Lead Tracking With Google Analytics

For the last two weeks I’ve been talking about the importance of tracking leads and providing some inexpensive ways of doing that.  

This week I want to focus on a free tracking tool – Google Analytics.  Google provides free web tracking software that provides you good information regarding your web site activity.  It tracks many statistics including:

• visitors
• unique visitors
• repeat visitors
• pages/visit
• time on your site
• referral sources
• key words 
• geography
• navigation summary (how people navigate your site)

Using Google AdWords? Google Analytics will track their success by ad and by where your ad shows up in the sponsored search (rank).  

If you have ecommerce on your site, you can track a visitor through to the sale along the same statistics.

Want to measure how certain online and even offline activities are working? Add Google Analytics to your site- if you already have tracking software beyond what your host may use to measure bandwidth, that will work as well – and benchmark your web activity.  

All online activity will be easily tracked through the referral sources and offline activities can be monitored by any increases in activity measured against a television spot airing or a newspaper ad running.

Using tracking software is going to make you smarter on who you target, which media is working hardest for you and even what creative performs better.  

For example, after two months of using paid search for a client, one version of creative was generating 75% of our web traffic yet getting only 50% of our budget.  Needless to say we increased the budget for that ad to 100% and saw the click-through rate double.

Right now, you are hearing a lot of people telling you that the companies that continue to market will succeed when the market rebounds.  I agree, but don’t just keep marketing. Make sure you market smarter.

Marketing = Sales?

If sales aren’t improving then marketing must not be working.  It seems like this is the simplest equation in business, but business is never that simple.

Marketing’s role is to drive leads by changing perception, creating desire, communicating a point of difference and enhancing a brand. 

Marketing’s job is to get a positively predisposed audience to call for more information, look for your product on a shelf, walk in your store or visit your web site.  From there it is up to you.

So how do you know if marketing is doing its job?  Set up a tracking system. 

Today there are many tools available to help you set a benchmark and track your marketing efforts.  Here is a list from typically least expensive to most expensive;

Asking how a person heard about you

• By formalizing this process you will be able to gain significant insight on what marketing tools are working

Online Question

• When people request more information from your web site have a question that prompts them to tell you how they heard of you

 Web Analytics

• Google has a free web analytics product that provides you good insight into how people are coming too your web site
• More robust analytics products exist, but these can get costly

Discreet URL/Phone Number

• Track activity of a specific marketing tactic by driving it to a specific URL or 800-number

Clipping/Tracking Services

• If Public Relations is a tactic you use often, using a clipping service to track stories is useful in justifying the expense
• Conducting online searches also help track where your company has been mentioned in the news

Promotional Offers

• Use promotional offers tied to specific marketing tactics
• Offer will determine the expense of this endeavor

Quantitative Research

• Annual tracking surveys will identify changes in awareness, perception and usage

Over the next few weeks we will discuss how to implement these tracking programs.

Warning:  If you find out marketing is doing its job then have to look at your operations to see why sales aren’t meeting your goals.

Happy Marketing.