RULE #26
It’s a marathon, not a sprint.
Your non-responders aren’t necessarily saying “No,” they may be only saying “Maybe.” Repeated exposure is the key. That’s why it’s crucial to develop and implement a sustained direct marketing program. Sporadic or ill-planned “one-off” solicitations will only be effective in driving up your costs and lowering your response. Approach marketing goals and initiatives with a long-term focus to ensure you’re in the prospect’s consideration set when they’re ready to buy.
RULE #27
Use customized landing pages and vanity phone numbers to maximize recall and response.
It sounds over-simplified, but you’d be surprised how often you see a major brand print ad driving traffic to the corporate home page – or a 30-second radio spot that uses a randomly assigned 800 number in the call to action. Make it easy for consumers to respond to your direct response advertising. Use vanity numbers in your broadcast advertising – they won’t remember 800-438-5626, but they will remember “800 GET LOAN.” Use customized landing pages to promote the advertised product. Don’t drive prospects to your home page and expect them to navigate through the maze to find the product you’re promoting.
RULE #28
Build programs to reward your underperforming customer segments.
These customers are underperforming and not using your product or brand enough to make it profitable for you to continue to service them. Put a best practice plan to work:
- Conduct research to determine audience motivational “triggers.”
- Develop an audience segmentation scheme to effectively target the program and forecast the results.
- Test multiple reward strategies to determine the optimal sales stimuli to drive response and incremental usage.
- Test various levels of “richness” to determine behavior thresholds and requisite program investment.
RULE #29
Consider the Fog Factor!
Many communication professionals write without considering the clarity of their copy. A reader sees fog when they try to read big words, long sentences and passive verbs. Here’s how to stamp out the fog: write at, or below, an eighth grade level. Mark Twain, Ernest Hemingway and Winston Churchill all wrote simple copy.
- Avoid unusual and multi-syllable words
- Shorten long sentences and break down complex ones
- Eliminate as many adjectives, adverbs, and comparisons as you can
- Choose action words to avoid the passive verbs
RULE #30
Follow a formal process for product naming.
Companies often have no formal process in place to assist in naming new products. Establish a strategic process for naming and adhere to this process to derive a “short list” of potential names.
- Start by defining the attributes of the product’s functionality and positioning.
- Organize the attributes into categories based on similar characteristics.
- Engage a group of people from different backgrounds, areas of experience and knowledge to brainstorm potential names.
- Rank and prioritize potential names based on alignment to product attributes.
- Create a short list based on qualifying criteria such as URL and trademark availability.
