Maximizing Direct Marketing Effectiveness

No longer is it good enough just to get a return on your direct marketing. To survive in this economy, you must maximize marketing ROI. That means not only ensuring advertising effectiveness in terms of response rates, but also in terms of closing ratios and how you handle those customers once they make the effort to contact you.

Before you even begin to launch your direct marketing campaign with full force, you can ensure advertising effectiveness via a testing marketing strategy in small batches using split testing. Use these tests to determine the best copy, delivery method, demographics, pricing, and more. The best way to perform these tests while adding additional strength to your marketing material is by using toll free numbers.

Each different test piece utilizes a different toll free number so your direct marketing performance for each group can be tracked effectively, accurately, and easily. The leading toll free service providers offer real-time access to call details for your toll free numbers online. This option enables you to see which direct marketing pieces are yielding the best responses so you know which you should use for a full-scale campaign.

The great thing about toll free numbers for testing direct marketing campaigns is that, besides the number of responses, you can also track any missed calls and capture their numbers as well as be able to see exactly how long the calls lasted. Why is this information important? Clearly those calling in response to your direct marketing who did not acquire your product or service were somehow turned off during the call. If prospects are hanging up quickly, perhaps your direct marketing is not targeted enough and is not really of interest to many of those responding. Or it could be that the accents of your call center staff are too strong and hard to understand.

If your prospects are ending the call after a couple of minutes, then it is likely your pricing or an issue with your script that is turning them off. Simply make the changes to your direct marketing pieces or scripts and call center staff and run the marketing test again. Keep tweaking your campaigns and delivery systems to maximize your direct marketing ROI.