Assessing SEO and PPC performance
Search engine optimization (SEO) and pay-per-click (PPC) advertising are two top-of-funnel marketing-related activities that directly influence sales. Each can be tagged with campaign IDs so you can see what kinds of leads they’re driving to you.When you’re looking at SEO, evaluate the strength of keywords on search. Google, and to a lesser extent Bing, send you traffic based on what they perceive your reputation and relevance to be. Work with an SEO expert to come up with the right keywords and content for your pages. To the extent you can see what kind of search words bring traffic to your site, work with your web development and marketing team to make sure you’re targeting the right people and maximizing clicks from those important market segments.
SEO is as much about what you put on your website as it is what other websites publish about you. When high quality sites link to you, they tell search engines that you’re relevant and important. Be sure your SEO strategy includes both aspects.PPC gives more control to you as the advertiser. You can bid on different keywords, adjust how much you spend on them, and evaluate the success of those campaigns.
Comparing campaigns and their impact
You can set up web analytics and assigning campaign IDs to your advertising. Your marketing team should look at the different campaigns you’re running to assess how your campaigns are performing. Invest more money into the better performing campaigns and test new variations on those. Continually adjust and perfect your ads, landing pages, and follow-up strategies. Use A/B testing in conjunction to see what kind of content resonates best with your target market.Tag your campaigns with IDs, so you can see how your website traffic is performing with each campaign. Take a look at the average number of webpage views your visitors generate with each campaign. More page views generally indicate greater interest, which usually results in more revenue, but not always. Be sure you track conversions, which you can trace back to different campaigns. Evaluate cost associated with bringing in a lead to access which campaigns are most effective. This cost per lead (CPL) calculation is good for comparing raw numbers of people entering your sales funnel.
With any campaign, your goal is to minimize the cost of generating a new lead while maximizing both the chance of converting that lead and the revenue generated by that lead. Structure your reporting to look at these factors and focus on the best campaigns you’re running. Ask your marketing team to determine why your better-performing campaigns are more successful so you can learn from what works and capitalize on it.When your CRM tracks interactions across multiple channels, you can generate a report like the one below. When one channel or campaign significantly impacts brand interaction, you can see it visually in a report like this.
