Does Your Material Fail?

Do your advertisements, resumes and other marketing material (including brochures, coupons, business cards and flyers) successful or does it fail?  And by “successful” I mean “does it produce real results?” 

After all, isn’t success the point of your material… to communicate a message that creates an action or result?

Here are two simple tests for effectiveness:

1) Do you get measurable, actionable responses?

and

2) Is the material memorable to people you don’t know?

First off, forget what your colleagues, friends and family say about your material.  They want to be encouraging AND they stopped to look at it because YOU ASKED… not because the material would have caught their eye in a newspaper, magazine, TV or billboard.

Or in the case of colleagues, they may already be sold on your product or service, so the material is redundant to their already formed opinion.  In fact, they may brag on your material because it looks like their material and that makes them feel affirmed.

Actionable responses would be phone calls, emails, visits from (or with) a qualified, potential consumer (or potential employer if you seeking a job).

* How many responses from qualified people do you get and for what cost?   Do the math… what is the cost per qualified lead?

* What percent of the qualified leads produce revenue?

* What was your goal number of qualified responses for each ad?

* Most Importantly… Do you know the answers above for every promotional and marketing piece you buy or create?

If you can answer these questions AND be very comfortable with the answers, you are on track to success.  Anything less and you are just gambling.  Maybe you’ll get lucky, maybe you won’t.  If you have the success you want without these answers, great.   If not, you may want to reconsider your approach ASAP!

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