Showing posts with label Return on investment. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Return on investment. Show all posts

Monday, October 8, 2012

Pay Per Click Marketing - Does It Work For Industrial Companies?

Image representing Google as depicted in Crunc...
Image via CrunchBase
I discovered pay per click marketing in late 2001, launching my first campaign with Google Adwords. At the time, I was managing a search engine optimization (SEO) project for an industrial controls manufacturer and immediately recognized the potential of this new channel.
I opened a Google AdWords account, compiled a list of keywords, and developed a small group of text ads. Within five minutes of my campaign going live, the four lines of text that I had crafted into an advertisement were appearing on the right side of Google's search results. More importantly, targeted visitors began trickling into my client's website; the power of this marketing platform really struck a chord with me. I had achieved visibility on Google's highly coveted first page using the same keywords being optimized through my "natural search" project.
Let me distinguish between paid listings and natural search listings - I am not suggesting that they are equal in value, but rather competitive in value. Natural listings enjoy a higher perceived relevancy in the eyes of search users; however pay per click advertising, when managed properly, affords businesses immediate penetration into desirable search engine result pages (SERPS). Additionally, paid search marketing is much more flexible in its approach to targeting markets and budgeting for return on investment.
Search engine optimization is a valuable strategy that can deliver a strong return on investment when properly managed. Businesses can cultivate a web presence that organically ranks high in the search engine results pages, delivering requests for quote and product sales. By the same token, the effective implementation of SEO is a long term strategy, often requiring months of development and significant project costs before a return on investment is realized.
Pay Per Click marketing on the other hand is completely measurable, making it possible to monitor profitability on a real time basis. Furthermore, the pay per click model enables marketers to revise their advertisements, budgets, and target audience(s) on a real time basis. This flexibility, when properly harnessed, is the key to an industrial manufacturer's success in the world of Internet marketing.

Tuesday, September 18, 2012

Integration Mobile Marketing and Social Media

Image representing Twitter as depicted in Crun...
Image via CrunchBase

Mobile marketing is a natural extension of social media. If you are successful in promoting your business and spreading word of mouth advertising by "creating apostles" to your business with social media then mobile marketing is the next step to take to increase your customer interaction, frequency and sales.

These platforms from Twitter, Facebook, mobile marketing and now new sites that are showing huge promise such as Groupon and FourSquare can all be used effectively alone. When we see the big difference and missed opportunity for small business owners is how to run multiple social/mobile marketing platforms together and integrated with each other.

It is important to use multiple platforms for several reasons. First, social marketing provides the highest ROI in marketing. While it does take some time in the beginning to learn these services effectively, they are essentially free and only take your time. If you are short on time, there companies that will build your social media sites and manage the marketing strategy for you so you can focus on other aspects of your business.

Second, customers that are more involved in your business and feel a deeper connection are less likely to leave you for another business. Social and Mobile create brand loyalty, positioning, differentiation and if you reward these customers accordingly, a very high rate of customer satisfaction that cannot be matched by direct mail, television, radio or other forms of print or mass media marketing.

With all of these sites and methods you must add value to the users experience by providing your fans, followers and subscribers with discounts, exclusive promotions and sales. If you you're your customers what they want, you will be rewarded. People who allow you to engage them in these mediums are most likely to spend money with you, spread the word of your business: "Creating Apostles!", and you are circling the wagon so to speak around your best customers, the ones that support your business and provide the main base of your profits.

People that are fans on your Facebook page are more likely to buy from your business. Use twitter to drive traffic to your Facebook page and get them signed up as a fan. Use Facebook to offer fans the chance to answer the mobile call to action to receive another reward for signing up to your mobile campaign. When you send out a new SMS message you will soon be able to have the ability to have the message automatically update your twitter and Facebook page. This will complete the circle and drive customers ultimately to your mobile list.

Unlike other marketing mediums, mobile marketing is far from saturation or showing any signs of slowing growth. Customers will not be members of multiple or dozens of Facebook fan pages or be following thousands on Twitter. With mobile marketing your customers will most likely follow one business from each market category. This allows you alone to have their sole attention which will drive your sales and ROI to new levels in this economy. While you may be able to use effectively to show a ROI or increase in sales, combine the power of mobile and social media marketing to compete and grow your sales.


Article source:
http://EzineArticles.com/4069006

Enhanced by Zemanta

Sunday, September 16, 2012

Measuring Social Media Company ROI

Return on investment after training and resour...
Return on investment after training and resourcing an Otago Polytechnic teacher how to use social media for open education (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
There are number of factors to measure the ROI of a company. These would be metrics and measurements that can contribute to a company's longevity. These measurement includes but not limited to: reach (# of website visits, relay and #post), relevance (engagement and authority) and outcomes. The outcome is the ROI that can result in exposure, as Jack mentioned, customers satisfaction, increase in leads and sales.

A business that wants to track their ROI from social media should start with a baseline of your company's current growth, website visitors, online transactions, telephone inquiries, etc. If you don't have this information, start tracking it.

Next, create an activity timeline that tracks all new social media projects: blog launches, new Twitter campaigns, press releases, etc., 

By stacking these timelines on top of one another, your company can create a picture of which efforts are working, and which ones aren't. Over several months, you can graph your progress and watch for correlations between events, such as certain blog articles equaling more customer calls, or positive online mentions and a jump in site visitors. 

Keep in mind, though, that another part of a good social media campaign and tracking ROI is having a goal in mind when you start so you know where you want to be. Your goal could be monetary return (more sales), or non-monetary (brand awareness, increase in social media mentions). It's not too late to start tracking your progress so your business will know how your social media efforts are affecting your company.

With social media being a prominent mode to gain popularity, companies streamline their efforts to build an entire presence through twitter, facebook & other popular social media outlets. Talking about ROI, it is indispensable to form parameters before measuring the profits for a company. Hence, business and marketing professionals who embark on the journey of social media should define what they want to achieve from using social media marketing.
Enhanced by Zemanta

Facebook Social Comments

Social Media Marketing News Headlines