Is Measuring Marketing ROI A Key Part Of Your Web Marketing Strategy?

"95% of business websites fail to deliver"
I passionately believe that every business could benefit from having a website. However, I am concerned that 95% of business websites fail to deliver value to the business? Is yours one of them?

Just putting up a website, or opening a shop, or inventing a product, or launching a new service is no guarantee of success. It requires an effective marketing strategy and for me marketing is about solving customers' problems profitably. 

How do you choose which web marketing strategies to invest in?

There have never been so many ways to waste money and you don't have enough time, resources or money to try everything. It's not about spending more, it's about doing the right things and doing them well.

Marketing ROI (Return On Investment) should be a key component of your overall web marketing strategy. Simply, this involves measuring marketing activity and making sure that the value of the return is higher than the cost of the activity e.g. Given a choice of 5 activities, each costing a £1,000 ($2,000), which one generates the highest value to the business? 

At this point if your eyes are beginning to glaze over, just think about it as getting more for less. I have no doubt that when you want to buy a new car or TV or holiday you compare alternatives and consider what you are paying and what you get for it. Marketing ROI is just applying the same principle to your business activities.

Everyone can evaluate Marketing ROI now

I have been evaluating Marketing ROI for over 15 years for some of Britain's biggest brands. Although, the principles are fairly simple, the application used to be complex, challenging and costly. However, there are some great tools available that make it significantly easier to do Web Marketing ROI than it used to be. 

For example, Google AdWord analysis includes a simple but powerful tool to measure the return on Google AdWord investment. Google Analytics takes this on to a higher level and provides data on hundreds of web metrics. 

However, for some people the data is scary and they often can't see the wood for the trees. That's why many of my web marketing clients ask me to do their Marketing ROI analysis which empowers them to make wiser choices in deciding which marketing activities to invest in.

Web marketing tips that any business (large or small) could apply to attract and retain valuable customers

• Make measuring marketing ROI a key part of your web marketing strategy

• Have a business objective for every marketing activity e.g. attract x target web visitors per week at less than £z per visitor or achieve p sales per week with an average revenue of £q at less than £r per visitor 

• Measure your web performance against your key objectives on a regular basis. The more you spend, the more frequently you should measure
  

• Identify what's working and what isn't

• Make improvements based on the learning

• Continue measuring & improving

• If it's too daunting for you or you need help then get a Web Marketing ROI expert to help

Remember...web marketing is about solving customers' problems profitably.

Peter Hawtin is an internet marketing specialist with Brand New Way, a UK web marketing agency (based in Wiltshire & Bristol) which helps companies to attract and keep valuable customers online.

Is the web channel the enemy of the call centre?

Privilege Insurance sent me a renewal notice for my car insurance a few weeks ago & I was surprised to note that it had gone up over £70 ($140) since last year. I went online to find a lower cost alternative and used the Tesco Car Insurance Comparison  Site. This is an independent search and comparison website. 

Getting quotes online saves significant time

It must take at least 10 minutes to get one car insurance quote by phone. On the Tesco site, it took about 10 to 15 minutes to enter all my details but a minute or so later I had quotes with a summary of cover from 23 companies. It is possible to select 4 quotes to compare in more detail against nearly 30 criteria which took another 15 seconds or so.

And Saves Significant Money

22 out of the 23 quotes were lower than my renewal quote offering a potential saving between £60 & £334 ($120 - $668) which is not bad for 15 minutes effort.

Same company, different costs

Imagine how surprised I was to see my existing insurer (Privilege) with the 2nd lowest cost, £209 ($418) lower than my renewal quote. 

Same company, more worried about internal competition than helping customers

I clicked the 'Buy' button to get more details to make sure I was comparing like for like. However, there was a problem on the Privilege website and all the text for the price and terms and conditions was jumbled up and not legible. I called their call centre and explained the problem. They said that their website never has problems and therefore the problem was at my end and they couldn't help.

I asked as an existing customer, could they transfer me to the web prices to match my web quote. They said no: I would have to re-enter my data on the website and start again.

I explained they were about to lose a customer of 4 years and they said they couldn't help.

Web marketing tips that any business (large or small) could apply to attract and retain new customers

• How could you help your target audience solve their problem? In my case, Tesco helped me save over £200 ($400) in around 15 minutes (by taking all the hard work out of contacting more than 20 companies) which is worth doing. Their site was easy to use, provided good information to make a decision and followed up with emails making it easy to log in again.

• Many businesses have different pricing strategies for different channels with the internet often being a lower cost? Too many companies see other channels within their company as the 'competitor'. Do you make it easy for customers who want to switch channel or would you rather lose their business to an 'external' competitor?

Remember...web marketing is about solving customers' problems profitably.

Peter Hawtin is an internet marketing specialist with Brand New Way, a UK web marketing agency (based in Wiltshire & Bristol) which helps companies to attract and keep valuable customers online.

Your name is beautiful

He remembered my name

I recently went to our dry cleaners and as I walked in the manager said "Hello Mr Hawtin." I had only met him once before, 3 to 6 months earlier and didn't recall saying or doing anything particularly memorable. He may have a photographic memory but the simple fact that he remembered my name was impressive and made me feel that I made the right decision by going to his shop. 

When I worked at UK supermarket Asda, Tom Leonard, (CEO of US Dairy Supermarket, Stew Leonard's with a reputation for legendary customer service) gave a talk to the top 100 Asda managers. He said that the most beautiful word to a customer is their name. It is standard policy in his store for the checkout operator to thank every customer by name when they leave. Someone asked, "How do you know their name?" He replied "It's easy. We read it off their credit card or cheque book."

Can you do this online?

The simple answer is yes. When I visit Amazon it recognises me and serves appropriate content. It remembers recent searches and suggests products to buy based on my purchase history. My purchase to visit rate is probably higher for Amazon than any other store. They make it so easy to buy, but in a smart way rather than a crass heavy-handed way. Sadly, so few sites do this. 

Web marketing tips that any business (large or small) could apply to attract and retain new customers

• If part of your web marketing strategy is to increase customer lifetime value by encouraging customers to make regular repeat visits then use cookies (with visitor registration) to recognise customers when they return
  
• You have to do more than just say "Hello Peter" - Offer appropriate content based on their previous history. 

Remember...web marketing is about solving customers' problems profitably.

Peter Hawtin is an internet marketing specialist with Brand New Way, a UK web marketing agency (based in Wiltshire & Bristol) which helps companies to attract and keep valuable customers online.

Why is UK web marketing growing so fast?

UK web marketing spend up 40%

UK internet marketing spend grew by over 40% in the first half of 2007 and achieved a 15% share of all advertising spend according to the UK Internet Advertising Bureau. They forecast that UK web marketing spend in 2007 would be £2.8 billion ($5.6 billion).

Paid for search (Pay per Click) accounted for 57% of internet advertising and was up 44% over the previous year.

The UK internet advertising market is the largest in Europe (39% share) and the UK ad spend per web user averages £56 ($112) compared with the European average  of £26 ($52) & the US figure of £40 ($80).

UK media agency ZenithOptimedia forecast that by 2010, internet  advertising in the UK, Denmark, Norway & Sweden will exceed a 20% share of advertising spend. 

So why is web marketing growing so fast?

Bigger brands are under more pressure to account for the return on their marketing investment. In many cases. conventional advertising fails to show an adequate return or it is often too complex to measure sufficiently robustly.

This is partly due to media fragmentation and there are now hundreds of TV channels, radio stations, press, magazines, outdoor posters etc to reach your audience. It's harder to reach a mass audience but arguably easier to reach niches.

Consumers are more savvy than ever at decoding advertising. They are also bombarded with thousands of messages every day and as a result, tune out of virtually all of them. How many ads can you recall seeing or hearing today? I often ask this question at my web marketing seminars and generally only 1 person can recall only 1 or 2 ads.

So most advertising fails to score. If you are not looking to buy a new mini you will largely not notice their advertising. When you are looking to buy a new Mini, suddenly you notice Mini's everywhere and you are also more likely to notice a Mini ad campaign.

The old way of trying to reach masses of people is largely broken and too expensive for all but the biggest brands. Demonstrating a marketing return on investment is far from easy but I have done this on projects with Asda, Egg, AA & ITV.

The new web marketing model enables target customers to find you rather than you trying to find them. Pay per click advertising does this brilliantly. If I am looking to buy a new TV or find an accountant, I sit down on my Mac and see what comes up on Google Search. Bigger brands are seeing this and switching funds from traditional media to web marketing.

Small and medium size companies using Pay Per Click advertising can compete on a level playing field alongside a big corporate. This wasn't possible in the old world as the production and media cost was often a barrier to entry. So lots of smaller businesses are getting into web marketing too.

I love it that a small business in my village can compete globally against big corporates 24 * 7 and the consumer wins.

Web marketing tips that any business (large or small) could apply to attract and retain new customers

• Do you have web marketing strategies in place to attract high numbers of targeted prospects?
  
• Is your Search Engine Optimisation strategy delivering good results against your target key words?
• Have you invested sufficiently in Pay Per Click advertising? The UK average is around 9% of advertising spend. However, as small and medium sized businesses are unlikely to be using more expensive media like TV, then their investment in web marketing should be much higher.
• Is your web marketing working?
• Have you got a programme in place to measure web performance against key business metrics? 
• Do you have the skills in house to do this?

Remember...web marketing is about solving customers' problems profitably.

Peter Hawtin is an internet marketing specialist with Brand New Way, a UK web marketing agency (based in Wiltshire & Bristol) which helps companies to attract and keep valuable customers online.

When was the last time you delighted a customer? - A great web marketing example from Amazon

Most businesses focus on making the first sale but fail to focus on growing customer lifetime value. However, what separates the good from the great is the way businesses deal with customer problems. Discover how Amazon's great customer service sets it apart from the competition. Read more...

Remember...web marketing is about solving customers' problems profitably.

Peter Hawtin is an internet marketing specialist with Brand New Way, a UK web marketing agency (based in Wiltshire & Bristol) which helps companies to attract and keep valuable customers online.