{"id":1164,"date":"2010-04-27T20:24:07","date_gmt":"2010-04-27T10:24:07","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/thomaslgrimshaw.com\/tomsblog\/?p=1164"},"modified":"2010-04-27T20:24:07","modified_gmt":"2010-04-27T10:24:07","slug":"scott-bywater-is-a-copywriter","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.tomgrimshaw.com\/tomsblog\/?p=1164","title":{"rendered":"Scott Bywater is a copywriter"},"content":{"rendered":"

He sends me a daily newsletter.
\nYes, that’s right. Daily.
\nAny you know what?
\nMost days I read it.
\nThis was what Scott had to say today on the subject of Market Research and Advertising.
\nI thought it worth passing on to you.
\nI am reading a book by Steven Scott at the moment.
\nFor the record, this guy has probably written more infomercials than anyone on the planet.
\nAnyway, I was laughing my head off yesterday when he was talking about how conventional ad agencies make their decisions about advertising.
\nThey rely on market research, focus groups and surveys.
\nNow listen to what Steven Scott has to say about this:
\n“Those results are about as accurate and projectable as trying to hit a three-foot target from twenty thousand feet with a paper airplane.”
\nHe continues:
\n“No wonder they are wrong more often than they are right. In my opinion, most of the time that they are right, it’s because of the broken clock theory. (You know: even a broken clock is right twice a day)”
\nNow I found Steven’s candidness very entertaining.
\nBy the way the books name is a Millionaire’s notebook.
\nAnd while I am by no means an expert in market research and I am
\nsure it has its place (I have a relative who does it for a living who
\nwill probably disagree with me) I will say this:
\nNothing can ever beat testing.
\nAnd whenever anyone argues with me about anything when it comes to advertising, my answer is always:
\nTEST IT.
\nBut what about this?
\nTEST IT.
\nBut that won’t work.
\nTEST IT.
\nBut I think you are full of S**T
\nTEST IT.
\nBecause at the end of the day you can do all the market research you want… all the surveys you want… and have all the opinions you want.
\nBut the only thing which matters is…
\nWhen you have written and run that ad, does it make the phone ring?
\nBecause that’s when the customer votes with their wallet.
\nDon’t get me wrong.
\nI am a massive fan of research.
\nIn fact, I always do a significant amount of research before writing an advertisement.
\nAnd wherever there is market research available, I would pay attention to it.
\nBut what a lot of companies do is spend so much time and money on creating this whiz bang campaign.
\nAnd they think they know it all. So they think they don’t have to test.
\nBut remember this:
\nTesting is the GOD of direct mail.
\nNot market research, surveys or anything else.
\nBecause the bottom line of advertising is: when you run it, will it make you money?
\nHere’s what I recommend you do instead of spending thousands of dollars on market research…
\nLearn how to write advertising by getting your hands on my step-by-step guide at
\n http:\/\/www.copywritingthatsells.com.au\/cashflow<\/a>
\nAsk your target market a few research questions to get inside their heads.
\nWrite 6 ads.
\nTest those ads spending the least amount possible.
\nRun with the one which works best.
\nThis isn’t brain science, guys.
\nAnd it isn’t reserved for those super smart marketing guys in big corporations.
\nIt’s just a simple, logical process which has been proven to work over and over and over again.
\nAll for now,
\nScott Bywater<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

He sends me a daily newsletter. Yes, that’s right. Daily. Any you know what? Most days I read it. This was what Scott had to say today on the subject of Market Research and Advertising. I thought it worth passing on to you. I am reading a book by Steven Scott at the moment. For … <\/p>\n

Continue reading “Scott Bywater is a copywriter”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1164","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-general-interest"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tomgrimshaw.com\/tomsblog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1164","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tomgrimshaw.com\/tomsblog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tomgrimshaw.com\/tomsblog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tomgrimshaw.com\/tomsblog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tomgrimshaw.com\/tomsblog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1164"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.tomgrimshaw.com\/tomsblog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1164\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tomgrimshaw.com\/tomsblog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1164"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tomgrimshaw.com\/tomsblog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1164"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tomgrimshaw.com\/tomsblog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1164"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}