Back in the 1890s John Wanamaker,
notable U.S. retailer and founder of Philadelphia’s first department store
said, “Half the money I spend on advertising is wasted; the trouble is I don’t
know which half.”
This old quote is why Kevin
Hourigan, president and CEO of Web design, development and Internet marketing
agency, Bayshore Solutions, is so passionate about Web marketing.
“When correctly implemented, you
can clearly measure and effectively manage your website’s profitability,” he
says.
Smart Business spoke with Hourigan
about how to ensure your organization’s website is a revenue-generation asset
versus an advertising expense.
How can you tell if your
website is making you or costing you money?
Let’s look at the process:
marketing and advertising produce leads and prospects, of which a percentage
converts to sales, which eventually fuels profits. With website marketing
initiatives including SEO,
paid
search, online
advertising, social
media, engagement, etc., the hard costs
associated with those activities are readily known. Therefore the straight-line
comparison of Web marketing costs to number of leads produced and sales dollars
as a result will yield this information, if you are tracking the data
correctly. The vital key is tracking, and unfortunately an alarming amount of
businesses are not tracking correctly, compromising their ability to understand
if their Web marketing is making them or costing them money.
How do you track correctly?
The tracking information that is
going to help you truly see your Web marketing performance picture does not end
where the majority of Web analytics and Internet marketing tracking tools leave
off. Unless all sales are processed on the firm’s website, correct tracking is
a much more complex process. Web traffic analytics and conversion to leads,
inquiries, requests for quotes, etc., can get you to the leads-generated
number, but you need to connect this number to the amount of sales that result.
Marketing that is on its A-game
delivers ‘cost-effective leads that quickly convert to sales.’ Therefore it is essential to track all your marketing activity, and
all of the associated metrics, through to the sale. Making this connection
enables you to make informed decisions on keeping the half that serves your
business and tossing the half that doesn’t.
