Outbound Marketing Agency & Email Marketing in Toronto
Increase conversions with A/B testing with your online and offline marketing
Whether you use direct mail, email or online ads, testing and measuring is the best way to make money with your marketing efforts.
As a marketing firm in Toronto, we constantly hear the same argument “We’ve tried direct mail and it doesn’t work.” For that matter you can substitute ‘Direct Mail’ with ‘Email Marketing’ or ‘Pay-per-click Advertising’. However, when we ask what type of testing they’ve done, we typically get the same blank stare and the answer “None” followed up with the question of why we, as marketing experts, need to test.
And therein lies the counter-intuitive reality: Even experts have to run tests. Amateurs think they can pull amazing ROI with one shot. And unfortunately, should that shot miss the mark they decide direct mail (or email marketing, PPC, etc) doesn’t work.
Operating on experience and gut instinct alone can result in missed opportunities. Data is king! A/B testing gives us the cold, hard facts with which we can move from believing something to be true, to knowing it is.
What exactly is an A/B test?
Simply put, an A/B test is a way to compare the effectiveness of two different versions of something (an A and a B) against some kind of conversion metric.
You can test all kinds of elements — lists, offers, headlines, teaser copy, add-ons, design, page layout, images, email subject line, etc.
How you define conversion is decided by what you‘re trying to accomplish, be it more phone calls, sign ups, sales, click-throughs, donations, time on page, etc.
To run a test, set up two versions of the same thing — be it a direct mail piece, ad, web page or email, etc. The only difference in the two versions should be the one element you want to test. If you make more than one change between the two versions, you won’t be able to isolate the meaningful variable.
Then split your list and/or viewer traffic between version A and version B and track what happens.
The principle of testing and measuring is simple. By testing small and measuring the results you quickly identify what works and what doesn’t. When you find something that works, you roll it out on a larger scale.
Testing and refinement methods are used over multiple campaigns to continually refine marketing strategy, messaging, and delivery—effectively improving response rates.
It sounds ridiculously simple doesn’t it? Unbelievably, less than 1 in 50 businesses apply such a process systematically. So by integrating testing as a fundamental part of your approach you’ll already be way ahead of the competition.
At Mystique, our objective is to ensure your email marketing campaigns are appropriate to your brand and customer while maximizing your return.
Contact us today for a no-obligation initial consultation.
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Toronto, ON M3C 2E8
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