The key to Internet marketing – Test, test, test!

They say good things come in three’s and the past few days I’ve read a few things from three individuals that is right on about about the right way to Internet marketing.

I guess I should write good thing come in fours since it was a classic marketing book written BEFORE the Internet was even created that got me on this track. It was David Ogilvy who is a legend in advertising and his wonderful book Ogilvy on Advertising. David Ogilvy stressed the importance of testing campaigns. David Ogilvy then went to say that if there is one book that is a must read it’s Tested Advertising Methods written by John Caples. So off I went and ordered Tested Advertising Methods and that is one of the best book on marketing that I have read. And it was written in 1937! John Caples was HUGE on testing your advertising. I read both David Ogilvy and John Caples book earlier this year and I was blown away by the quality.

I already had the importance of testing in grained in my head so I scoff at these get-rich-quick Internet marketing so-called gurus who claim it’s so easy to make millions online overnight, no less! That is why I like Jeremy Palmer who is a super affiliate who speaks the truth on how to make money as an affiliate online. His ebook High Performance Affiliate Marketing is a must (you can read my review here). Jeremy’s newsletter is one of the few I actually read and look forward to receiving in my in-box. His newsletter last week he discussed how to build a successful affiliate business and he stressed the importance of testing. You can read his post about thin affiliate web sites vs. fat sites here. He does a wonderful job at explaining the importance of testing just as David Ogilvy and John Caples did years before.

It was while reading Jeremy’s post and in his comments I noticed that Linda of 5 Star Affiliate programs commented about the thin vs. fat post, Linda is another person I pay attention to so when she commented I took notice. She mentioned her post about his subject and even created a discussion about it on her forum (you can read Linda’s post here). Linda’s post lead to yet another (this is the final of the good things come in three’s/fours ) post on the subject by John Reese.

I’ve read about John Reese and his sites before but to be honest I ignored him because I thought he was another Internet marketing guru spewing the same old get-rich-quick garbage. The fact that Linda whom I trust linked to his post, I decided to read. And am I glad I did. It’s a great post and fits right in with what Jeremy Palmer had written about testing. Read John Reese’s post here.

This the type of stuff that I’m all about, forget all the other noise and stick to these principles that good Internet marketers like Jeremy Palmer and John Reese follow. You might notice I won’t call them “guru” and that’s because that term has such a bad taste in my mouth when it comes to Internet marketing that I won’t insult them with it.

That is the common thread that I’ve reading the past couple months, test, test, test! Testing is also an important part of Tim Ferriss’s book, The 4-Hour Work Week which I just finished reading. Tim also creates a thin site just to test if his product is worth marketing. It’s a wonderful way to know if you have a winner. If you do move forward with your idea, if it doesn’t scrap it and move on to the next.

By following the formula used by Jeremy Palmer, John Reese, Tim Ferriss, and others you won’t take as big of a gamble when you launch a new site/product.