Chapter 13
Strategic Marketing Optimization
An ounce of practice is worth more than tons of preaching.
—Mahatma Gandhi
The term conversion-rate optimization is a misnomer. It implies that conversion-rate improvement should be the sole goal of your testing work. That’s a limited view.
Although conversion-rate lift is important and should be a goal for individual tests, the result of a testing strategy produces much more. As you’ve seen from the case studies in this book, test results can produce massive revenue improvement, learning, and customer insights. Forward-thinking CMOs and business leaders use these quantitatively tested insights to create a positive feedback loop into their marketing and business strategies.
Beyond even those outcomes, testing produces an organizational culture shift toward data-driven decision-making. In a scientific marketing organization, data is valued over personality, experimental methods are structured and refined, and tested learning is disseminated throughout the organization.
When you begin to leverage the ongoing learning andinsights from conversion-rate optimization, you’ll have progressed to a state I’ll call strategic marketing optimization (SMO).
Through the ideas presented in this book, I hope to inspire more than just conversion-rate optimization. I hope you’ll take up the challenge of building a culture of ongoing SMO.
Aim for Marketing Insights
Despite how much attention conversion optimization is getting today, it’s still being undervalued. Most marketers don’t appreciate its potential.
Think about it this way: you have thousands of visitors to your website every month. From those visitors, you have the ability to gain insights with scientific certainty. Yet the predominant talk about conversion optimization views it as a method for eking out small conversion-rate bumps on landing pages.
This is tragic!
Those of us who do the most testing understand the power of all the beautiful traffic arriving on your website. Not only are these prospective customers looking for an opportunity to buy from you, but they’re also willing to (unknowingly) tell you the types of messages and experiences that are most effective.
Consider the far-reaching effect of testing your value proposition, for example. By running controlled tests of your messaging approaches, you can gain statistically significant learning about which messages move the most customers to action. Yes, those tests can give dramatic lifts in leads, sales, and revenue. But beyond that, the insights can lead to even greater changes in your marketing and business strategy.
As marketers realize the potential for gaining marketing insights, the conversion-optimization industry is evolving. We’re no longer just tweaking and tuning button designs and headline colors. We’re no longer just boosting conversion rates on landing pages. We’re fostering a culture of data-driven decision-making. I hope you’ll join us in adopting the Optimization Manifesto, which encapsulates this culture of continuous testing and optimization.
The Optimization Manifesto
We listen to our gut, and then test what it says.
We gather marketing research, and then test it.
We create best practices, and then test them.
We listen to opinions, and then test them.
We hear the advice of experts, and then test it.
We believe in art and science,
Creativity and discipline,
Intuition and evidence,
And continuous improvement.
We aim for marketing insights.
We aim to improve business results.
We test because it works.
Scientific testing is our crucible for decision-making.
Come with me as we push the boundaries of conversion optimization toward SMO. For a full-size printable graphic version of the manifesto, visit YouShouldTestThat.com/SMO.
Be a Marketing-Optimization Champion
Your organization needs a marketing-optimization champion. The challenges of developing a data-driven culture may be great. Some will resist the rigorous discipline of a testing strategy. Those who have spent their lives following their intuition alone are unaccustomed to asking the data for direction.
If you’re a data-driven decision-maker, this may be frustrating for you. Why would any company willingly reject conversion optimization when so much revenue could be within easy grasp? Sometimes decision rationale doesn’t make sense.
Your organization’s culture and norms determine how decisions are made. The company may be accustomed to following the strongest personalities, or letting the HiPPO dictate direction, or following the whims of the Black Turtleneck (See Chapter 1, “Why You Should Test That”). Creating a data-driven culture can take time and effort. Persuading people to adopt a marketing-optimization strategy requires an organizational champion.
Your company needs you to step up and be an influence for marketing testing. Fortunately, being your organization’s champion is very rewarding. Marketing testing is one of the most easily provable strategies, and the rationale for it is unassailable. When you stand as an advocate of the data-driven approach, you’ll reap the rewards in your career. Data advocates inevitably rise to positions of influence.
Here are some tips for creating a data-driven culture:
Some organizations will never adopt marketing optimization. The culture may be too entrenched in old ways. I cringe when I see companies start on the path of testing and then turn around and redesign their website wholesale without considering the progress and learning they’ve already made. If you don’t see progress in your data advocacy, you should move on to a company that values it. Companies that don’t test will eventually yield to competitors that do. Life is too short to battle for years as a cultural misfit at companies with outdated thinking.
My goal for this book has been to make the case for why conversion optimization is important for gaining business improvement and marketing insight. I’ve also given you many tips, frameworks, and insights to get the best results.
I hope I’ve convinced you that there’s a better way to handle expert and colleague opinions and recommendations. I hope the next time you come across a good idea, your instinct will be to say, “You Should Test That!”