This question gets asked by our clients the most out of any others and it used to be a very difficult question to answer. Through Google Analytics and Hubspot we are able to get a more accurate gauge of where leads, conversions and sales are actually coming from. This has been an issue plaguing businesses since the inception of marketing.
A quote that I really love was first coined by John Wannamaker who opened the first true department store in New York City in 1896, he said:
“Half of the money I spend on advertising is wasted, the problem is I don’t know which half.”
If every business owner or Director of Marketing could solve this issue, they would sleep much easier at night.
I think because this question is asked so frequently and has to be answered, we have seen a large shift of marketing dollars from traditional media to online resources more and more over the years. Every small business needs to ensure they are getting the absolute best return for every penny they spend.
It is very difficult to ascertain exactly how effective radio and TV actually are, most feedback I get from our clients is “Our commercials seem to be working” or “I think we got a little more business because of radio”, but they never know for sure. When things are going well and the economy is booming these responses are adequate, but when a business wants to be successful and profitable no matter the economy these responses come up short.
The clients we work with that have the most success don’t make ambiguous statements, they know what works and what doesn’t and for that reason they have shifted a large portion of their marketing to digital media.
What Does This Mean for our Clients?
I was recently sitting in a meeting with a client and they informed us that they tracked a six-figure sale all the way back to their Pinterest marketing efforts. The marketing director was excited to be able to show a return from their social media and it helped show their efforts were effective. This type of tracking allows a small business to hone in on what’s working and improve upon the campaign.
Moving forward businesses that can accurately attribute where each sale came from are the ones that are going to be more successful.
As an Internet marketing company we have always provided call tracking, analytics, keyword rankings and a myriad of other reports to our clients. This tracking really holds our company accountable to see if we are getting the results the client desires or not.
In my opinion the missing piece has always been going one step further to what is the actual ROI from these leads. A client can say “yes you are driving X amount of leads to our company but are these leads high quality?” and it was a question that had to be answered.
Through our partnership with Hubspot we will be able to let the client know not only if the leads are high quality, but also:
- Which traffic source is producing the highest quality leads (Pay Per Click, Social Media, Search Engine Optimization etc.)
- Drill down all the way to the keyword level for the lead
- Score the lead based upon interactions they the prospect had on their website
- The ROI in terms of actual revenue produced from each inbound marketing effort
Being able to make these types of determinations in marketing is going to be instrumental for our clients to continue their growth and success. No more will they have to throw money at different marketing initiatives hoping one of them works and they get some customers. I cannot stress the importance of this enough and it is why we are spending countless hours educating ourselves with the technology and platform.
– Drew
