After yesterday’s email about testing, I got to thinking.
It’s really a shame when people see a goo-roo quoting their latest test results, and then immediately treat those results like gospel, as if that’s the new “rule” for everyone’s product and market.
This can absolutely destroy sales and tank a business.
It’s like my recent food allergy test.
For the last 6 months I was POSITIVE I was allergic to eggs. There was no question about it, and really, I considered the allergy test a mere formality.
A trifle nuisance.
After all, I was such a smart guy, I already knew the results.
Well, guess what?
Turns out I’m NOT allergic to eggs.
Not even a little.
Instead, I’m allergic to something else I never would have suspected in a million years of being allergic to. A food that was causing me considerable discomfort because of my ignorance — and that I’d happily eaten the entire time I swore off eggs due to my being so sure I was allergic to them.
Can you believe that?
Well, most marketers do the exact same thing.
They assume something’s working when it isn’t… or that something’s hurting their ads when it isn’t.
The result is ads that die slow deaths.
Or (at the very least) don’t pull even close to their potential.
I’m not sure who coined this phrase, but it’s true:
“It’s a mess to guess.”
Ben Settle
P.S. The Copywriting Grab Bag has all kinds of ideas to test in your ads and sales letters.
In fact, here’s what a couple “hardcore” testers have said:
“My first read through I pulled out between 6 to 10 new things to take and test in my own sales letters online. And it’s on the shelf for another read through again coming up soon.”
-Terry Dean
TerryDean.org
“I absolutely love The Copywriting Grab Bag and it’s already making me money. Just the other day I wrote an article using ‘precaution copy’ as recommended on page 106 and it helped me sell quite a few extra copies of one of my new products.”
-Roger Haeske
RogerHaeske.com
You can nab “The Copywriting Grab Bag” here:
