Marketing – Page 60

Looking Ahead – Marketing Calendar September 2011

With the arrival of September, we’ve come to the start of the run-in to the end of the year.

In Australia, it’s the beginning of spring…

…and in the north it’s the end of summer and back to work and school.

On September 23, it’s the autumn equinox in the north and the spring equinox in the south (the time will vary, depending on your location).

Events specific to Australia…

Sep 1 – National Wattle Day AND First Day Of Spring

Sep 3 – Australian National Flag Day

Sep 4 – Fathers Day

There’s also the nation’s biggest flower festival, Floriade, in Canberra from September 17 to October 16.

Around the world…

[Read more…]

Direct Response Marketing The Corleone Way

Been a while since I featured one of Tom Fishburne’s wonderful cartoons…

…and this I think is a classic.

Now, I confess that there are occasions where as a direct response marketer it would be nice to have this kind of offer available to use!

However, there’s a serious marketing point here…

[Read more…]

Looking Ahead – Marketing Calendar August 2011

Time for our monthly look ahead for event-based marketing opportunities in August 2011.

Frankly, it’s a lean month both in the northern and southern hemispheres.

In Australia, it’s the middle of winter and in the north it’s the lazy days of summer.

So, you’ll need to look for more offbeat occasions, business-linked reasons and reasons linked specifically to your circumstances.

In Australia, there is a Bank Holiday in NSW on August 1 (quirkily, this is an old-style Bank Holiday where it’s only the banks who have the day off). In Queensland, it’s Queensland Show Day on August 17.

It’s also the Sydney Fashion Festival August 22-26 (apologies to other Australian states for local events I may have missed!)

Elsewhere…

[Read more…]

Focus In Marketing – More Usually Isn’t Better

Reminded of one of my favourite marketing themes the other day…

…the need for, and the power of, FOCUS.

Happened when I noticed an ad for Snap printers making a big thing about all the new services they offer.

Their tagline is…

…”We do more”…

…which gives you a clue as to the problem.

More of what?

For who?

Why?

What’s it going to do for me?

When you look more closely, you discover that Snap are offering a number of services such as design and customisation…

…plus marketing advice.

A “complete marketing solution” in fact, whatever that means.

So what’s the problem here?

[Read more…]

Better Website Conversion Tips – Part 9

Better Conversion Tip #9 – Test

Split testing, also known as A/B testing, is the process of having two identical pages (except for one change) rotate randomly to see which one generates more sales (or opt ins, or whatever the goal of the landing page).

A little piece of code called a “cookie” is stored on their computer, so if they return to your page again, they will always see the same page where they originally landed. This is important because you don’t want them coming to your landing page and seeing one deal, then returning later and seeing another.

Whenever you contemplate making a change, you should always split test the change against the control (the control page is the one that is generating the most sales or opt ins or whatever). The object of split testing is to always try to beat your control. Then the one that beat it becomes the new control, and the process starts again.

If you take away anything from this tip about split testing, it should be this: Split testing is an ongoing process. It never ends. You should always try to beat your control. Sometimes one small change will make a big difference. This is especially true when split testing headlines, because more than 5 times as many people read your headline than they do your copy. So headlines are a good start to get the biggest bang for your efforts.

In fact…

[Read more…]

« Previous Page