Feb 20th 2015

The First Thing Every Business Owner Wants to Know Is...

I speak to business owners all the time:  at speaking events, luncheons, chamber events and on the phone.  Most of the conversations generally center around their problems:

  • they don’t like their websites
  • competitors are outranking them on Google
  • no way to track performance and especially Return On Investment (ROI).

Eventually the conversations turn back to us here at Gainesville Marketing and without fail, the first question that I get is “So, what is it that you guys DO?”

Reading between the lines, the question really becomes “How can Gainesville Marketing help MY business grow?” Now we are getting to the heart of the matter!  The short, jargon-free answer that I use when I am speaking to someone in person is simply, "We focus exclusively on generating more referrals and sales online”.  How we do that is often the second question, and the answer might surprise you.

The Science of Marketing Online

In order to help you grow your business, we need to understand the nature of the problems that are inhibiting growth.  Much like a physician, we need to run diagnostics and collect information that will help us prescribe an effective remedy.  This is why I often refer to my team as “marketing scientists” - we are researchers more than artists.  They are more left-brained than right-brained.   They are focused intently on letting the metrics  dictate the next steps, rather than just making assumptions.

At Gainesville Marketing, we have built a culture of targeting customer behaviors and using those behaviors as the guide by which we determine how best to serve your company.  Once we gather all available information, we have a better idea of where we can focus your valuable marketing budget in a way that makes the most sense and most importantly, will have the BIGGEST IMPACT.

Using Marketing Data to Increase Your Bottom Line

Here's a perfect example of effectively utilizing website metrics:  Recently a new client came to us wanting help with Local SEO - they wanted to be in the top position on Google, Yahoo and Bing for their keyword terms and phrases.  Now, that’s an admirable goal, but when our team began examining their website and specifically their web metrics, we saw a couple glaring concerns:

  • High bounce rates on their top 5 most visited pages - meaning that the website was not engaging new visitors
  • No conversion goals were established - they weren’t measuring how well their “contact us” (and other conversion pages) were working and as a result, weren’t able to identify where leads were coming from
  • Little to no social engagement - the company was focusing significant energy on Facebook and other social media sites, but based on the visitor metrics of the website, it didn’t appear that this was driving significant traffic back to the website

We noticed many strategic changes that could be considered “low-hanging fruit” - fixes that should and could be addressed quickly for maximum impact.  Our recommendation solutions did come back with an SEO element to them, but it was not the primary focus. What we emphasized was that by addressing other fixes first, their SEO efforts would reap a much better return.

Key Takeaways For Any Business Owner

Peter Drucker, considered by many as the Godfather of modern management, was famously quoted as saying “What is not measured is not managed.” You don’t need Gainesville Marketing to begin measuring customer behaviors on your website; that information already exists! You can install google analytics for free and take advantage of a wealth of data that will help you make sound marketing decisions. What you need Gainesville Marketing to do is help you interpret that measurement data, and then utilize that data into making actionable marketing decisions. By doing this, Gainesville Marketing can ensure that you are reaching your highest possible ROI with your Internet Marketing budget.

What are some of the indications of your marketing efforts you have noticed with your own metrics? How did that information help you better-focus your Marketing strategy and/or budget? Make sure to leave a comment below and contribute to the conversation!