A Question Filled Tuesday...

OK...so here I am thinking about things...many things. This morning I was up early driving to Mount Pleasant, MI to visit a client. You should have seen the sunrise this morning...it was AMAZING....but I digress.

My post this morning is in the form of several questions....more thought provokers than anything....here it goes:

• When was the last time you had lunch with 3-4 customers and asked them about their experience at the bank?
• Have you recently held a small "focused meeting" with several front line staff? Asked them what they are hearing?
• Have you mailed out personal invitations to 5 customers this week to visit you for a cup of coffee?
• Does your bank track referral frequency from customers?
• Do you know who is your largest depositer? Loan holder? Commercial customer? Trust customer?
• Have you come in the back door of your offices and walked backwards through the experience of a customer...as you know the bes way to proof-read a document is to read it backwards...I bet the same can be said for auditing your branch experience!

Many questions...no real "right" answers...other than YES and/or I will. These are important gut-level checks that are so easy and inexpensive, yet widely missed.

Take a stroll around...and see what you see!

Cheers!

Bruce

It's that time - SES San Jose

We love the Search Engine Strategies conference in San Jose, which happens next week from August 20th to 23rd. It's a cutting edge conference about all things online and it's right in our backyard. Lots of Googlers will be in attendance, from engineers to product managers to client services, representing a wide variety of products including search, AdWords, AdSense, Webmaster Tools, Feedburner, and of course, Google Analytics and Website Optimizer. Many of us will be on panels or presenting, but we're most looking forward to the idea exchange and conversations that take place during the week.

To learn more, visit the SES website and browse the daily agendas on the left. Google Analytics' Brett Crosby will speak on Thursday at 10:45am as part of a web analytics panel, and Tom Leung from Website Optimizer will speak on Tuesday at 4:45pm as part of a panel discussing landing page testing and tuning. The Google Analytics team will also be present at the Google booth (#403 in the expo hall on Tuesday and Wednesday), so stop by and say hi, ask us questions, or see a demo. And don't forget to register for and attend the Google Dance which is literally in our own backyard on Tuesday evening after SES at Google. Google Analytics will have a demo station there, so feel free to come by in between (or during) dancing, eating, and schmoozing.

Hope to see you next week!

Posted by Jeff Gillis, Google Analytics Team

ROI in Hispanic Marketing

I am fully in favor of having every investment return a profit. Not only a profit that is commensurate with the investment but better than other alternatives would have provided. Lately, however, ROI, or return on investment, has become a fixture in marketing parlance but it has been loosing force and significance. Looking at ROI, Costumer Lifetime Value, and other measures of profitability one notices that one needs to have a baseline or history, or one has to make assumptions.

That is the problem. In Hispanic marketing we need to make assumptions most of the time because we do not generally have historical data. ROI becomes a roadblock more than a value proposition in Hispanic Marketing programs. Why? Because lacking historical data, high level managers can also say that lacking substantive data to figure their return on investment they prefer the status quo. That is a sad state of affairs. ROI, can in fact become the argument against Hispanic marketing programs.

It is sort of a circular problem. Without prior data we cannot reliably calculate future return on investment, and without ROI calculations Hispanic marketing programs do not get funded. In my opinion marketing creativity suffers because of this. Most successful entrepreneurs follow their intuition when starting their ventures. It is also true that many fail. But without taking risks, how can anyone succeed.

My editorial is that we should always try to calculate how much a Hispanic marketing program can return to the company/brand, but when such calculation is more of a figment of our imagination than reality, then let us talk about entrepreneurship. Let us not stifle innovation and growth in a new marketing era because we can not come up with solid calculations. You know the story of the pendulum. ROI was totally ignored in the late 90's and now it is dogma. Should not there be a middle ground?

Your success stories wanted

We have several case studies on the Google Analytics website that show varied real world examples of Google Analytics use. And recently, the AdWords team put together a great new case study video (below) with furniture and accessories company Carolina Rustica which touches on their use of Google Analytics. I know many other people have equally compelling stories that can go into much greater depth about how they have had success using GA. If you are one of them, please tell us your story. When you do, please also indicate if you would be a good candidate for a video case study.



Posted by Brett Crosby, Sr. Manager, Google Analytics

Are bankers really thinking like retailers??

A very good friend of mine is a former car dealer and now leads the Greater Dayton Automobile Dealers Association....I share this to provide a frame of reference for Tom's words of wisdom.

He always says, when times are tough or challenges lurk ahead, that we have to "retail our way out of this..." I have heard it many times and I stopped to think about it just yesterday.

What Tom means is that we have to put energy, focus and many times financial resources toward overcoming problems...that means when sales are slow, you ADD more advertising, promotion and marketing. Traffic generation is critical to a car dealers success. Now think about banking...and more specifically, your bank. When margins are squeezed, loan volume dips, or competition is extra tough...does your marketing investment increase to compensate or are you on the sidelines trying to save the investment?

I certainly hope you are making the case for increasing the investment to support and overcome the challenges. However, IF we have not built the case that, 1st, marketing IS an investment vs. expense...that conversation is going to be a tough one.

So, how do I build the case for marketing being an investment vs. expense? Three magical letters... R - O - I !!!

You should be tracking EVERY marketing dollar spent and categorizing them into one of three categories....(1) ROI Trackable (2) Community Involvement/Donations (3) Cost of Doing Business.

ROI Trackable
These are ALL marketing, advertising and promotional investments. Home equity promotion back in April...Yep. Summer loan promotion...Yep. The pending fall checking push...Yep. We need to track the results, make assumptions and quantify the impact and match it against the investment required to make it happen. I firmly believe you should have a "floor" that protects your investments...say 150%. That floor is the lowest projected ROI that you will move forward with a program. Imagine being able to go to your CEO and say, with heart and passion, that every program is generating 150% or more....and the ones that do not...we analyze and make better!

Community Involvement
This category is for the "must do's" and "we have done it for XXX years" categories of expenses that simply cannot be measured or the measurement does not apply because you will be required/urged to do it anyway.

Cost of Doing Business
These are expenses...yellow pages, online hold, etc. that are simply required for doing business as a bank and should not be help as accountable for ROI measurements. However, diligence in managing these items will certainly win you big points!

Once you categorize your activities...you have clear guidance on what to track and what to monitor...we overlook nothing! So...how do I calculate the ROI...a discussion for another day...or simply give me a call!

Cheers!

Bruce

Customer Service at 37,000 feet?

I know that at some point you all are going to get sick of our airplane stories. But in my opinion, for as long as there is a lesson we can learn from the airlines we should continue to share these experiences. That being said, listen up!

Like Bruce, I seem to travel quite a bit. Monthly, I fly from Denver, Colorado to Dayton, Ohio. Sometimes I afford the direct flight, and others, it is just a good decision (read: economic responsibility) to connect in Chicago.

This week, I boarded my flight from Denver bound for Chicago, O'Hare, on my way to Dayton. I sat next to a mom who was traveling with her two children, on their way to visit grandparents in Northern Michigan. Being from Michigan myself, I was excited to talk about old home with my new friend and her kids. Ryan, her 4 year-old son, had broken his femur bone and was in a hip to toe cast...and a VERY good sport about it. Abby, her roughly 18-month old daughter was as cute as any toddler I have ever seen.

Somewhere around "flight attendants please be seated for take off" Abby started to SCREAM...and that is in all caps because Abby was in a full-fledged, red-faced, no-tears, award winning temper tantrum. About 20 minutes into the flight, the people in first class are starting to turn around and glare at us...mostly me, because I had the luxury of sitting on the aisle.

Now, I felt bad for the mom, who had apologized to everyone around us and even tried Benadryl for Abby...but Abby had an ear infection, so I am sure you know how badly her ears must have hurt.

After 45 minutes of the constant SCREAMING in my ear, I realized that I had two choices. I could 1.) go completely insane and take everyone with me, or 2.) start laughing.

Any of you who know me well know that I teeter on the edge of crazy anyway, and that I love to laugh. So, obviously, I chose to laugh...and laugh hard. Which apparently was the right decision because everyone around me started to laugh too. Is it possible that the giggles are contagious? Apparently so.

Finally, it was our turn for beverages. The beverage cart had trapped me between itself and screaming Abby. The giggling stopped, but the smile lingered...and that's when it happened. I couldn't believe what I was hearing. The flight attendant looked at me and said, "You have a beautiful smile. All smiles are beautiful when they are shared, but yours is really pretty."

That was the nicest thing anyone had said to me in a really long time. It was almost as though Abby had quit screaming and the turbulence had settled. But neither had. I was just happy and didn't really care what else happened that day...it was a GREAT day.

So, how does this relate to our version of customer service? Very closely.

This compliment may not have been enough to fly United faithfully for the rest of my life, but it was enough to make me want to seek out that women's flights so she could be my flight attendant every time, I would do it in a heartbeat.

So, when was the last time you said something unexpected and complimentary to one of your customers? I am guessing it has been a while. If your tellers could make it part of daily routine to find the good in every one of your customers...imagine how your customers would feel and what they would say to their friends and family. I will even go so far as to say that when you begin to find the good in others, you will also begin to see the good in yourself.

A smile isn't too much to ask. And when you smile, everyone around you will too. Share the wealth!

Jenna

Google Conversion University Attendees: Thank You!

This past Wednesday, we hosted our first ever Google Conversion University event. Over 100 participants from across the country visited the Googleplex for a day to gain insights into using Google Analytics, Website Optimizer, and AdWords. To everyone who attended: Thank you for making the event so much fun and for sharing your ideas and experiences with us. We sincerely hope that you left inspired and more knowledgeable than you arrived. (We also hope that you enjoy your T-shirt and Avinash Kaushik's new book!)

So, what was covered? Brett Crosby opened the day by providing some perspective on the evolution and direction of Google Analytics. Avinash Kaushik presented "Successful Web Analytics Approaches" and "Creating Data Driven Cultures". Stephanie Hsu spoke about using Google Analytics to optimize your AdWords campaigns and Alex Ortiz explained how to track rich interactive web experiences. In "Optimizing Customer Experiences", Tom Leung described how to implement a variety of testing scenarios using Website Optimizer. Jeff Gillis presented on the spectrum of the Google Analytics product ecosystem including how to track offline and radio advertising.

But perhaps most interesting of all were the "Ask the Team", Lab, and Q & A sessions. We were able to hear your thoughts, challenges, and ideas and renew our focus on making Google Analytics even better.

Those of you who weren't able to attend will get another chance. Our plan is to make Google Conversion University available to as many website owners and advertisers as we can. We'll keep you posted.

Posted by Alden DeSoto, Google Analytics Team