October 15, 2024   |   Vol. 23   |   Issue 10
By Jacqueline Zeranski, Account Director

Get the Best Results from Your Marketing Testing - Top Do's for Testing

Testing…As marketers, we know that it’s important. It helps improve program performance by identifying what works better and helps you get more bang out of your precious marketing bucks.

We test new messaging, channels, lists, creative, etc. Let’s face it, it can be overwhelming to know how to elevate your testing and program performance. So, let’s break it down and discuss testing priorities.

Test for Impact

When planning your campaigns, prioritize testing based on what’s likely to have the most impact on your campaign and on your results.

1. Lists/Audiences contribute more than anything else to marketing success. It’s critical to target the right prospects in your campaigns. Testing can help you find prospects that are most responsive. Test lists and audiences frequently!
2. Offer is the next big contributor to marketing success–the incentive you offer prospects to inspire them to join NOW. Find the thing that will entice them the most to join, the items that they “must have.” Examples in your membership recruitment campaigns: dues discounts, discounts on conference registration, premiums.
3. Creative can have a big impact on results. From messaging to layout, landing pages to subject lines…test your creative often.
4. Channel choice is important as well. Test to find the best mix…where you can reach your target audiences. Whether direct mail, email, or digital, don’t stay away from certain channels because you think they don’t work. Continue to test channels either alone or in combination with others to get your best results.

Now that we’ve reviewed what to test, let’s talk about how to do it.

How to Test

Implement the three “golden rules” for your marketing testing:

1. Test One Thing at a Time: Use A/B testing, where your campaign is split into two parts with only one difference between them. For example, if you have a win-back email to lapsed members, test different offers (e.g., a free webinar vs. a free water bottle) with the same subject line. The only difference is the offer, so any difference in response rates is due to the offer.
2. Use a Representative Sample: Ensure your test cell is a randomized sample representative of the whole list.
3. Use Conversion Tracking and Reporting: Set up conversion tracking and reporting to measure your results accurately. This could involve using promotion codes and doing a member matchback to match respondents to your prospect file. This setup lets you measure test performance accurately and pick winners based on response rate and ROI.

Give these testing tips a go in your marketing program. We’re confident you’ll see positive results!

Want to learn more about testing strategies? Reach out to Jana Darling at jdarling@marketinggeneral.com.