Keith Goodrum

When I started my offline business I studied a well known marketer and copywriter Dan Kennedy. He wrote that I needed to test all of my marketing.

The reason you need to test is because you can’t predict how well any ad will perform.

He said I needed to test Display Ads, Yellow pages, Val Pak, sales letters it didn’t matter. He also taught me that I needed to test elements within each marketing piece.  Like headlines, prices and stuff like that.

Well, I didn’t know any better… so I did what Dan said. I started testing ads and the different elements against each other. Finding out what worked, what didn’t and tracked the results.

This was exciting and fun. I could see how testing was profitable and saving me money. I would keep ads that were working and toss out the ones that were losing money.

Imagine my surprise the first time I met a business owner and found out he didn’t test! Then I met another business owner, another and another… not one tested. It finally dawned on me that I was the only one testing my marketing.

I guess I shouldn’t have been surprised.

Well, I’ve made the move to online marketing, and have transferred my testing habits here. Actually it’s much easier and faster to test online vs. offline.

And the best part… It’s free. That is if you use tactics to drive free traffic to your websites.

The least you should do is A/B split tests of your headlines. It’s easy to setup and return on investment is well worth the effort.

On Stephen Dean’s blog he give a great explanation why it benefits your bottom line to test. You can check it out here:

http://www.stephensblog.com/?p=209