Having big amounts of data is one of the greatest benefits of platforms like Google AdWords, Facebook and LinkedIn. However, not all marketers can take full advantage of it, because, let’s face it – it can be overwhelming. The amounts of reports and graphs we can access is so big, that we sometimes wonder where to start from.
- Step one. Decide precisely what you want to achieve. This sounds easy. But it’s not. Many times, organizations go in vicious circles. They simply want to get everything at the same time: more leads, better quality, low cost per enquiry, higher conversion rate and so on. The truth is that we must sacrifice one, to get another. Decide on which metric you absolutely must improve.
- Step two. Let’s say you chose to get more conversions and keep the cost under a certain amount. The best way to do this is to access the campaigns which are not converting but generate big costs. You can do this by sorting by cost per conversion and then check the campaigns with the highest. Also, don’t forget to go through campaigns which did not generate conversions but costed a lot of money. If there is no obvious reason like broken landing page or big mistake in the ad copy, get rid of them. Sometimes you never find out why certain campaign does not perform. Accept this.
- Find what you are missing on. In AdWords start by checking the Search Terms report. These are all the phrases people typed in Google and then came across your ad. Great way to getting insight is to download the report in Excel and do a frequency macro. Here is some guidance on how to do this. I have also shared more techniques on keyword research in my previous article.
- Find better converting locations. Choose carefully your targeting, This is important in Google search and three times more important on paid social media like Facebook, LinkedIn or Snapchat. On Google, access the Locations Report and see where your most conversions are happening. You can pin down to a postcode. On Facebook experiment with different audiences. Try to narrow down not only by location, but also by interests and pages liked. Think outside the box – try to get in the shoes of your typical customer. Do they like other similar brands? Are they likely to follow certain celebrities from this sector? Split the ad sets by interest and then see which ones perform.
- Check progressions. When it comes to lead generation, we tend to get very excited by the quantity, but forget that only a small fraction pays money. If you are an ecommerce, think about basket abandoners. Do certain campaigns make it too easy for people to add a product? When it comes to leads, what percentage does your sales team close?
As a conclusion, whatever decision you take – see what the data says. Test your hypothesis and evaluate, this is the only way to reach the truth.