winning them back (and upselling products)
  

And other email initiatives to ensure they continuously use messaging that appeals and converts their customers. 

Following best practices in marketing doesn’t deliver sustainable conversion results. GetUplift’s emotional targeting methodology works because we focus on identifying the emotions that drive the purchase decisions for the brand’s customers. Shai saw results because GetUplift created a conversion optimization strategy that put his customers’ emotional needs at the center.

Final Words

Most companies believe emotional marketing is a waste of time and resources. Our team at GetUplift has proven otherwise. We achieved meaningful results for PowerUp Toys and MANY other brands because both tactics form the foundation of what we do. 

The emotional targeting methodology we use at GetUplift is based on years of research into buyer psychology and the power of emotions. I share some of the best-kept secrets of this methodology in our flagship courses:

Emotion Sells

The Income Engine

In both of these courses, you get direct access to me and a community of entrepreneurs and business professionals who’re improving their conversion optimization processes. I share the methodology that helped Shai and the PowerUp Toys team achieve the amazing results described in this article. 

So, are you ready to create a conversion optimization process that works for all stages of your sales funnel? Check out the courses.