As you work in this business year after year you learn that there are many ways that you can cut your expenses and become more economical in your approaches to marketing your products, services and/or programs. One way you can minimize expenses is by testing the ads that you are using.
Everybody always talks about testing publications or asks what publication does the best. That's a good question to ask but you need to consider the other half of the equation. What about the ad you are using. You could advertise in the best publication in the world but have a lousy ad. Of course when that happens it is usually the publication that takes the bad rap! "Yeah, I tried that publication and I didn't get any results.."! If you are getting minimal results from your ad, you might need to step back and take a look at it. You may be just throwing your advertising money away.
Whether you are marketing a product, service or a program, you should have several different ads for each. You need to test each to see how it does. One way to do it is to take two different ads for the same product or service. They should be similar in size but different in setup and copy. Run one in a publication of your choice and then run the second one in the next issue of the same publication.
It is important to "key" each ad differently so that you can tell what ad and publication the response came from. One of the easiest ways to key an ad is to use the two step method, i.e., use an email address in the ad for more details and then send them the details. This way you can tell them in the ad to put a specific phrase in the subject of the email like: "Home Income 99" and "Income At Home". You would use one for the first ad and the other for the second ad. That way you can track and analyze the results.
You want to test both ads in separate issues of the same publication so that you can tell how each ad pulls responses and then compare the results. You then try the same test with the same two ads in another publication. If one ad seems to pull better than the other, get rid of the bad one. It might also work out that you end up using a combination of both. Of course you can conduct the same type test with your offline advertising.
Many publications have ad specials where you pay for two insertions, you get a third free, or a similar combination. When you place your order, send both your ads or even three slightly different ads and ask the publisher to change the ad in each issue.
You want to get the best results for your advertising money so you need to know how the ad does. And the only way you can find out is by testing it. Once you have a great pulling ad and a great publication to put it in, you are on your way to success!
Don't work in the dark, work smarter!
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