Direct-response testing is what makes fundraisers smart. Smarter than advertisers, who have nothing to go on but bogus, misleading research like surveys and focus groups.
You'll get your money's worth from testing by doing two kinds of testing:
Test big
Test things unlike you've ever done before. Test crazy ideas. Test new offers. Test those notions that everyone hates. That's where the breakthroughs happen.
And you need breakthroughs. The fundraising that work best today will eventually fade. If you've been testing big, you have a much better chance of replacing your winners before they fade into losers.
When you test big, you learn even from failure: Near-misses can be revised into winners. Even big, fat, raspberry failures give you knowledge.
Test small
Testing small is much safer than testing big. It's the way you squeeze another 5% or 10% more performance out of what's already working. Starting with a strong package, you look for improvements, testing things like these:
- Tinker with the amounts you ask and the way they're arranged and expressed.
- Change the size of the package
- Change colors.
- Add or remove elements.
