How do you approach any other form of marketing you do in your business? It is quite simply another business decision that follows the same process. You do need to understand what your objectives are, what the returns you seek are, how you measure them in terms of dollars and then decide what you are willing to spend in order to reach those goals. The marketing aspects are no different - know the market segments, align your products and services to those segments, define your value proposition and then define the initiatives that need to be put in place to deliver to the objectives.
So how should you determine whether marketing your business through your Internet site is worthy? I would propose that you begin with asking yourself the following questions:
1. What would the average sale be worth to you for a well qualified lead?
2. What % of qualified leads can you assume will convert to actual sales or new business?
3. Given a target for new business, how many visitors to your website would you need to generate in order to convert to actual sales?
Of course the actual figures will deviate clearly between business types and product / service types. Also coming into play is how good your Internet site is in getting the attention of visitors and converting them to opportunities. And finally, how effective are your sales staff supporting Internet generated opportunities in creating new business.
OK - so now you have to look at some further information. What is the history of your website visitor traffic. Who visits your site, where do they come from, what pages do they visit and what percentage of visitors convert to business sales? You do have this information don't you? If you don't then arrange to obtain this data right now and start collecting it. A free tool is provided to do this - Google Analytics which offers comprehensive information that is critical to developing and managing any Internet marketing strategy.
So now you have all the basic data you need to make a preliminary business decision. It is now a case of determining how many additional visitors you need to generate a set value of additional revenue and what that will cost to achieve. Your return on investment then forms the basis of your business decision. You can now see the opportunity to come form having a well planned Internet Marketing Plan that is cost justified and is likely to realise unrecognised revenue opportunities for your business. - 15336
So how should you determine whether marketing your business through your Internet site is worthy? I would propose that you begin with asking yourself the following questions:
1. What would the average sale be worth to you for a well qualified lead?
2. What % of qualified leads can you assume will convert to actual sales or new business?
3. Given a target for new business, how many visitors to your website would you need to generate in order to convert to actual sales?
Of course the actual figures will deviate clearly between business types and product / service types. Also coming into play is how good your Internet site is in getting the attention of visitors and converting them to opportunities. And finally, how effective are your sales staff supporting Internet generated opportunities in creating new business.
OK - so now you have to look at some further information. What is the history of your website visitor traffic. Who visits your site, where do they come from, what pages do they visit and what percentage of visitors convert to business sales? You do have this information don't you? If you don't then arrange to obtain this data right now and start collecting it. A free tool is provided to do this - Google Analytics which offers comprehensive information that is critical to developing and managing any Internet marketing strategy.
So now you have all the basic data you need to make a preliminary business decision. It is now a case of determining how many additional visitors you need to generate a set value of additional revenue and what that will cost to achieve. Your return on investment then forms the basis of your business decision. You can now see the opportunity to come form having a well planned Internet Marketing Plan that is cost justified and is likely to realise unrecognised revenue opportunities for your business. - 15336
About the Author:
Greg Tomkins is the Web Architect at Top Left Designs a Gold Coast | Brisbane Internet Marketing & SEO consultancy servicing website owners for SME business. For further info about Google Analytics visit Measuring Website Performance
