1.  Review your options – find a good campaign for your 1st project

Before you make a commitment, learn more about the details and where you should begin. Talk to a few experts in the field, share information about your marketing programs and goals, and learn about the costs and benefits of scientific testing. Consider your strategic plans and identify an important program with potential for improvement. Focus on a program with:

• High potential ROI (a large, strategically-significant program)
• Fast data (results come in relatively quickly)
• Flexible execution (you can create multiple versions of the vehicle)
• Ideas for improvement (your ideas drive the whole process)

Think about the options—should you begin with…?

• E-mail or Internet test with speed, flexibility, and low production costs
• Catalog or direct mail test with greater potential ROI
• Retail test to increase marketing impact at the point of sale
• Advertising test to increase the profitability of various channels
   

2.  Find an experienced guide

Like marketing itself, testing looks so easy when done well. With so many technical and management details that impact your ROI, it’s good to get some guidance. After you get some hands-on experience, then you can decide the best way to integrate the techniques within your on-going marketing and testing programs.

Find someone who knows the specialized statistics and quirks of marketing testing, can streamline the process, and will fully support your marketing team at every step through the implementation of results.
 

3.  Just do it

How much can you achieve with scientific testing? You’ll never know until you do it. Scientific testing is the most efficient, powerful, and profitable way to test, so if testing (and increasing marketing ROI) is important to you, then you need to give it a try. You surely have other priorities, yet every mailing that goes out and every promotion that runs offers you another chance to learn new ways to increase sales and build your competitive advantage.

As a new approach and a new way of thinking, scientific testing needs the unswerving support of your management team. They need to help push the bounds of current knowledge, encourage strong test elements, and take the time to review the results and the knowledge you've gained.

What campaigns are planned for the next few months? Which have the flexibility to test lots of new ideas and the potential to achieve a big return? Narrow your list and then learn more about the details. It’s never too soon to increase sales. Your next campaign may be the best place to start.
 

Contact us to discuss the details, learn about the statistics of scientific testing, or look over some of the case studies & articles explaining other industry leaders’ success.

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