Testing for More Profits

The only way to know if one marketing medium is better than another is to test. Some businesses fall into the trap of doing what they have always done marketing and advertising-wise because it produces what they think are okay results. This is all well and good if you have in fact tested other ways to market and found a particular medium does outperform every other. But, if you are doing it because this is the way you’ve always done it, you may want to re-think your strategy. Testing may reveal a better way to get less costly leads.

There is another reason some businesses don’t test. They are afraid to spend the money because it may not render results and they don’t want to take that risk. This is one-sided thinking. The other side is that you may strike gold with your new found source. Surely the only way to find out is to test.

Testing doesn’t mean you have to take all of your allotted advertising dollars and throw it into the test. A small sample should be enough to gauge whether what you are doing is working. Trying it once and giving up after little or no results isn’t the thing to do either. There are many reasons why advertising doesn’t produce results. Maybe the headline was weak, maybe the offer wasn’t strong enough, or maybe you reached the wrong audience. Perpetual tweaking on the sample test until the desired result is achieved or you really do determine that it doesn’t work is what needs to be done.

You may think you don’t know enough about marketing to do this. One thing that does seem to get into a lot of people’s way is thinking that they are their customer. If you own your business or have been in the same industry for a long time, sometimes it is hard to separate from it and look at it objectively. One way to learn what your customers want is to ask them. A good way to ask is through a survey. You may be amazed what you might learn. But let’s get back to our original subject of testing.

A great way to start testing without spending too much money or feeling you might not know what to do would be with your sales force or if that’s you, your sales presentation.

If you have a sales staff, there are probably a select few who consistently do better than others. What is it they do that the others don’t? Have them walk through their presentation and then script it for everyone else to use. Having those who don’t close as often performing the same presentation as your better closers should improve your sales markedly. Then take that same presentation and see what you might do here and there to affect close ratios, testing each change along the way.

There are many things you can do to make improvements to presentations. Perhaps your use of language could be improved. You may need to spend more time letting people know just who you are and why they would benefit from a relationship with you. Maybe more questions need to be asked of the buyer to better understand their needs. Perhaps the presentation could be better organized for a more natural flow. You may need to do a better job of explaining the process and what the customer should expect. The list could go on. Only you and your sales staff might know what kind of changes would be beneficial. Continuing to make adjustments and improvements and measuring the results with each change should ultimately improve your close ratios thereby increasing your revenue.