I’m doing lots of work on fine tuning our metrics for online marketing.
What I really love about online marketing is that you can measure everything. But the trouble is you need to sort out what the key measures are to help work out what makes money and wha doesn’t.
So we’ve come from not being able to get the metrics we want to being overloaded with numbers that don’t make a lot of sense.
And the next job is to put together a simple report that doesn’t take forever to compile and tells the story at a glance. It’s a huge balancing act.
I’ve come across lots of resources, so that’s good. Now to reduce the complexity to simplicity. That’s hard.
And then working out the benchmarks is the next step. What is a good open rate? What should be the target for bounce rates? How many unique visitors should I aim for?
I know that there are lots of variables to consider in answering these questions. The trouble with online is that it’s all very new and most people are still sorting their way through the maze of numbers.
We are constantly improving out metrics and you should be doing that as well. The better you measure the better the results from your campaigns.
I’ll keep you posted on how we progress. I’d love to hear how you are managing your metrics.
I was in Europe for 7 weeks, longest holiday since I started my business. It was great. It went from the sublimely relaxing to extreme mountain stuff. The Austrians call it walking but it went far beyond that in my book. We were in the Alps between Austria and Italy. I’ve climbed mountains in this region a few years ago but this was harder!
When we climbed we were roped up so if I fell I’d be OK. On this so called ‘walk’ over the mountains there was no rope and it got veeeery dangerous. I can tell you from first hand experience that fear does overcome exhaustion! It was 12 hours a day, up and down the mountains (max altitude was 2,450 metres) mostly above the tree line, sleeping in the huts (they are great) and then on our way early next morning.
But the scenary was just magnificant - from the high peaks, to alpine meadows, to dense forests and the wildflowers were endless in colour and variety. So the rewards were there.
Now to the economy…
The ‘relaxing part’ was spent in Sperl Cafe (Vienna) reading the papers and eating too much of that freshly baked Austrian cake.
The papers are full of doom and gloom, much more so than in Australia. The Georgia situation has re-ignited very negative feelings about Russia. That hasn’t helped. Perhaps the mood is best summed up by a comment from an equity investor that I met, ‘I’m advising my clients and colleagues to buy gold. Not the shares but actual gold. Even though prices may go down I still think that they’d be better off in the longer term.’
With a US election in November and the uncertainty in Europe we all need to monitor the implications for the Australian economy. This will impact on both business and personal financial positions. My advice, read the Financial Review and the more reputable commentators in the next 6 months. You might just save some money.
Last month I got a renewal notice for our security certificate for our website, and I thought ok, we are up for another $15, no problems right? Wrong. It’s now $85 to renew! At no time during that initial sign up process did they mention that 1 year fee is significantly less than subsequent year fees. I mean imagine if they had credit cards where you have a significantly smaller interest rate the first period than subsequent periods? Or imagine if they had printers where the ink costs more than the whole printer.. oh wait. That actually happens…
Anyway after letting that experience digest, I went to renew a domain name today, and again the price to renew is more than the initial price. What is worse is that they tried to get me to buy another domain name in the 4 pages of upselling before I was allowed to press “submit” and the price to buy the new domain was half the price of my renewal order.More and more I felt ripped off for renewal for such a high price.
So, the lesson for today - check to see what the renewal fees for SSL and domain names before you order. If you can’t find any information about it, then contact them and don’t order until you know for sure. Chances are the reason the information is not readily available is because it will be a lot higher than the initial fee.
If you are not using a blog then you should come along to our workshop, to really understand why blogs can generate big volumes of traffic for your business. During this workshop Barnaby De Palma from Alive Online will talk about:
How to build your blog strategy to get more traffic
Linking blogs to a range of Web 2.0 networks such as Facebook, LinkedIn, PR Web, YouTube, StumbleUpon, del.icio.us and many more to maximise the power of Web 2.0 opportunities
How Podcasting can connect you to your prospects and build relationships
How you can use RSS feeds to know what’s going on in your market and keep an eye on your industry competitors
That’s just a taste of what you’ll hear about.
If you want to find out more about how blogging can help you get more leads then come along to our workshop on Wednesday 25 June being held at the Tattersalls Club starting at 5:45pm. Full details on the registration form. Click here to Register
Here is what others had to say about what Barnaby reveals during his talks:
Here is an excerpt from the DVD we have just released of our recent sold out “How to turbo-boost your business using Internet Marketing” workshop. This clip is of Andrew and Daryl Grant who were our keynote speakers for the event, and they are talking about costly mistakes businesses make with websites.
We’ve just finished our 2 day internet marketing workshop. A big job. It was go, go, go.
The big thing - we tested a new workshop model. Basically, keep the entry price low, provide great content with the very best speakers and have speakers sell their services at the workshop.
All worked (except 1 speaker who didn’t provide enough content).
Why this model? From a survey we did in February companies made it clear that they have no idea where to go to get the right suppliers. We heard horror stories about web developers who really screwed up websites because they didn’t understand marketing, people who paid the ‘Google Dumb Tax’ - in other words paid way too much for their Google ads, databases that were very broken and next to useless, etc, etc, etc.
I’ve paid dearly for some internet whoppers and I know how much that hurts.
The Internet Workshop covered all the essentials of what companies can do to get effective internet marketing working for them. I’m feeling pretty good about it right now - the feedback has been great. We need to ’smooth logistics out’ but basically all else hit the spot with our participants.
So I’m looking at how we can help companies get the right advice from the right suppliers - read, and not paying a motsa for it. Anyway watch this space.
Yesterday was Day 1 of our 2-day Internet marketing workshop at the Bardon Conference Centre in Brisbane.
In a packed house, we had our guest speakers presented to the delegates some new ways of getting the Internet and their websites to generate leads, get traffic and convert to sales. We have delegates from the SME, Government and Non-Profit sectors and in multiple industries.
We had Gail Geronimos Introduce the event, Andrew and Daryl Grant were our Keynote speakers and talked about how the transition from traditional marketing to Internet Marketing has helped them. Sue Gardiner talked about copywriting for Internet Marketing. We had Matt and Amanda Clarkson who has developed an eBay business share their story. Barnaby De Palma from Alive online talked about Blogging, Social networks and SEO.
I’ll be speaking today (Day 2) about technology, automation, SPAM and metrics along with Monte Huebsch from AussieWeb Conversion who will be talking about Google Adwords, Meyrick Adams from Gen3 Media talk about his Email marketing solution. West Loh will be introducing online outsourcing options. Then Andrew and Daryl Grant will discuss Internet Strategy to be concluded with Gail Geronimos on “Putting it all together”
I’ve been rehearsing my talk, I’m covering quite a bit and when it comes to technology, it’s important to be succinct as possible. My job is to help the delegates understand how technology can help instead of confusing them with jargon and detail.
If you are at the workshop today, I’d love your comments, not only on my talk, but also my fellow speakers.
We sold out tickets to our workshop “How to Turbo-Boost your Business using Internet Marketing” over the weekend. This is 2-day event is being held at the Bardon Conference Centre in Brisbane this Thursday 3 April and Friday 4 April.
I’m now busy preparing my talk on the 2nd day which will be called “The Insider’s Guide to the Technology behind Internet Marketing”.
If you want to use our live webpage to see if any seats become available due to cancellations, click here or call me 07 3122 6022 and I can check on the system for you.
Here is Monte Huebsch from AussieWeb Conversion revealing his secret technique of measuring Google Adwords Pay-per-click performance to find the best keywords for Search Engine Optimisation.
