Markets, Metrics and Research Probes
0All The Information You Could Ever Want Is At Your Fingertips
It doesn't matter how many books you read, how many courses to take or how many videos you watch about how to market your business; these are all strategies and tactics that will not reach the heart of marketing your business.
What do I mean by this?
You can go ahead and learn all kinds of tips about copywriting but what you won't find in a book or course is the headline your market will actually respond to.
You can choose your subject and write a book, or create a course on it because a few of your friends think it's a good idea, but the market may not buy it.
You can write and article that you think is going to be really informative, but that may not be the information they are after.
These are exciting times for anyone wanting to create a business online if you up with the times.
If you are still trying to learn from marketing books from years ago, you are going to be left behind.
Ok, so I feel like I'm leading you on a bit with the questions and what-not.
Here's my point.
The Internet has become a treasure-trove of metrics. Metrics that our marketing forefathers couldn't have ever believed would be possible.
If you know where to look you can find out data about almost anything… and if you can't find the data you're looking for then you can quickly implement a research probe to find out what you need to know.
So let's talk about how to do this:
Headlines:
Markets have always responded to headlines. We know from years of split testing that the difference between the best headline and the worst can be 10x better or more.
Of course, every niche is different so how do you know what to use for your niche?
Go to the major news sites in your niche and write down all the blog titles that have the most shares… If people are reading, liking and sharing these posts do you think that they are paying attention to that headline – that subject?
Absolutely.
Do you think you could write a better article?
Before you leave that page, go down to see if there are comments on the page. What are they saying?
Do people agree? Are there passionate opposing points of view?
Food for thought right – surely you can glean some intel about the market you are in from these simple data points.
Content:
Head over to Amazon and see if there are any books on your subject.
Now read what the reviews say. It's especially good to check out the 2 & 3 star reviews because these people have found things they didn't like about the book but are more likely to have considered feedback.
What did they say? Is there information they are missing? Or that they wanted but didn't get?
Can you provide the solutions they are looking for?
Find forums or discussion boards in your niche and spend some time reading what people are talking about. What do they like, who do they recommend? What are they wanting?
This is also a good place to ask what people are wanting.
Check out podcast directories and see what information people are putting out there and see how well those podcasts are rated.
If you are looking for content for articles, go to BuzzSumo, which will show you articles and social media pieces ranked by how much they have been shared.
Take inspiration from these articles and do it better.
If you have a choice of subjects and one shows up on buzzsumo with 1500 shares and another shows up with 357,000 shares which do you think I'll be “taking inspiration” from?
It's clear from this kind of data that people are interested and taking action on some topics for whatever reason.
This is exactly why a copywriting book or course, for instance, is going to let you down because the information is static whereas live web metrics are fluid and real-time.
People's interests change all the time, fashions and trends change all the time and if you can catch that wave using the right metrics then you could be in for a big ride.
Headings, Titles, and Covers
Using this kind of existing market data is incredibly useful as you can see but when it comes to naming a book or a product, or choosing a look or feel it's hard to use this kind of data.
The problem is that you are creating something new and don't know how people will respond to it.
So the best way to find out how they will respond is to put choices in front of them and ask them to choose…
People buy from the heart. They think they buy from the head but when it comes down to it the think that triggers then to actually go ahead and make the purchase is usually the heart. Something…we don't know what triggers them to whip out the credit card and make that purchase.
So when you come up with title ideas for your next book or product here's what you have to do:
Create a small Google Adwords campaign or a Facebook ad campaign and split test different titles. The one that get's the most clicks is the winner.
What this measures is the title that grabs a random selection of people's interest the best.
You can do the same with your covers, logos or branding using banner ads or Facebook ads… see what get's response in the form of people taking action and clicking.
It doesn't have to be a big campaign… just spend a few bucks to find out what people want to respond to. Doing this, you are creating your own market metrics to test the effectiveness of any new product you are creating.
