Yet we've seen marketer after marketer limit or eliminate the amount of testing they do. And major marketers fail to look at issues that can have the largest impacts on their businesses.
Hence, this Test Test. It's not meant to be exhaustive, just diagnostic.
Media-Lists
These apply to both traditional lists and email lists --
1. Have you run head-to-head tests of mass compilers? In your particular markets, the best known isn't always the best. Quality and selectability of data can change in just a few months' time.
2. Do you look for out-of-category winners? In the second mortgage/re-fi arena, everyone uses the same data sources. When The Money Store (now defunct) began a serious direct mail effort, the TV Guide subscribers list was tested and became a big winner. Why? It capitalized on the fact that the company had spent some $50 million in five years on television. Similarly, a timeshare marketer in Bermuda made "lifestyle" lists (House & Garden, Inc. Magazine, and Boston Magazine) work far better than against the previously used Bermuda Department of Tourism list.
3. Are you using modeling to help you carve out segments of previously unprofitable lists? Here are two cases of negligence. One is an investment newsletter publisher that has given up on the personal finance magazines without matching its active subscriber base against such files as Money, Smart Money, and the Bloomberg entry. Modeling has been proven to work because 15 years ago just a simple age/income zip screen produced acceptable results. The second is an upscale food magazine that can't make other food lists work.
Generating Qualified Visitors to Your Web Site
4. What media have you tested to get people to your site? You have more competition every day so you may need support of other media. Even highly successful EBay is using print catalogs to get prospects to their site. We know from the dot.com debacle that Super Bowl advertising is not worthwhile, but have you tested stripped-down mail packages or small space print?
5. Have you tested offering an incentive for prospects to click on? In addition to helping you evaluate the lead-generation powers of supporting media, it could actually boost response. It's the cyberspace version of the old Columbia House Gold Mailbox.
Offers
6. Now that you can't sell a Sweeps approach to management, you may have to come up with something else to engender interest. Post 9/11, Cause-Related Marketing must be tested. How much do you give to the cause, how much "flag-waving" should you do?
7. What are you doing about speed? Have you considered offering it as a premium? It's our old bugaboo updated for the Internet - you order a magazine online and it still takes 6-8 weeks to get the first issue. Are you going to get more orders if you promise delivery in a week? You bet. And the cost could be less than a conventional premium. And have you tested the offer of speed against NOT promising speed, but just doing it? What do you think the effect of the latter will be on collections, second orders and lifetime value?
8. Can you turn your product or service into a club or association situation? It's easier to renew a membership than a subscription, for example. And with all its internet configurations, affinity marketing is hotter than ever. What can you do to make your affinity offer stand out from others?
9. Have you looked at continuity propositions? Negative option clubs may be on their way out, but the countertrend is 'til forbid subscriptions. Continuity works particularly well in combination with 30 day free trial offers, and when the consumer can stop easily - e.g., via a few clicks on your web site.
Creative Strategies and Tactics
10. Have you tested capitalizing on one or more key societal trends? For example, how does your product or service fulfill the desire for connectivity? Will it satisfy the need for "little indulgences"? Is there a way for your creative to connect your product/service to the Harry Potter/Lord of the Rings phenomena? How do you weave 9/11 and its effects into the sales pitch for insurance, travel, high-end merchandise, health concerns?
11. Are you sure people have stopped reading long letters? You haven't been looking at what the investment and health newsletter publishers are doing. Bob Hacker related a highly-successful case of a 4 page letter lead generation letter his agency did for PriceWaterhouse/et al. to CEOs.
12. Did you ever test leaving out the brochure? This is particularly important in lead generation. You may be trying to sell the product instead of the next step in the sales process. Also, if you have a web site, that's your brochure. Test offering only an 800# and mail reply vs. getting prospects to click on to your site. You may find you get more responses without offering the click-on; better qualified responses from those who click on to your site first.
13. Experience the joys of UPsizing? Yah, you pay more postage and more lettershop among other things… but upsizing to a 9x12" envelope can help you break through clutter. And when you add appropriate bells and whistles, you can really drive up response rates and lower cost per response.
In situations where you have a severally limited universe and a high ticket product or service, you have to DIMENSIONalize. A 2% response rate means nothing if you're mailing to 2,000 people. You may need 20% or 30%, and the only way you'll get it is with something utterly intrusive.
14. … and DOWNsizing? Do the math. Suppose, for example, you have an extremely strong 9 x 12" control package (6-page letter, brochure, lift letter and L-shaped response form). Consider a 6x9" version in which copy would be exactly the same.
In quantity, the savings in lettershop and postage charges are about $125/M. If you have a newsletter sells for $16, with the smaller package, you would attain the same cost per order with 8 orders less per thousand mailed, or .8%. That could amount to a significant bump to your bottom line.
15. Are you testing your response device? Some second mortgage/re-fi people have eliminated the response form in favor of a phone-only response without testing. Frankly, that's insanity. The same thing has happened in auto insurance - leaving out the Request for Quote. Have you tested including a freemium on your response device - stamps, stickers, how to tips, etc.?
Of Time and the Stream
16. What's your season, month, week, day? What difference does it make? Traditionally, there was a mail order" seasonality - e.g., never mail in the summer months. But tests need to go way beyond that. Some business-to-business testing has shown that the best time to get mail into the office is on a Tuesday or Wednesday. When should business emails arrive (not only day, but time) vs. emails to consumers? A company selling renter's insurance, serving lower-income residents, times mailings to arrive a few days before Social Security checks… and its mailings do best in the months in which fires are most prevalent.
17. Have you tested time between efforts? With prospects, do you really know whether to time the second effort at two weeks, four weeks or six weeks? It is really important that you do know. (And have you tested whether the second effort should be the same as the first or if they should get a different package?). With customers, what's the best frequency for renewal, re-sell, or activation promotions?
18. How long should the stream of efforts be? Have you tested adding on additional billing and renewal efforts? How long does it pay to keep mailing to a prospect?
And Don't Forget
19. When did you last test postage class? Many find going first class pays - faster response, of course, but also more response and lower cost per response. (But, please, if you're testing first class, test taking the teaser copy off the envelope. Don't even say "Personal," "Confidential," or "First Class Mail.")
20. Did you ever test merge-purge services? If you're a volume mailer, this can really pay off. Imagine learning that your current vendor isn't catching 10% of the dupes someone else can find. If your mail quantity is 10MM, your current dupe rate is 10%, the new vendor is saving you 100,000 pieces.
At a modest $350/M including postage, your savings are $35,000.
If you have the answers to every one of these questions, uh oh - it means you may have little room for improvement. If you don't have answers to a few questions, good! You can look for improved results if you slate tests in these areas. But, if you lack answers to more than thirteen of these questions, may we suggest you log onto Deadendjobs.com.
LEE MARC STEIN is a direct marketing strategic and creative consultant with over 35 years of experience. You can read more of his articles on www.leemarcstein.com. You can contact Lee directly at lmstein@earthlink.net.
