For two to four cents per contact, the researcher can now gather
market intelligence from both specialized vertical markets
(lawyers, doctors, etc.) or broad based horizontal markets (all
marketing executives across industry lines). In addition, these
same markets can now be tested in such confined geographical
areas as business executives in Hawaii or professionals in
Minneapolis.

Not only does the marketer overcome one of the traditional
problems in research…test sizes…he or she also reaps the
huge advantage of accurate measurability and accountability.
Since all responses can be directed right back to the research
organization, market feedback is both quick and accurate.

Many firms have difficulty in obtaining statistically
significant samplings through traditional channels because of
budget restrictions.

It’s not uncommon for important strategy decisions to be made on
the basis of sampling as few as 2,000 names out of a universe of
several million potential buyers. This is risky at best. It
could lead to marketing disaster based on serious sampling
error, or wrong conclusions drawn from insufficient data.

With direct response card packs, it is now possible to test or
survey as many as 100,000 potential buyers for as little as
$2,000 or less. For the research or direct marketing consultant
this results in meaningful figures which are both statistically
significant and forecastable.

Proper analysis of this larger sampling should result in
strategy decisions which are more accurate, more meaningful,
more valid and more profitable for the direct marketer.

The ability to order and conduct true A/B (or more) split run
tests of offers, prices, etc. has important implications for the
creative team.

The marketing intelligence gathered through card packs can be a
valuable road map to success. Critically important data,
discovered through card deck advertising, can determine the
answers to such questions as: Have we targeted to the correct
audience?

Is the audience responsive to the degree necessary to maximize
potential profitability?

Do we have the right combination of offer, price, copy,
graphics, headlines, terms, etc.?

Are the response/profit characteristics such that they justify
testing such other direct response media as direct mail, space
or broadcast advertising?

Is there potential for a variation of this product/service to be
marketed to a closely related audience?

What is the potential for back-end profits from related item
sales?

Are we barking up the wrong tree? Should we cut our losses now
and thank our luck stars that we were able to discover,
inexpensively, that we were wrong?

While the advantage of card decks as a market research tool
outweigh the disadvantages, there are some restrictions you need
to be aware of:

1. The card itself is small (about 3″x5″) and as such restricts
your ability to test such things as long copy and multiple
option offers. Some decks provide larger format sizes with the
ability to do fold-over inserts which provide more space, but
these options are at a substantial premium in price. The small
space can work to your advantage because it forces you to limit
your testing to those factors that have the most profound affect
on response and profitability…i.e. offer and price, for
example.

2. Color reproduction, if it is important to your product, is
not always the best. The conventional .007 Hi Bulk paper stock
normally used in card decks is not the best choice for color
printing. Most deck publishers, however, offer a coated stock
option and you may find it useful.

3. Response rates are,on the average, lower in card decks (1/4th
of one percent to 1 percent) than they might be in a free
standing direct mail package. On the surface this may appear to
be a disadvantage. In fact it is not. Your goal in market
research/testing is to obtain statistically significant data
across the broadest sampling possible…consistent with
budgetary limits.

Card decks allow you to achieve this goal, precisely. It’s much
better to have a 1/4th of 1% response from a 100,000 name
universe (250 responses) than to have a 12.5% (250 responses)
from a small 2,000 name test cell. Although the total numbers
are the same, the former example gives you a truer picture of
market conditions and possible product/service acceptance.

In summation, we have found that direct response card decks, if
used properly, can be ideal market research tools. Card decks
are inexpensive to use. They give quick accurate and projectable
results. They reduce the risk of sampling error, and the
resulting data is both statistically significant and inherently
more valid.

There’s only one way to know for sure…test it!

However, feeling your way around and relying on your gut feeling is hardly the best way to proceed. When dealing with your marketing issues, keep these five points in mind to ensure that you take a sound decision that meets your expectations and the needs of your company:

1. Decide on the information you need

2. Deal with the lack of background knowledge

3. Prepare your analysis

4. Choose your strategy

5. Sort out time and labor constraints; 1. Decide on the information you need

For anyone trying to grow a business, one of the first tasks is to map the competitive landscape. By understanding the market, your product and competition, you’ll be able to react to opportunities as they arise.

A sound marketing strategy should be based on information about the market, target customer group, competition, positioning, the product or service you are selling, pricing, advertising and promotion. The process of selecting which ones you need is a lengthy and confusing one. There are many sources out there and it is quite an issue to know which are worthy of your attention and which are not. Finding successful ways to defy rules of thumb is a great way to have a healthy business.

One of the unorthodox ways to do this is to use certain productivity software to help you understand what kind of information you need for your marketing endeavors. By following a wizard and answering some questions you can get a pretty good idea of what information you need to go out and collect. You need to know how you can compare your product to the ones offered by your competition – metrics like price, performance, brand awareness, product life cycle and many more are crucial for evaluating how you stack up against them. 2. Deal with the lack of background knowledge

Once you have settled on the types of information needed, the next problem arises – how to make heads or tails of the information. More often than not it is necessary to have a certain background to be able to use the data you have just gathered. In order to do that you have a handful of options: you can invest a few years of your time to attend college and study marketing or you can read on your own some of those marketing books available in the bookstore. The educational route is both expensive and time consuming, not to mention the fact that you are not going to turn into a marketing pro in the blink of an eye. You can also hire a marketing professional to do that for you on a full-time basis or outsource the activities to an external company. The downside is that you stretch your budget even further.

Then again, you can use software to try to solve the mystery behind your piles of data. The application you’ll be using will most likely have all the necessary expertise and tools for you to sort out your metrics. It is readily available on your computer so you don’t need to spend that much time to turn yourself into a marketing wiz. Yet you will have a full control and understanding of both your core business and that marketing knowledge, thus making the most out of your company’s current standing.3. Prepare your analysis

When you have sorted out the information you have gathered, you need to analyze it. It may turn out to be a staggering option to deal with all that number crunching and raw data you have. If you are having a hard time seeing trends through the sheer numbers, it is necessary to put them into a format that will be easily comprehensible. That means playing around in a spreadsheet program, coming up with a certain template and putting together charts to represent the data.

No matter whether the data is meant for you, your business partner or some client whom you are consulting, you should present the information in a professional manner. Neatness and attention to detail indicate that you are serious about what you’re doing. Using a spreadsheet program is by all means a viable option but there are a few issues to be faced if you go that route. You will have to manually enter the data and the formulas to perform the analysis – that means there is a possibility of error as manual data entry has always been error-prone. You have to select the most appropriate formula for your calculations and that may be somewhat difficult to do when so much needs to be taken into account. On top of that, you have to visualize the results of your hard work. The right chart can make all the difference for you – it lets you see facts that will remain hidden otherwise.

All this can be dealt with by using specialized software. You get the benefits from the time the experts have spent thinking and designing – you can visualize your research and historical data in the best possible way. Charts can be altered easily and as often as necessary, no matter how complex the data behind them is. Then the application draws the conclusions automatically for you by analyzing everything in a snap. 4. Select a strategy, learn something new or confirm your gut feeling

The right marketing strategy helps identify market segments of interest to a particular business and tailors product offerings, prices, distribution, promotional efforts, and services towards them. In a perfect world the strategy should address unmet customer needs that offer an adequate potential profitability. A good strategy helps a business focus on the target markets it can serve best.

There are a few alternative strategies to follow as you are running your business. Anyway, it would be nice if you could be offered a particular professionally developed one, based on your market situation. And if any particular metric changes or you think it will change eventually, you can react by simply tweaking the plan with a single mouse click. Of course, you may want to play around with more than one metric, or you may want to explore a few “what-ifs”. This is also perfectly achievable within the software you’re using.

If you work with clients and prepare marketing plans for them, you know the situation when a client drops in and wants something checked out or confirmed. Digging out that information on such a short notice is a pain in the neck for someone managing a handful of accounts, unless, of course, specialized software is used to this end. It will keep your marketing plans organized, easily accessible and editable. 5. Time and labor consuming

Time is money. You knew that all along, didn’t you? Well, selecting the metrics you need, gathering the necessary information, building your spreadsheet model and analyzing it takes up a considerable amount of time and a lot of work. You may even be tempted to quit doing all that stuff because it takes away too much of your limited time. The matter of fact is that it is crucial for your business and you can’t throw it away just like that.

If a quick reference is needed, your information must be readily available. You need a tool that’ll save you most of the time and effort. In comes the right software.

You can’t have too much effort put into your marketing analysis, it is simply never over-kill. The important point is to “work wiser, not harder” and putting intelligent software to use is a certain way to achieve that. The speed and correctness of the decisions based on such software will provide a competitive advantage for you. Thus it is not enough to know how to do your marketing right; it is also important to be able to do it in a precise and timely manner.