Entries Tagged 'lead generation' ↓

The end game for all search marketers - whether we’re focused on getting you on page 1 in Google search results, or social media optimizing your business, or fine tuning your PPC campaigns - is, obviously, conversion.

Ahh, the holy grail of conversion - the sweet spot where traffic meets action, which results in revenue!

But what, exactly, is a “conversion”? Is it solely the empirical evidence of a sales lead?

The buck stops where?

Shockingly, not every action taken by your visitors results in a “ca-ching” (in the case of e-commerce) or even necessarily a phone call or email. Say what?

Leading web behavior research firm, Enquiro, explains it well in their report, “Inside The Mind of the Searcher [PDF]:

“…The shopper never converted by offering her contact information or making a purchase. The entire research process was done anonymously… By all performance metrics typically used by search marketers, this [experience] would have been unsuccessful.

Yet, in all likelihood, it will lead to a sale… and should be considered as a very successful online search interaction. This points out some of the shortcomings of current conversion-based search ROI analytics.”

So while I am tracking every variable of metrics possible for my clients to ascertain conversion results from our search marketing work, I may be missing out on intangible payoffs, such as:

See it, like it, bookmark it, share it, think about it… come back to the company later - offline or online - and buy it! Sweet spot, anyway you look at it.

I was talking the other day with an owner of a health care retailer seeking new business. She told me how last year her company spent $10,000 on a local radio campaign that ran several ad spots a day.

She did get some return on investment - but, unfortunately, the payoff came with lots of limitations:

• The radio campaign lasted a few weeks, then was gone without a trace.
• The broadcast ran in only one of the four municipal markets the company serves.
• The $10,000 spend took every last dollar in their marketing budget, leaving nothing for complementary media spends.
• One year later, the company finds its new business drying up again, and it will take another big chunk of marketing money to fix that.

How to stay on the air with your prospective customers

Every time someone turns on the radio, they don’t learn about your company, right? Nor every time they turn on the TV, or pick up the newspaper.

Of course, you know that. It’s unreasonable to expect your prospects to find you regularly with one marketing channel…

Or is it?

How about every time your prospects go to their computers and Google a product/service and your name comes up - every time they look, no matter what time of day or night, no matter where they live.

I pointed out to the owner with the post-radio blues that investing in Search Engine Optimization of her website would generate new business - and continue to do so in the years ahead, without significant reinvestment needed.

SEO has ROI with a rocket launcher attached to it: expect a quick payoff and a long payoff - in all your markets.

(Put that in your pipe and smoke it, Mainstream Media!)

Getting a web page to rank well in Google using SEO is one thing - and getting the visitor to stick around - with the potential to convert to a sale - is another thing altogether. First comes love, then comes marriage: first you get the search engines to love ya; then you get your prospects to hook up with your wares!

Don’t get swept away by the SEO after-party (popping the cork for all those Page 1 and 2 rankings!) without watching to see who sticks around your site and what they do.

Keep your eye on the (sticky) prize

Remember the goals: visitor loyalty, and a good conversion rate (whether that’s sales leads and/or online commerce).

Never take your eye off the importance of site “stickiness,” i.e. length of time spent on a site, number of page views, number of return visitors. Search engine optimization services will get you the traffic, but it’s up to your brilliant marketing mind to keep the (right) traffic.

All web readers - even B2B - like to do stuff

Good ole CTA (call to action) should be front-of-mind in the writing and design of each web page. Simply put, web users like to do stuff. Are your website visitors…

• Emailing for more information (via automated form that’s pipelined to your sales reps)?
• Downloading a PDF of your product’s specifications, or a case study of a customer application?
• Playing a demo video of your service?
• Clicking through to your distributors’ sites?
• Popping something into their shopping cart?
• Adding a comment to a corporate blog?
• Joining your company’s Facebook page/group?
• Using the Search function to locate items and/or brands?
• Subscribing to your e-newsletter?
• Other actionable items (and there are lots)

There’s a reason that social media - networking sites like Facebook, voting sites like Digg, the “blogosphere” in general - is so popular and growing every day. Because people rule the roost. They get to review, comment, share, collaborate, socialize, vote, promote, demote, update, fly around in virtual worlds, and much more.

Not all customers - especially B2B - are going to be into the whole “friending” movement the way some demographics are, granted. But everyone still wants to DO STUFF online.

So let them. Build it (with SEO) and they will come… Fill it with great, sticky features and they will stay, participate, contact you, and buy.

Word-of-mouth (WOM) marketing can be a beautiful thing… if the word that’s passed on is actually remembered correctly. Unfortunately, memories fail and human communication often ends up like the kids’ game of “telephone” - with the message at the end not much like the one that started:

Let’s say Susan phones Kevin about a custom orthotics website she heard about on the radio; she passes on the domain name to him.

Kevin forgets the domain name, but he remembers the company and passes that information along to his cousin Rob.

Rob sort of remembers the orthotic retailer’s name, and tells his neighbor Zoe about it.

Zoe recommends custom insoles to her mechanic, Colin, for his foot pain standing under cars all day. She says there’s some retailer in their city who sells great orthotic products online…

SEO saves the day… but not in this case

OK, there’s been a breakdown in the WOM chain, but no problem, right? Colin, Zoe, Rob, Kevin can all go and ‘Google’ to find the website of this exciting retailer, typing in search terms like foot pain, custom orthotics, insoles, arch support, etc.

But wait a sec - the company that Susan raved about isn’t turning up in the first page of Google search result pages, nor the second page… !

Turns out this talented shoemaker (and lousy web marketer) has not had his website search engine-optimized. He failed the number-one rule of reaching prospects today: Get Found Online.

Psst, I just heard from Susan that he’s having a going-out-of-business sale; let me get a pen and write down the URL…