Testing. Testing. Marketing is a Science.
Posted on | September 28, 2009 | No Comments
What is the difference between “pea green” and “sea green”? Or between the word “buy” and “purchase”? How about the different between a model wearing glasses and one without?
In the world of marketing, these small changes, slight as they may appear to the untrained eye are the ingredients for a successful marketing campaign. As consumers, people minds are constantly reacting to subtle cues in marketing, branding, and media. On the surface a slight variation in color is a trivial change but to the psyche of your target market, this slight alteration creates a whole different set of clues about your company, product or service – most of the time reacted to by your consumer but usually completely unbeknownst to that very same consumer.
Now your job, as the psychological and marketing genius that you are, is to figure out what clues to give and how to give them. This is done is a series of ways but lets start with the easy ones.
(Let me digress for a moment to give kudos to what a consider a particularly good marketing genius. The idea for this post came from a entry I read recently on the Four Hour Work Week blog created by Tim Ferriss, author of “The Four Hour Work Week” (to purchase this book, click here). This is a constant read for me as I find it intriguing and baffling the way the his mind works but through extensive experimentation, he has become an out-of-the-box marketing genius. See my previous post on Tim Ferriss titled “Tim Ferriss – Marketing Outrageously” by clicking here.)
Sending the right message
1. Draw a picture of how you want to be perceived in your field. By draw, I mean map out. No art skills needed here. Are you reaching a market that expects your company to be edgy, funny, professional, even dry? If you were to describe what your target market is looking for in 5 words, what would they be?
2. Now take that map and create 3 examples of what you think your clients are looking for. This is where the testing will begin. The are a lot of factors in testing two so it is important that you start with this image in your own mind and develop it from there.
3. With three mockups in hand (be they what they may such as landing pages, print ad copies, email newsletters, etc). Divide your mailing list, marketing effort or advertising in three equal (as equal as you can) parts. Your goal here is to create a constant in the testing. Once you have 3 equal parts, send out a test to an equal portion of each list.
4. Track which piece performed best. This should be based on things like layout, color, actions steps, etc.
5. Take the best layout and perform the same test with different verbiage, calls to action, etc.
Tags: marketing > marketing testing > tim ferriss
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