Are You Really Testing Your Test Campaigns?

As a CEO I know one thing first hand – Every cent not spent correctly is a mistreat of the company budget. Every time a company spends it should be with the aim to generate ROI in some aspect. No matter how little or much you spend, this should be your goal if you are genuinely interested in growing your business.  Of course there will be times when you won’t be able to generate ROI, but that needs to be your aim, and to get there you need to put in some hard work.

Over the years I’ve been involved in numerous banner campaigns that have only been small tests from the advertiser’s side. The budgets involved have usually been rather small due to the risk involved in trying out a brand new site; roughly around 1 000 – 2 000 Euros in average. These tests are something that most companies are and should be familiar with. It is also something that I’ve seen all types companies engage in, no matter size. I think test campaigns are very wise, but only if done correctly. In most cases however, these test campaigns end up being nothing more than a waste of the budget. In this article I will go through some common mistakes that damage test campaigns, and also give my ideas on how a text campaign should be planned and executed.

One of the most common mistakes is when the advertiser fully ignores the website owner’s advice or the agencies advice (if there is an agency handling the website). Let me give you an example. Some years ago I was working for a company that did a campaign with a client that was active in the poker industry. This client created a promotion where all new players who signed up through that specific banner were rewarded with a small amount of money to play with, with no obligation to deposit their own money. This was a success and the campaign got renewed and lasted for over a year without getting exhausted. The website in question wasn’t at all related to gambling or poker, but a general website that had a good age range for that specific advertiser.

That poker campaign showed us that there was great potential for poker companies on that website, so we asked some of our other poker clients if they wanted to try it out. Many were eager to give it a go and do test campaigns. So we launched the first test campaign, but with a different promotion. This poker company instead chose to offer a depositing bonus of 100% up to $300 USD. The campaign did not work out at all. This was a bit strange since we were running the other campaign simultaneously with great results. So we launched another campaign, and this poker company also had another type of banner where they promoted a specific tournament that they were arranging. This campaign did not work out either.

So now we had one campaign that was doing really well, and two that didn’t work out at all. They all offered same type of products (poker) and were equally well known in the industry. We started therefore suspecting that the two latter promotions did not fit the target at all, so when yet another poker client wanted to test the website we were fast to give our advice. We specifically told this poker company to use a promotion similar to the campaign that was doing well, and they listened. Right away, we saw good results again. This made us confident that this website was all about having the correct promotion, so every time we had one of our clients asking us to run campaigns there, we suggested what promotion to use.

The problem came pretty quick though. Many of the clients coming to us for advertising space did not listen at all to what we had to say. They kept giving us banners with 100% bonuses, special tournaments, rake back offers and other promotions we knew just wouldn’t work out. We launched their campaigns, and tada: no results what so ever.

I saw countless 1000-2000 Euro campaigns being burnt off like it was nothing. For example, one of the clients launched their test campaign with a promotion we had told them would not work, and then came back several weeks after the campaign was finished asking us whether the campaign was still live or not. They hadn’t tracked the campaign, they hadn’t listened to our advice, and most importantly, they didn’t get any kickback at all from that campaign. You’re not running a test campaign if you do not do any testing while running the campaign. Instead of choosing the correct promotion, monitoring the campaign and trying different tweaks, they did nothing. That is also what they got out from the campaign – Nothing.

So how should you then treat your test campaign? Well to start with, listen to site owner or agency that you’re doing the campaign with. All website owners or agencies that deal with publishers will know the websites audience very well if they’re serious about what they’re doing. And we will assume that they are serious, because if not then why would you be in business with them in first place? Second of all, monitor your campaign. Keep track of the impressions, clicks and conversions as close to real time as possible. Only then will you be able to do the necessary tweaks that can provide you with the information you need to evaluate the test campaign. By tracking the results while the campaign is live you can do changes such as time-targeting the campaign and only show your ads during specific hours. You can also switch banners to try out different promotions and types of ads. In other words, you can do what you set out to do: Testing!

So if you do decide to go with a test campaign, then make sure you have the resources to take advantage of the opportunity. Otherwise you will waste your own valuable time and money, and also miss out on a potential great partnership for your marketing.

Soheil Amorpour, CEO @ CPerspective Online Marketing Agency