Internet Marketing Tips, Tools and Strategies

Google Analytics isn’t just for seeing how many website visits you get in a month; it is a powerful tool that gives you the ability to understand your customers and their needs based on statistical information. Customer behavior is often dictated by their geographical location and thankfully Google Analytics gives you information on customer location.

So how do you get location data in Google Analytics? Well Google has a handy section under visitors called “Map Overlay”. This allows you to see where your website visitors are located in the world, which you can drill down from country, to state and even to city level maps. 

If you are a company that targets customers in your local area - your surrounding neighborhood, city, or maybe the entire state; knowing how to access this geo-information can help you make improvements to your website content, advertising, etc. to increase traffic and conversions. How?

Find the content that is bringing your target audience and improve on it. Are particular products or content phrasing on your website resonating with a particular audience? Do people in your area use search strings that your website contains? Find the keywords that are driving your target location traffic to your site and write content focused on them.

Really understand who buys your product. Are you under the assumption your customer is from suburban locations? Google Analytics can show you that urban or rural users are actually the bulk of customers searching for your product or service. Knowing exactly who your client is, not who you think they are, helps you develop marketing and sales tactics that work.

Locational information also can tell you if you are limiting your business. By viewing your Google Analytics location information, you might discover that there is potential for expansion to another state or even internationally! Or, maybe you might want to consider adding an ecommerce option to your website that allows users to buy product from areas you aren’t currently doing business with.

Knowing where your customers are located helps you understand them. Understanding your customers allows you to market yourself and your company effectively for success! So be sure to start utilizing Google Analytics location data right away to start understanding where your customers are located and what they need.

Don’t currently use Google Analytics or need some help understanding what all the numbers mean? Contact WSI for an analytic consultation today.  

Most companies, okay all companies, want to see a return on investment (or ROI) when it comes to their marketing. This allows them to assess if their marketing activities are worth the time and money being spent on them. Measuring the success of Social Media Marketing isn’t always easy to do, but not any less important than any other marketing initiatives.

When it comes to social media marketing success, you have to look at several factors:

Traditional metrics like page views, time spent on site, unique visits, and goal conversions – all of which can be found in Google Analytics.

Engagement metrics like Twitter retweets, or replies; Facebook likes, or comments; blogs comments, or links to posts.

Influence metrics like Twitter followers, Facebook friends or blog/RSS subscribers.

Now looking at the hard numbers is only half the battle when it comes to determining Social Media Marketing success. Unfortunately, when it comes to measuring SMM success, some of the data you are looking at is subjective. Sure you could say having 1,000 followers is better than only having 100, but what if those 100 followers are engaged, consistently re-share your posts across their networks, etc. and on the flip side you never hear a peep out of those 1,000 followers. Now those 100 are starting to look pretty good, aren’t they? So remember to look at the communication level behind the numbers when trying to measure Social Media Marketing success.

Need help making your Social Media Marketing worth the cost and a true success? Download our free Social Media Strategy Kit for insight into utilizing social media the right way.  

 

Blogging really is a form of social media. Some social media sites are hard to measure the success of and blogging can be included in this.
 
The key to keeping a successful blog is to decide what you're going to write about and why. Your posts should speak to a specific audience and share information that this audience will find both unique and interesting. You then want to stay focused on this topic. If you start your blog about car repair you should not write a post about fixing your roof.

Once you have outlined your blog topic, do some keyword research. Use the free Google Keyword tool and type in some keywords related to your blog topic. It helps if you get into the mind of your target prospect and ask yourself – Who am I trying to reach? What am I trying to accomplish? What would they search for in relation to this blog post?

Don’t wait to start tracking the traffic to your blog posts. Get Google Analytics or another analytics software installed into your blog right away. eFusion blogs come with analytics built in and Word Press blogs, you can easily add the Google Analytics tracking script. Tracking the analytics of your blog posts will tell you how many people are visiting your blog, what keywords they used, what blog post they landed on, as well as how long they stay and what they do from there.

Follow these steps to help you measure the success of your blog:
 
1. Track Visitation - How many people are visiting your blog?

2. Are You Sparking Conversation? - Do readers comment on what you have to say? Do they discuss it?

3. Duration of Visit - Use your analytics to find out how long people are staying on your site. Did they land on your blog by accident and leave right away or did they start with one blog post and spend time jumping around and reading more? This will help you determine if you blog as a whole is interesting to readers.

4. Page Visits - Analytics will let you see what pages people are visiting and what page they enter into your site through and what page they leave from. This can help you see what posts are grabbing traffic so you know what to keep writing about.

5. Physical Location - Analytics can get as detailed as telling you where your readership is coming from. If a high percentage of your readers come from California it might not make sense to blog about a recent snow storm.

6. Keywords – Find out what keywords people are using to reach your blog. You might find some great keywords that you could use to expand on throughout your existing site or even write more blog posts around.

Ultimately measuring blog success takes time. Measuring the ROI of a blog comes from readership and followers. A good web analytics program will help you better understand your readers and their viewing habits. The more you blog, the more traffic you will get which will ultimately lead to more business for you.

These days website traffic can be increased through numerous methods. Whether you're initiating a PPC campaign, sending targeted emails or adding valuable content to your site you need to keep one constant in place. Your goals!

The ultimate (macro) goal may be to sell a product or gain a customer. Other macro goals may be:
    •    Downloading a whitepaper
    •    Signing up for an e-newsletter
    •    Requesting a quote
    •    Submitting information in return for something of value
    •    Viewing a product, service page or consuming some form of content (article, video, blog, etc.)

These macro goals can take time to achieve. Equally important to success are smaller (micro) goals that help build to your ultimate goals. Micro goals are the steps it takes to complete the macro goal. These may include:
    •    Opening an email
    •    Clicking on a PPC ad
    •    Browsing your website and viewing multiple pages
    •    Putting products into a cart and providing billing information
    
Initiating an analytics package can easily help you track the actions of consumers during a visit to your website. Where did they spend the most time, what actions did they take and what was the bounce rate upon the initial arrival? Understanding the steps taken prior to completing a macro goal can help you better understand your consumer and how to direct them where you want them to end up.

Think you have squeezed every last dollar out of your Pay Per Click campaigns? Or think you have your Custom Landing Page down to a science? Maybe....maybe Not.  As the old saying goes, "You can't improve what you can't measure." This holds true even more so during tough economic times like we are facing today. The answer is effectively managing your Analytics.

Marketing managers and business owners are looking for ways to trim marketing budgets and increase ROI  (we should always be looking to do this, recession or not). If you can spend less and make more money, why wouldn't you want to do this?

Ask yourself:
1)  Does my print ad in the local newspaper really work? And how well does it work?
2)  What is my Yellow Page Ad costing me per lead? 
3)  Is my website unattractive to my visitors?
4)  Is my search engine optimization (SEO) work giving us the leads we are looking for?
5)  Are my email marketing campaigns even reaching my prospects INBOX or going straight to Junk Mail?
6)  I am spending all this money on a radio ad, but how can I measure its effectiveness?

If you are asking yourself these questions then its pretty clear that you probably aren't up to speed with Web Analytics. You can track and measure all of these marketing campaigns effectiveness. Without proper analysis and not being able to make informed decisions, business owners and marketing managers might stop campaigns that might be working or just need some tweaking. 

Check out our Analytics Webinar and Whitepaper on Web Analytics and How to Optimize Your Marketing Dollars During a Recession.

Optimize Your Marketing Dollars During the Recession (410 KB)

Watch the Webinar
 

At WSI, we have been saying this for years....SEO (Search Engine Optimization), PPC (Pay Per Click), and E-mail marketing are the most effective ways to increase company wide "conversions", and now Forbes Media has just completed a study that confirms this.

Forbes Media "Ad Effectiveness Survey" polled 112 marketers online back in February and March to learn more about their attitudes towards digital marketing. Not only were these forms of internet marketing considering most effective at increasing conversions, but also considered most effective in demand fulfillment rather then demand creation. That is the true beauty behind effective internet marketing, your message appears at the exact time the prospect wants it to appear, its not forced, the prospect has the control.

Internet marketing is not a "demand creation" marketing medium like TV or radio. TV, Radio, and even magazines can be effective in creating demand for your product, but we get bombarded everyday with thousands of marketing messages and most people are simply tuning out. A greater ROI can be derived from effective internet marketing campaigns because we are focusing only on those who want to learn more about our products and services, and not wasting our time/money on those who don't. In today's economy, a great website marketed effectively on the internet, can be the difference maker between those companies who survive and those who don't.