Test Your Headlines for Maximum Profits!
Professional copywriters do not simply write or select one
headline and then hope for the best. They create a number of
different headlines; often times as many as a hundred before
selecting the headline they think will perform the best.
But they don't stop there! Professional copywriters know that
their choice will often not be the choice of the public and
therefore they test their headlines in the market place.
Believe it or not, even professional copywriters find that half
or more of their ads, sales letters, or campaigns fail to become
winners. But, by testing, they are able to cut their losses
early and maximize their successes.
The method of testing most commonly used is known as split
testing. With headlines, split testing involves the exposing of
two different alternating headlines to prospects. This can be
done both online and offline, but online is much easier and the
testing process is quicker.
Here is the way headline split testing works online. Visitor A
comes to your website and sees headline #1 while visitor B comes
to your website and sees headline # 2. When visitor C comes to
your website, headline # 1 is shown again and the alternating
process continues for the length of the test.
After a number of actions have been recorded for each headline,
such as clicking through to the order page, the results are
compared to determine which headline resulted in the largest
number of desired responses (the click through to the order
page, in this example).
The larger the number of total responses recorded, the greater
the accuracy of the test to determine the headline winner. Once
a winner is chosen, that headline becomes the new control. A
control is the current best performing item being tested, in
this case, a headline.
Now that a control has been established, a new headline is
tested against the control to see if the response can be
improved. This process continues on until a given headline has
been the control for a large number of tests.
Initially the two headlines that are being tested can be quite
different. What you are looking for in the early test is what
general kind of headline seems to work for the target market.
Once a general kind of headline appears to be a winner over
competing types of headlines, then you begin to tweak and split
variations of the winning headline itself.
Let's take a look at an example.
This headline example comes from Jimmy D. Brown, a very
successful Internet marketer. The following two headlines were
split tested to determine a winner.
Headline # 1: "The Power of Viral eBooks" Headline # 2: "How to
Create Automated Profit Generators"
The Result? Headline # 2 out pulled headline # 1 by multiple
times.
Now to simplify this process, let's assume for the sake of this
example that Headline # 2 proved to be the winner, not only of
this test, but a number of follow on test against a number of
other headlines. So, you have determined the type of headline
that seems to work well for your particular target market. Now,
it is time to tweak the headline by split testing variations of
this particular headline.
When you split test variations of a headline, you want to only
change one thing at a time. Perhaps you will change only one
word in the headline, or the color of the headline, or the using
of quote marks around the headline, etc. But you only test one
item at a time. Each item you test is called a variable; it is
the thing that varies between the headlines in the test.
Everything in the headline can make a difference in the headline
response rate. Things that make a difference in response are
called response modifiers. In addition to the items mentioned
above, other response modifiers in a headline might include the
font used, the size of the font, the capitalization of the first
letters of each word, etc. Everything in your headline can and
should be tested.
For an example of how a very minor change can make a difference
in your headline response, take a look at these two headlines:
Headline # 1: "Put Music In Your Life" Headline # 2: "Puts Music
In Your Life"
The only difference between the headlines is the addition of the
letter "s" to the first word. Again the second headline greatly
out pulled the first headline. Some copywriters assume that this
is because the first headline implies some work on the part of
the reader, while the second headline implies that something or
someone else does the work. But the reason is not important,
only the results matter.
Each tweak of your headline that results in a new control
improves the desired response rate of your headline leading to a
maximization of profits, if your headline involves the selling
of a product or service.
You can never know for sure why one headline out pulls another,
but while you can guess, the reason is not important. What is
important is the results, no matter what the reason.
Jim and Audri Lanford of www.netrageous.com, now
www.scambusters.org, once made a change of color to a sub
headline on one of their online sales pages and their orders
almost dropped to zero. When they changed the headline color
back, their normal order rate returned. They guessed that this
was because the color change may have caused the headline to
look more like hype, but as noted above, the reason is not
important. What are important are the results.
Are you testing your headlines? If not, you should be. Every
little positive change continues to increase your profits and it
all adds up in the end. While some changes may only increase
your desired response by a fraction of one percent, some people
have seen changes of as much as 1,500% with a single headline
change while the rest of their copy remained the same.
How would you like to see either a single or cumulative
improvement over time of 1,500% in your desired response rate? I
thought so! Then go forth and test, test, and test some more!