Email Advertising - How Ad Tracking Helped Create a Killer Ad

I recently undertook an email advertisingAdvert 2 pulled 5 unique hits and 1 action hit.
promotion,using a number of advertising media. TheAdvert 3 pulled 4 unique hits and no action hits.
exerciseinvolved a program of mine called the MagicalHeadlines
Marketingsystem.I have always advocated trying to keep headlines
As an email advertising Internet marketing exercise,short,especially where email adverts are concerned.
Idecided that I wanted to approach the members ofYou only havethe width of the email pane to enter
someof the affiliate programs that are featured inyour message, soyou must tell your story within a few
Magicalwords.
Marketing, and offer their members the chance toI don't consider any of the Headlines that I have used
jointhis system, and reap the benefit of the multipletobe excessively long. However, the first advert is
promotionmethods that it employs.very short,and perhaps that accounts in part for the
And. as an email advertising marketing exercise, thishuge number ofadditional clicks for the first advert?
hasworked very well, and whilst an interesting exerciseIn part, I believe that this is true.
inHowever, I am now thinking that perhaps email
Joint Venture Marketing in itself, it has produced aprospects havebecome wary of seeing their name in
resultso remarkable in my eyes, that I felt it worthy ofemails from people thatthey don't really know. Think
a report.about how you react when yousee such an email?
With one particular featured program, I did a multipleadDo you open it immediately, or do you become
test, to see what the comparison between three ads.suspicious?
It was the results of this that struck me, andTrust your gut feeling.
promptedme to put this article together.I have used the personalised approach in the body of
The three ads, which were very similar. This is goodthe email,and maybe the psychology here is that once
ofcourse, because it means that any variance in thesomeone has openedan email, they have 'let you in'
resultscan be explained in relatively few ways. Soand are more amenable to yourbeing personal.
there are twopoints that need to be made aboutHeadline conclusion
these ads, which mayaffect your thinking about howI am more convinced than ever that email headlines
you write your own ads.should beshort - as short as possible. I also
1. Use Of Variables in Headlinesrecommend that if youpersonalise the Headline, you
I don't know about you, but I am always hearingstop, and test your ads withoutit.
thatusing someone's name in an advert can make aBulleted Benefits
significantdifference to the effect of that advert. Not allYou can see that advert 1 has produced a massive
programshave this kind of facility though. It justamount ofadditional click thru's over the other two ads.
happens theprogram that I ran the adverts with does,Bearing inmind that each ad went out, probably every
so I made use ofit in the headlines for 2 of the 3six days, the firsttwo ads are not far removed from
adverts, but not forone of them. I have used thethe norm with the program that
variable in the body of allthree ads, so someI used. This makes the results achieved by Advert 1
personalisation took place in all cases.even morestaggering.
2. Bulleted BenefitsThe change in headline may go some way to explain
Again, all the books and articles that I have everthis, butthe huge number of clicks tells me that
readtell you to spell out the benefits, and a lot of themsomething much moresignificant has occurred.
tellyou to bullet them to add emphasis. So, I have doneThankfully, the body of the three ads are very similar in
thiswith all three adverts, but with a differenceallaspects, except one; the bulleted benefits. In the first
between ads 1,and 2 and 3. In the first advert, I justad,
made single wordreferences to the benefits, in theI have given one word answers. In the other two, I
other two, I elaboratedin order to explain the benefithaveelaborated.
better.Bulleted benefits conclusion
3. ConclusionsOne cannot escape the fact that keeping the benefits
The results are so striking, that they are worthy ofso shorthas had an impact. And not only in click thru's
comment.either. If youlook at the graphic under 'Actions' column,
The ads were placed from 12th December 2004 toyou will see that
18h JanuaryI have tracked the prospect through to the signup
2005. So, the time span is about a month, but, I usepage. Youmight expect that the 20% conversion rate
theprogram in question to send other ads out too.be the same, but itisn't, it has increased to around 28%.
About everySo the shorter bulletpoints have also pre-sold more
3rd day, I will send one of these three ads, in rotation.effectively, so the prospectslikelihood of signing up has
So, each of the ads would have been sent aboutincreased as well.
every 6 daysor so.As a final note, please remember that all of this is
Advert 1 pulled in 70 unique hits, with 19 action hits.courtesyof tracking my ads. If you don't do it, then you
Thelatter is where prospects followed through to thewill struggleto make an impact in the marketing world.
sign uppage.