There are a lot of metrics that can tell you something about how well your digital marketing is working.
But most of them fall short of the bottom line. They don’t give you an accurate picture of your ROI.
To know that, you need good conversion tracking. It needs to be set up properly. And it’s got to be telling you the right kinds of actions visitors are taking (or not taking) on your site – the actions that lead to revenue.
Let’s take a look at what proper conversion tracking means – and how you can make it work to your advantage.
Conversion Tracking is More Important for ROI
than Traffic or Visitor Behaviour Metrics
Traffic is important. Don’t get me wrong.
No traffic = no revenue.
And if people aren’t staying on your site, reading your content and finding out who you are and what you have to offer, that’s not good either.
That’s why we look at metrics like the number of visitors, number of page views, bounce rate, etc.
It’s not that those metrics don’t matter. They do.
But what really matters is how many of those visitors take an action that puts them in your sales funnel.
Those actions, or events, are at the heart of goal tracking.
If you don’t have this on your website, or you have it but it’s not set up properly, you’re missing out on a key metric that tells you a whole lot about your digital marketing ROI.
Getting the Most from Google Analytics
A lot of small & medium sized business owners have Google Analytics set up for their website.
This is a great tool. It tells you what sources are driving traffic to your site, which is something you’ll want to have a feel for.
But when it comes to digital marketing ROI, what you really need to care about is which channels are bringing you visitors who translate into revenue.
And the only way to know whether a visitor translates into revenue is when they take an action on your site that will have them entering your sales funnel.
Those actions, or what we call events or goals, are what need to be measured on your website. They come in the form of:
- Tap to call
- Contact form completion
- Newsletter signup
- Downloading content (PDF, eBook, etc.)
Basically we’re talking about anything where you capture information to begin to influence a visitor and lead them towards why they should spend money with your business.
How Are You Missing Out on Conversion Tracking?
The issue is that conversion tracking is often not something people think about setting up, because nobody tells them it’s important.
Most website design companies tell you they’ll put Google Analytics on your site.
And most business owners seem to be content to leave it at that.
But what if you could have analytics that told you exactly what sources are the main reason that the phone is ringing?
E.g. those Facebook ads that are actually translating into phone calls. Or those Google ads that are consistently leading to new business requests.
Conversion Tracking is the number one metric that allows you to compare what you’re investing into marketing versus its anticipated reward to your business – from a revenue & profit standpoint.
An Example of How Good Conversion Tracking Can
Set You Straight – on the Road to Profits!
Let’s say you’re spending $2,000 a month on Google ads as a roofing contractor.
You want to know how many leads you’re getting directly from that $2,000 worth of ads – versus other advertising initiatives you might be getting, or just natural website traffic you’re getting through word of mouth, referrals, etc.
Conversion Tracking allows you to say exactly how many leads came from a specific source, e.g. from clicks that started with Google Ads.
It lets you then determine whether those ads are providing profitable ROI.
For instance, if those $2K in ads translated into 27 phone calls and 12 booked jobs… and 12 booked jobs translated into $8K in bottom-line profit… you’d now know that the math makes a lot of sense.
That’s when it’s time to “turn on the spigot” and let the revenue stream flow nicely, to the extent your capacity permits.
Why Don’t You Have Conversion Tracking Set Up?
(Or Set Up Right)?
Why are you missing out on this metric?
Why isn’t your website team or person providing you with these details?
Because conversion tracking can be quite difficult to set up well.
Let me give you one example of something that can cause a setup to go wrong.
Registering a conversion just because somebody clicks the Submit button on your contact form doesn’t guarantee that you actually collected information, for example if the contact form wasn’t filled up properly.
And often times people forget required field and end up having to go back and make an edit and submit again. This means you may end up registering two leads instead of one lead.
You can imagine how a series of these events could totally throw off your metrics.
How to Ensure You Have Good Conversion Tracking
First check to make sure that you have conversions set up by checking Google Analytics… you should see a screen this:
Second, if you have goals, great! Make sure that those goals actually relate to the actions you’re trying to encourage visitors to take on your website.
If you don’t have goals – which is more often the case – think about the actions that you’re trying to get people to take on your website, so that you can do business with them. In other words, they:
- call you
- fill out a form
- fill out a request for quote
- connect with your live chat or respond to a live chat prompt
- sign up for an e-newsletter (i.e. after seeing a pop-up)
These are the actions that you should be talking to your website or marketing team about implementing for you, so that you can start to see how many leads you’re getting based upon the different sources of traffic to your website.
Next Steps for Conversion Tracking
When conversion tracking is et up beautifully, and you’re running multiple advertising campaigns, you’ll be able to compare your investment into each campaign versus your reward.
You’ll get an apples-to-apples comparison on what advertising methods are providing you the best ROI.
Seem like something that you want to have set up on your website?
We’d love to help you get started.
