Sam, My Border Collies Internet Marketing Advice! Part 3

Sam (that's my 12 year old Border Collie) and I were walking again through the Bush (Australian countryside). Sam as usual was ranging out from me checking for the Eucalyptus trees that needed his advertising skills.

When we reached our usual rock beside the fallen log, without prompting Sam said excitedly "Gordon! you know that big Gum tree down by the creek? Well I have been posting a test ad there for a few days now and today I've struck gold. You should see the responses I've got, they're beautiful!

As you know I'm very particular about how I design an ad. I thought this ad had all the ingredients of a strong pulling one. However, over the last few days I've been getting a very poor response. So I've been tweaking the ad each time I placed it on that big Gum tree to see if I could get a better response.

I was starting to think about ditching the ad altogether when all of a sudden it clicked. You know it's funny, no matter how long I've been in this business there is always something to watch out for.

I'd designed the ad to comply with all the components of AIDA just like this;

I had reviewed all the features of my latest program and converted them to benefits that would appeal to my target audience.

Then I had taken what I thought to be the best benefit for the Headline to get Attention.

In the body of the ad I'd placed a couple of good benefits to create Interest and Desire.

Finally in the last line I'd called for Action by asking for those interested to go to my link for more information.

I've been posting testing ads on that old Gum tree for ages because it's where most of my prospects go down to the creek for a drink so I know from experience that they are a fairly targeted audience. What I couldn't understand was the poor results I was getting.

In the last few days I've tweaked the benefits in the body and my call for action with no improvement to the responses. Yesterday I decided (in desperation) to tweak the headline and the results today are spectacular. No wonder that old Kookaburra has been laughing at me for the last few days!

You know Gordon I've been thinking about this sudden change to the results. It's not that there was anything actually wrong with my old headline I think there has been a change in the target audience. I'm not quite ure what that is yet because I'll have to do a bit more testing but so far it seems that this change has resulted in the need for an eye catching headline that appeals more to the needs of my target audience.

What I'm trying to say to you Gordon, is that after all the years of placing ads at that old Gum tree, my target audience has had a slight change in what interests them. Boy oh boy am I glad I always test my ads so thoroughly before I put them out in the rest of my territory."

Sam's right of course, you can create the super-duper ad and it will remain just that in your mind until you TEST, TEST ,TEST each ad for results.

Come on Sam, I'd better get you home for lunch. Goodness knows what you'll come up with tomorrow.

About the Author

©2000Gordon Brownlie
Gordon is an Internet Marketeer based in Australia. He specialises in helping newcomers to the Internet earn an Income from a position of integrity. You can learn more about his training course at:
empowerism.com/e/12025

:To contact see details below.


gbrownlie@turboweb.net.au
http://www.empowerism.com/e/12025