Okay, here is a challenge for you experienced marketers. I think you might be able to relate to this one.
I have a company that specializes in a niche industry. This target industry in turn is facing some of the most difficult challenges it has seen in decades. Competition is fierce, failures are everywhere, regulators and the news media are shining a spotlight on everyone and meanwhile, my clients are struggling with the day to day challenges of operating in a highly unfavorable environment.
So, with my target market at risk, what do I as a leader need to do to ensure my own company’s survival?
Well, I have a few options, I guess:
Hunker down and try to just hang on until it blows over
Get out while I can and expand into a different customer base that is not my specialty
Go all in and commit to do everything possible to help my clients succeed and save myself at the same time.
Option 3 -- that’s where I am.
After twenty years in the bank marketing business, I stand firmly with you in this mess and believe we can pull through it together and come out stronger.
So, instead of hunkering down, MarketMatch has made a move to strengthen its offerings and bring our clients the resources to succeed in these trying times. We took advantage of the disruption in the marketplace and invested in growing our business and positioning ourselves for the future by acquiring a regional competitor. The acquisition brings MarketMatch new products and adds key executives to our team with significant experience. For more details, read the announcement. (link to release)
Now, here is the parallel for your business. Your markets are disrupted. You and your competitors are struggling to operate in an unfavorable environment. Who will come through the challenges better off – those that hunker down and wait for things to blow over? Or, will those who take proactive action to better position themselves and their clients for the future come out ahead in the end? Obviously, I advocate the proactive approach.
I challenge you to ask “Are we doing everything we can to take advantage of the disruption in our market? “
Clients are concerned and many are moving or considering moving their money. The trust in bank/customer relationships is being eroded every day by the news media’s sensationalist headlines. Are you taking proactive steps to a) secure your current relationships and b) capitalize on your competitors’ weaknesses?
Comment and tell me what you are doing to proactively move your organization forward in this marketplace. Or, let me know if you need help identifying actions you can take to better position your bank for success.
If you are looking for more site information to help plan your display advertising campaigns and understand audiences on the web, Google Ad Planner can help. Our goal is to provide you with the most accurate site information for better planning and decision-making, and we're excited to kick off the new year with an improved traffic estimation model as well as several other features.
The new traffic estimation model should help reduce some of the confusion that often surrounds tracking the number of unique visitors to your site. When creating campaigns, many advertisers use media planning tools, including Ad Planner, to look at unique visitors based on estimates of real world users. However, publishers typically rely on web server logs or web analytics tools, such as Google Analytics, to measure unique visitors based on cookie counts. Discrepencies arise when these two types of unique visitors are compared. You can learn more about this topic by reading the IAB guidelines on Audience Measurement.
To address the various ways of measuring site traffic, we:
Added Unique Visitors (cookies), a new cookie-based metric, to help you cross-check and compare metrics, similar to Google Analytics unique visitor metrics.
Changed Unique Visitors to Unique Visitors (users) so it's clearer that you're reviewing estimated numbers of real world users.
Placed the Unique Visitors (cookies) and Unique Visitors (users) metrics on a site's profile page so you'll have a more comprehensive view of how a specific site can support your media planning. Learn how to make the most of these two metrics.
In addition, our new model improves our traffic estimates. You'll notice our page view estimates are now more accurate and consistent with web server measurements.
(Click image for a full-size version)
We've also added country demographics for Australia, Brazil, Japan, and Switzerland, which brings our demographics total to ten countries, with more coming in the future. In select countries we've also added a new demographics category, Children in Household, which can be used to research sites.
You've told us that defining an audience to fit your intended customers can be difficult. In response, we've created Pre-defined Audiences that represent commonly used audiences. Now you can experiment with different criteria without having to choose them manually.
This release represents only a fraction of what we're planning for 2009. Stay tuned for more Google Ad Planner announcements soon.
In the past we've received a lot of feedback from our users who have implemented the _setVar method requesting that custom visitor segments not affect bounce rates. You've asked for it and we've listened! Today we're modifying this feature so that the _setVar method no longer counts as an interaction hit with the result that you may see higher bounce rates and more accurate time on page metrics in your reports.
As a refresher, Google Analytics calculates bounces and durations based upon interaction hits. Now, interaction hits will only include pageviews, events, transactions and experiments (such as with Google Website Optimizer). Here's more on how this change to the _setVar method could affect your data: Higher bounce rates in your reports
Let's say that you've used the _setVar method on your landing pages to segment member vs. non-member site visitors. Previously, if a visitor came to your site and triggered the _setVar call, but viewed only one page, this would not be counted as a bounce. With this change the user defined call will not send an interaction hit and overall bounce rates will increase as this single page visit will now be counted as a bounce.
More accurate time on page metrics
Time on page metrics are normally counted by the difference in time stamps which are set by interaction hits. Prior to this change, using _setVar would cause Google Analytics to calculate the time on page metric between the time of the pageview hit and the interaction hit of the user defined variable. Now, as user-defined hits are no longer counted as an interaction hit, time on page metrics should more accurately reflect the time between one pageview and the next. Posted by Dai Pham, Google Analytics Team
Last week, we gave you a sneak preview of our seasonal display ad templates for Valentine's Day and President's Day. We're excited to let you know that these new templates are now available for you to use in your campaigns -- just visit the "Seasonal" section of the Display Ad Builder gallery in AdWords to get started.
We're always interested in your feedback and ideas for more template themes, so let us know if you're looking for something special. One of our advertisers, Jason Barnes of Superb Internet Corporation, helped us come up with the idea for easier, more timely display ad promotions. Jason and his team wanted a way to bring more relevancy to display ads, without the cost or lead time it would otherwise require, so he got in touch with us. Here's what Jason had to say:
Using Google's display ad builder is just a smoother process. Say we wanted to do a one-day holiday sale of 50% off, and the rest of the week, 30% off. That can be a hassle with standard image ad directories, but with the Display Ad Builder, we can easily swap in text if we have an image. It's a great time saver, and we'll definitely continue to use it that way.
You can adopt Jason's strategy of making quick text changes to your image ads in the Display Ad Builder, whether or not you decide to use one of our new seasonal templates.
If you're new to Display Ads, you can get started by clicking "Display Ad Builder" on the "Create an ad page" within a new or existing campaign. To learn more about creating and running display ads, visit our Display Ads 101 tutorial site.
Last week we talked about how Website Optimizer can help you convert a higher percentage of your website visitors (getting you more conversions with the same amount of clicks). This week we'll see how you can get more conversions from your existing AdWords campaigns and keywords with the Conversion Optimizer. We're also happy to announce that the Conversion Optimizer is now available to all campaigns using AdWords' free Conversion Tracking tool that also have at least 30 conversions in the last 30 days. So, if you were previously unable to use the Conversion Optimizer in AdWords, you may now be eligible to use it.
Whether you want visitors to fill out a form, sign up for an account, or buy a product, you want the people who click on your AdWords ad to complete some action on your site. The Conversion Optimizer, a free AdWords feature, helps you get the most conversions for your ad spend by using your conversion tracking data to improve your advertising efficiency. It does this by optimizing the placement of your ads in each auction based on the likelihood of a conversion. This process helps to avoid unprofitable clicks and to get you conversions without requiring you to spend as much time managing your bids - thus saving you money and time (which is particularly useful during a down economy).
For example, say you advertise on the keywords 'shoes' and 'brown leather shoes'. If the Conversion Optimizer determines that people who search for 'brown leather shoes' buy more shoes on your website than people who search for 'shoes', it will adjust your bids so you can appear higher on the page for the more profitable term and lower for the less profitable term.
You might already adjust your keyword bids with the goal of increasing your conversions or decreasing your costs, but the Conversion Optimizer is able to adjust bids using additional factors that are otherwise unavailable. This includes varying bids by broad match query, user location, and the particular search or content partner sites where the ad is appearing. These extra adjustments enable many advertisers to achieve double-digit percentage increases in conversions while paying the same price or less for each conversion.
To learn more or to get started, check out the Conversion Optimizer page. And remember to visit www.google.com/domorewithless to find a list of other Google resources that can help you achieve your advertising goals -- even in a downturn.
We'd like to share with you seven new help videos on popular AdWords topics. In each video you'll find the exact steps you can follow to use different features within your account. The videos cover the following topics:
The seventh video, shown below, demonstrates how to use the Campaign Optimizer, a free AdWords tool designed to help you fine-tune your advertising campaigns. The Campaign Optimizer analyzes your budget, keywords, ad text, and landing page to create a customized proposal for your campaign. You can then review the proposed changes and accept the ones you want to apply to your campaign.
Motion Charts make it possible for you to perform both high-level analysis (such as identifing long-term trends) and targeted analysis (aimed at gauging the impact of a specific change or event).
In today's post, we'll focus on identifying trends. Here are some examples of high-level trends you might want to examine using motion charts:
How the value of a keyword changes over time
How targeting traffic from a channel improves (or decreases) the quality of your visitors over time
How landing page optimization affects visitor behavior
How engagement metrics relate to your conversion rate
How your visitor profile changes over time
To get to Motion Charts, just click "Visualize" at the top of any report that has a table with two or more values. Reports from which you can launch Motion Charts include New vs. Returning Visitors, Languages, Referring Sites, Keywords, Top Content and many, many others.
When to use a motion chart instead of just a graph
A standard graph shows data across two dimensions, (X-axis and Y-axis). On the other hand, Motion Charts let you look at data across up to five dimensions (X-axis, Y-axis, Color, Size and Time). If you're having flashbacks to high school math class, don't panic! Let's look at an example. We'll use Motion Charts to spot a trend of increasing visits from users of Internet Explorer on the Windows operating system.
Example: Spotting a trend in the Browser / OS Report
Start by navigating to the Browser and OS Report.
Next, click the "Visualize" button at the top of the report.
We'll select Visits for the X-axis, and % New Visits for the Y-axis. The chart loads a view of the data for the first day of the period. Notice that the bubble for Internet Explorer/Windows starts well on the left side of the chart:
After clicking play, the chart begins to change. Midway through the period, the "Internet Explorer / Windows" bubble has moved and now hovers near the middle of the chart. The other bubbles stay to the left, showing that the increase is not a trend across all the browser/OS combinations.
By the last days of the period being charted, the Internet Explorer / Windows bubble has moved to hover in the far right corner, representing a substantial increase in both Visits and % New Visits.
Thanks to the Motion Chart, this trend was easy to spot. Here's the real question though, what do you do with an observation like this?
The project manager may budget additional time for quality testing in Internet Explorer vs other browsers due to the change.
The marketing manager may use the insight to refine his or her understanding of the audience for the site, adjusting the sales copy to match known preferences of Windows users.
The advertising manager may conclude that the company's new Mac-focused campaign was actually reaching the wrong audience and adjust accordingly.
Useful tips when looking for trends with motion charts
Focus on those bubbles that move more gradually. Often these are the bubbles based on the largest amount of data and are less likely to be thrown off by random, one-time occurrences.
Use the trails feature to visualize a bubble's path across time steps. You can turn on trails by hitting the "Trails" checkbox shown below.
Change your timescale from days to weeks when looking for longer-term trends. To change the time-scale on your motion chart, navigate back to the report you want to visualize, select the middle button next to the “Graph by” label on the upper-right hand corner of the graph and then click "Visualize" to return to the motion chart.
Focus on trends that let you take action. If you're easily able to make adjustments to your advertising mix but not your sales copy, then you may want to start your analysis by looking at keyword trends and campaign performance rather than landing page optimization.
Check out some of the other resources on Motion Charts to sharpen your skills:
We're pleased to announce that a Google Analytics Seminar for Success is coming to Atlanta on Tuesday, February 17 and Wednesday, February 18. Seats are limited so be sure to register right away! Here's the run-down:
Day 1 - Business Insights: Delivered from an analyst's perspective, Day 1 will focus on what reports to look at and why. You'll also find out about performance indicators that can alert you of potential problems. Day 1 also covers the latest Google Analytics tools: Advanced Segmentation, Custom Reports and Motion Charts.
Topics Include:
Introduction to web analytics
Website testing with Google Website Optimizer
Google Analytics reporting features
Sharing Google Analytics data
Custom dashboards
Understanding site visitors
Tracking online marketing campaigns
Evaluating site content and user navigation
Understanding goals and conversion funnels
Day 2 - Technical Insights: Day 2 will cover how to properly set up Google Analytics from a technical standpoint. From filters to code customization, all the technical topics you need are covered on Day 2.
Topics Include:
Google Analytics architecture overview
Learning about regular expressions
Improving your data with filters
Setting up goals and funnels
Implementing e-commerce tracking
Configuring custom segmentation
Introduction to event tracking
Tracking websites with multiple domains/subdomains
What kind of analytics user are you? Our Analytics Evangelist, Avinash Kaushik, has created a "Nine-Point Checklist of Analytics Awesomeness" to help you find out. Are you an Emperor or a Newbie?
You'll need to have mastered all 9 of the below to call yourself Emperor. If you're doing less than 3, you're still a Newbie.
9. Get external context to your performance (benchmarking) 8. Internal site search baby! Rock it! 7. Search, organic, get good at it 6. Landing pages, landing pages, landing pages 5. Goals, goals, goals (& goal values) 4. Enable deep e-commerce tracking and analysis 3. Your only true analytics BFF: bounce rate 2. Powerfully leverage custom reports 1. Give me segmentation or give me death!
Want to hear more on the above? Check out Avinash's post on Deeper Analysis & Insights for the full story. Worth a good weekend read and could be your ticket to Analytics Emperordom!
Adding a search box to your site not only offers your visitors an important ease-of-use feature, but provides you, the site owner, with powerful insight into what your visitors really expect from your site. If you don't have a search box on your site, you might consider using the Google Custom Search Engine (both free and paid versions are available). If you already have a search box, make sure that you're tracking visitor search activity.
We want to show you the many ways to take immediate action on the data in this report, so we've added a video on tracking internal Site Search to our "Google Analytics in 60 Seconds" series. You can view the video below and learn more about how to make effective use of the internal Site Search information in this article, Five Questions to Ask of Your Site Search Data.
Regardless of the year or economic climate, it's always been important to optimize the return on your advertising investment--but now it's more important than ever. Google Analytics specializes in providing you with the metrics you need to make informed advertising decisions.
By linking your Google AdWords and Analytics accounts, you can optimize your AdWords investment even more effectively with increased trackability and customized reporting. Check out this short video and learn more about the benefits of linking your accounts.
To learn more about advertising more effectively with Analytics you can watch the "Google Analytics in 60 Seconds" videos - a series of videos that illustrate simple tips such as how to optimize keywords and how to use placement targeting.
It only makes sense that Analytics should be able to track sites created by another Google product, Google Sites. Google Sites is an easy-to-use online application to make team websites. Multiple users can collaborate on editing the site at once online, and it's all hosted by Google for free.
Installing the tracking code for your Google Sites website requires just a few simple steps. After creating a new account and profile for your website within Analytics, another JavaScript code snippet will be generated with a new tracking ID for your site (the tracking ID from within the code snippet is always in this format: UA-XXXXXXX-XX). You can just paste the new tracking ID into your Google Sites settings page under Other Stuff > Statistics.
Once you set up Analytics for your Google Site website, you'll have to remember to apply the code to all the existing and future pages for your website. For full instructions on configuring your site with Analytics, please follow these instructions.
As you're starting your advertising for a new year, we'd like to share some strategies that can help you refocus your campaigns for the current economy. Over the next couple of weeks, we'll show you some different AdWords tools and features that can help you make the most of your marketing dollars. You can also visit www.google.com/domorewithless to find a list of Google resources that can help you achieve your advertising goals -- even in a downturn. This week we'll focus on how you can get more conversions (sales, form fills, account sign-ups, etc.) from your website.
When the economy's down, it's more important than ever to make the most of your paid search traffic. One way to increase your sales without increasing your budget is to convert a higher percentage of visitors to your website. That way you can pay for the same number of clicks, but have a higher percentage of them turn into customers. So, how can you do this?
This is where Website Optimizer can help. Website Optimizer is a free tool from Google that allows you to compare multiple versions of a webpage and statistically determine which version performs the best. For example: you can create two different landing pages, one with four small pictures versus a page with one large picture, and scientifically determine which design has the highest conversion rate. Sometimes small changes, like changing the size of an image or the wording of a special promotion, can improve conversion rates by 10, 20, or even 50%. And, since Website Optimizer uses actual visitor data, it can take the guesswork out of site improvement and give you confidence that you're improving your conversion rate.
Website Optimizer is very easy to implement and only involves inserting a small bit of Javascript code into your webpage and variations. If you are not sure what to test, start with these guidelines:
Simplify your page: try creating a variation that has less text, fewer input boxes, or a shorter header.
Move your call-to-action to a more prominent location: try creating a variation where the button you want your visitors to click is in a different location (at the top of the screen? more centered?).
Change the color of your call-to-action button: try creating a variation where your Submit/Buy button is a higher contrast color (like a bright red or green).
Change your promotional text: try creating a variation that emphasizes a different promotion to see if it affects sales (10% off versus free shipping).
Change the number of options the visitors see: try creating a variation with fewer product categories or fewer links to see if visitors have an easier time navigating the page.
For more ideas on what to test, check out Website Workout videos and learn how four companies improved their conversion rates using Website Optimizer. Also, if you're a testing and optimization pro, you'll be happy to hear Website Optimizer allows you to perform both A/B tests and multivariate tests on your webpage for free.
Check out the Website Optimizer page to learn more about the tool and how you can set it up for your website. Next week we'll talk about how you can get more conversions from your current campaigns.
As marketers, we all understand the importance of branding, but how do you craft YOUR brand as your bank or credit union’s marketing department?
A solid internal brand can transform marketing from the “arts and crafts” department to the strategic thought leaders … from the “ad guys” to an indispensible planning resource … from an expense to a valuable INVESTMENT.
As with any brand, your department’s brand needs to be differentiating, relevant and speak to a need.
Be Differentiating:The Marketing Department should be the ONLY one-stop resource for all information within your market.Among other things, you should be the expert on:
How your current customers perceive and use the bank
How potential customers perceive your bank and use their bank
What a potential customer looks like and where they live
What the competition is doing (or not doing)
What the financial trends are in the market
Each planning session, it should be your department that leads the conversation with the management team and the Board on market conditions and a basic SWAT analysis to establish a mind-set and get everyone on the same page.
Be Relevant:Banks are more in the forefront of American’s minds that they’ve been in generations.And people are crafting their opinion of you and your peers by what they see on CNN and the local news.
The bottom line is that YOU are the sculptor and guardian of your institution’s image.No one else in the bank, not even the CEO, is as concerned about the perception of your bank as you are.From the front-line interaction to the sales collateral to the external communication - you are responsible for the customer experience at every touch point.What could be more relevant?
Speak to a Need:Remember who your internal target audience is … the CEO, CFO and Board.Of these, most have a finance background and focus.So, speaking about creative awards will not necessarily address what is important to them.
You need to speak in your target’s language … cold hard numbers!A solid understanding and sharing of your marketing ROI will go a long way to adding value to your department’s brand.Consider this … if your CEO has only $1 to invest in the institution, where will they get the best return?An investment at today’s rates?More technology, branches or personnel?Or a sound marketing program that can generate 120% plus ROI?
We just need to take our own medicine and put the same emphasis on our internal brand as we put on our bank’s brand.Imagine what it could do for your involvement in key decisions, job security and your overall marketing budget.
As always, please share your thoughts as a comment below. Or if you think I'm full of it ... please share that too!!!
In the spirit of New Year's resolutions, one of ours is to work even harder in 2009 to hear what you have to say. My resolution to work out more frequently at the gym has already gone out the window (the Golden Globes took precedence last week), but I promise that listening to you is a resolution we'll follow through on! To help kick things off, here are a few ways you can get your questions answered and provide feedback to the Google Analytics team.
As of today, you can post comments on new features and developments directly in the blog
For support questions or more in-depth conversations, use the help forum
Celebrate Valentine's Day and President's Day with ad templates dressed up specially for the occasions. In a few days, we'll offer seven new templates in the display ad builder -- each with elements and animations designed for the upcoming holidays. Seasonal templates are a fun, effective way to make your message more relevant to customers, no matter what you're advertising.
As a sneak preview, we've included some screenshots of a few upcoming templates. Keep in mind that customization options for each template will vary, so we encourage you to check out all the options once you're ready to create your ads.
(Click screenshots to enlarge the images.)
The new holiday templates will be offered in all of the display ad builder's 13 languages. We'll update the blog once the holiday templates are available to you.
If you've added a profile recently to your account or read a help article that discusses the tracking code, you may have noticed an addition to the tracking code snippet. You do not need to change the tracking code in your existing pages, although doing so will add a layer of functionality that I'll explain in a minute. Here is the updated snippet, with the additions in bold. <script type="text/javascript"> var gaJsHost = (("https:" == document.location.protocol) ? "https://ssl." : "http://www."); document.write(unescape("%3Cscript src='" + gaJsHost + "google-analytics.com/ga.js' type='text/javascript'%3E%3C/script%3E")); </script>
So why the change? Adding the try and catch to the snippet removes the possibility that your visitor sees a JavaScript message that doesn't apply to her. It's a fairly rare occurrence because messages like these (frequently in the form of an alert box) can only appear if JavaScript messaging has been enabled on the browser. Most browsers have JavaScript messaging turned off by default, but sometimes people unintentionally turn it on. For those visitors who have enabled messaging, the try and catch will have the effect of halting any messages from the Google Analytics tracking code snippet.
As a best practice, we're including the try and catch in the snippet and updating our help materials to reflect this change.
Now it's easier and more affordable to advertise your business on national television and reach new customers from within your AdWords account.
Google TV Ads has partnered with SpotMixer to bring advertisers a new, free ad creation service. This means you can create your own TV commercial from a library of free images, audio and video content, or your own uploaded content. Simply access this service from the Submit Ad page when creating your Google TV Ads campaign.
What happens in Vegas.. doesn't have to stay in Vegas. At least not when you're going there to attend the Google Analytics and Website Optimizer Seminars for Success! Spend one to three days learning about Google Analytics and Google Website Optimizer. Come back armed with best practices and tips from the experts on how to use them to improve your business.
These courses are ideal for marketers, web designers, web analysts and anyone who wants to improve their online business savvy.
Introductory Course- Wednesday, January 21 The introduction and user training course is designed to provide a high-level overview of the products and will cover key features and reports. It's perfect for a marketer or account manager who is interested in learning more about how Google Analytics works, and who wants to understand how to use the information in reports to make decisions.
Advanced Course - Thursday, January 22 The advanced and technical implementation course is for those who need hands-on implementation training. This is a great class for those of you who need to install and set up Google Analytics on sites. You'll learn about and discuss different ways to set up Google Analytics to get the types of information that you need.
Google Website Optimizer - Friday, January 23 Learn how to make landing page testing work for you. You will hear from the experts on using Google Website Optimizer and testing the pages of your website to find out what works best for your visitors. Best practices will be covered, and you will leave with real hands-on experience running A/B/N and multivariate tests using Google Website Optimizer!
I volunteer for Junior Achievement. This morning I taught second graders the principles of paying taxes, why we have to do it and where the money goes. They learned the words "government," "services" and "taxes."
Then one of the students raised his hand so politely and asked if they could teach me new vocabulary words. "Absolutely," I answered!
My first word was "Tweet." And being the social media nerd I am my mind went to Twitter immediately. But these are second graders after all...so my answer, "Tweet is what a bird says." The class erupted with laughter. I was promptly corrected that "Tweet is what you do when you change your Twitter."
Second graders. I can't make this stuff up!!
So, what's the lesson is all of this? If second graders know what Twitter, MySpace and Facebook are, you should too. I am hoping they are not using these outlets yet, but if they are, you are already behind the 8-ball!
How do you get started? What is right for your institution? How does it work? Is it safe? All legitimate questions. And important questions too!
The Brown Bag Lunch series will address all of these questions on February 20. But in the meantime, if you need a little help, give me a buzz or drop me a note! I would love to help you sort everything out!!
Many businesses invest a lot of time into perfecting their AdWords campaigns, but rarely give their landing pages the same level of attention. Well, we have four savvy companies who put their sites to the test and saw results.
Back in June, we announced the Google Website Workout contest, where we selected four businesses to work with our consultants and improve their conversion rates using Website Optimizer, Google's free testing and optimization tool for websites. We're now happy to announce the winners and share their experiences with you.
Visit the contest site to watch the videos and learn what problems plagued the winners, what they decided to test, and what the results were. For example, check out how one of our winners, Extra Space Storage, increased conversions by nearly 10% by making a few simple tweaks.
Be sure to check out the other videos as well. You'll can find out how Colonial Candle improved sales, Outrigger Hotels & Resorts increased reservations, and Team In Training gained valuable insights into their visitors' preferences. Hopefully you'll even learn a few pointers that you can apply to your own website.
Last April, we gave you a few tips on using Website Optimizer and Google Analytics to improve your business online. As a follow-up, we announced the Website Workout contest last June. Four businesses were selected to improve their conversion rates using the data they gained from Website Optimizer.
The results are in! Find out how the winners improved their conversion rates here. I think you'll be surprised how a small change can make a big difference. For more information on how to optimize your site, check out the Website Optimizer Blog.
If there's one thing I've learned as an elite high hurdler in USA Track & Field's Masters Division, it's that the fastest or most agile opponent doesn't necessarily win the race. To be truly successful the hurdler must master the five fundamental skills: speed, agility, flexibility, focus and endurance. And in a race that is sometimes decided in hundreths of a second, failure in one of the five elements will leave you off the medal stand.
As a marketer, I always try to look at both myself and the company through these five filters in everything I do. Because a subpar performance in any of these five areas can quickly derail even the best laid plans.
Speed:
In today's world, information flows at the speed of light. Technology has changed our world forever. Does the corporate culture and management structure at you institution allow for fast innovation as market or competitive situations arise? Or is it the corporate equivalent of turning an oil tanker? It used to be that the big ate the small. Now the fast eat the slow. As a marketer, it is incumbent upon you to look for ways to streamline processes that will allow for your institution to quickly react to market conditions whether it be to communicate with customers, introduce new products or to promote your standing in the marketplace. Transform your institution from being innovative to one whose being is innovative!
Agility:
Changes in the financial marketplace are a daily occurrence--whether its interest rates, TARP news, deteriorating trust in banks, etc. How agile are you and your institution to these changes? As a marketer, do you wait for direction from your ALCO committee or are you part of the process? Are you ready to go to market quickly when faced with a declining or rising interest rate environment? Are you proactive or reactive? Are you ready to deal with these hurdles before they happen? If you assume and prepare for the worst-case scenarios you will be ahead of the curve--and the competition. And as the old saying goes: "unless you're the lead dog on the dogsled team then the scenery never changes."
Flexibility:
For financial institutions, new deposit generation is king in terms of liquidity and funding loans. And like in today's real estate market, deposits are a buyer's market. Now, more than ever, you need to retain and grow your best customer relationships to ensure future profitability and institutional viability. Do you have the flexibility to offer your best customers better value for their business loyalty in the form of discounted or relationship pricing based on their account balances and number of products? Do you coddle and nurture your best customers to make them feel special? Do your marketing plans have the flexibility to adapt to rapid market changes? Are you creating those barriers to exit for customers so they won't abandon you for 25 bp? Not being flexible in today's business climate is the equivalent to showing the customer the exit door.
Focus:
Keep your eyes on the prize! With all the chaos in the financial marketplace, focus on the two most important elements to success: giving your customers a compelling reason to stay and your prospects a compelling reason why your institution is their best choice. And that involves three critical factors: innovative products and services, outstanding customer service and instilling a high level of trust as a financial advisor in customers and prospects. In short, treat people as you expect to be treated--with respect and trust, and reward them for their loyalty!
Endurance:
Today's financial battlefield will be a protracted event that requires the utmost endurance in order to survive and prosper. There are no magic wands, silver bullets or quick fixes. Even if you mastered the other four disciplines, the lack of endurance will cause you to stumble over the final hurdle. Long-range strategic plans and yearly marketing plans will need to endure through all kinds of financial events--both known and unknown. Nothing can be set in stone. As you eye the finish line, never lose sight of what lies between the starting blocks and your ultimate goal. And with that, I'll leave you with this quote from the Chinese Taoist Philosopher, Lao Tzu, "If you do not change direction, you may end up where you are heading."
Since 2006, AdWords local business ads have been connecting your business with local customers. Today, we're excited to announce some upcoming new features for local business ads, making it faster and easier for potential customers to find your business.
Before we give you the details, we want to point out that while local business ads can appear in several countries and on a number of web properties, the changes described here will only affect local business ads that appear on Google Maps.
Info Window Features
Beginning today, your ad’s information window in Google Maps will feature new interactive links that are designed to connect users to your business quickly. The info window is the window that opens when a user clicks on an organic search listing or a sponsored result on Google Maps.
Previously, a click on your ad's info window could only take the user to your website. Now, users will be able to interact with the info window to get the information they’re looking for about your business, right away. The new links include "Get Directions," "Street View" (where available), and "Save to My Maps." Shortly after we implement these links, we’ll also add a "Send" link, allowing the user to send your business info to their email. Users will still be able to click through to your site if they wish -- the info window simply offers additional free functionality. Reporting Capabilities
We've also heard your requests for a local business ad report so, starting in a few weeks, a new interaction report for local business ads will be available through your account’s Report Center. The report will help you accurately assess your return on investment with local business ads by detailing how many users opened your info window and clicked on each of the new interactive links.
Often, Maps users are looking for different information than Search users. The new interactive links and the interaction reports should not only help customers connect with you faster but should also help you understand how to better target Maps users versus Search users. We’ll post again on this blog when the new changes to the reporting capabilities take effect.
With these changes, we're excited about providing users with more information about your business and providing you, our advertisers, with more features for your ads. If you're not already advertising with local business ads, this might be a good time to experiment. If you're interested in learning more about this format, check out the AdWords Help Center's section on local business ads.
Seminars for Success, our in-person trainings for AdWords, Analytics, and Website Optimizer, are continuing in 2009 with a few enhancements.
First, each AdWords seminar will now devote a portion of time to address online advertising in a down economy. We hope this new section will be especially relevant and helpful to your current business. Second, we've created a two-day format for the Advanced seminar so we can cover more topics and provide more time for questions and examples. Our new, advanced seminars are AdWords 301: Advanced Account Optimization and AdWords 302: Advanced Conversion Optimization. Check out the course descriptions for more information on both seminars.
In the coming months we'll be offering Seminars for Success in the following cities:
AdWords January 19-20: San Francisco Bay Area, CA - AdWords 101: Beginner and AdWords 201: Intermediate January 22-23: Phoenix, AZ - AdWords 301: Advanced Account Optimization and AdWords 302: Advanced Conversion Optimization January 28-29: Austin, TX - AdWords 301: Advanced Account Optimization and AdWords 302: Advanced Conversion Optimization February 11-12: Vancouver, BC - AdWords 301: Advanced Account Optimization and AdWords 302: Advanced Conversion Optimization February 12-13: Fort Lauderdale, FL - AdWords 101: Beginner and AdWords 201: Intermediate February 19-20: San Diego, CA - AdWords 301: Advanced Account Optimization and AdWords 302: Advanced Conversion Optimization
Analytics January 21-22: Las Vegas, NV - Analytics: Introduction and Analytics: Advanced February 12-13: San Jose, CA - Analytics: Introduction and Analytics: Advanced February 17-18: Atlanta, GA - Analytics: Introduction and Analytics: Advanced Website Optimizer January 23: Las Vegas, NV - Website Optimizer Seminar February 11: San Jose, CA - Website Optimizer Seminar
If you sign up for seminars at least seven days in advance we'll even throw in a $50 AdWords credit (view the terms and conditions of advertising credits).
For more information about Seminars for Success, including registration details, course outlines, and past attendees' comments, please visit http://www.google.com/awseminars.
We've been taking an in-depth look at some of the new enterprise-class features that were recently launched in Google Analytics, and we're proud to present the next installment. This one relates to Custom Reports.
Custom Reports are like super reports. You can spend literally five minutes building one and feel like you've just built your own metrics dashboard. Building a tailored report is easy and it feels great! It means quicker access to the information you care about, less data overload, and easy sharing with colleagues. Let's dig into some of the details.
A few quick definitions
So, you're going to be building your report by columns and rows, just like a regular report. What do you want to put in the columns and rows? We've classified everything in Google Analytics in two ways: Metrics or Dimensions. In truth, you don't need to really understand the difference, because every data point is easy to find on the left of the custom report building screen. But a rich understanding always helps, so here's an explanation:
Metric (columns)
A metric is a quantitative measure of how visitors interact with your site. Metrics include things like pageviews (the number of times visitors viewed a page), time on page (the amount of time they spent looking at a page), and bounce rate (the percent of visitors that leave your site after only 1 page). The important thing to remember here is that metrics are always numerical. Metrics will be your column headings, horizontally across the top of your report.
Dimension (rows)
A dimension is a characteristic of a visitor or a page on your website that you can use to organize your metrics. Dimensions are almost always text, such as "new" vs "returning" (visitor type) or "North America" vs "Europe" (region). Dimensions will make up the rows in your report and will let you drill-down to multiple levels of detail (e.g. you can click on "Google" to learn more about that referring site).
How to create a custom report 1) Navigate to the custom report page.
2) Build your report
We put together this video to give you step by step instructions on how to create your first custom report.
For more detailed instructions on how to build a report, visit the help center.
When to use custom reports
Custom reports are most useful when you have to combine metrics and dimensions that are not combined in other standard reports, or when you want to simplify an existing report by removing data that's not relevant. Here are some of the things that custom reports let you do.
COMBINE METRICS FROM MULTIPLE REPORTS - Custom Reports let you group together whichever metrics and dimensions you find most relevant. This lets you go beyond standard reports to compare data from multiple areas of GA all in one place. This means less switching from one report to another and more flexibility in how you analyze your data.
Example: An outdoor sporting goods store places a heavy emphasis on paid search to drive e-commerce transactions, and uses the AdWords Campaigns report often. When it comes time to share reports among their internal teams, they currently do multiple exports in order to incorporate metrics from the Site Usage, E-Commerce and Clicks tabs all in one view. With custom reports, however, they can drag and drop the metrics they'd like to see from each tab and perform a single export into Excel in order to share their data with team members.
CREATE RELEVANT DRILLDOWNS - By making use of multiple sub-dimensions in custom reports, you can create a report that drills down up to five levels deep, in whatever order you choose. This lets you easily break visitor behavior into workable segments, with more precision than ever. Example: Cross Country Inc., a major transportation and logistics company, uses Google Analytics to track advertising campaigns spanning many channels including print ads, banners and pay-per-click ads. For the sake of consistency, Cross Country has chosen to use one universal campaign name, "TruckerRecruitment," that includes six unique acquisition channels (PPC, Print Ads, Banner Ads etc.)
The agency managing the placement and measurement of these recruitment ads needs to report back to Cross Country's management team on their performance, but when they navigate to the "Campaigns" report, they can only drill down one level (done by choosing a value in the "dimension" dropdown).
But wait! By using custom reports, the agency can now arrange drilldowns up to five levels deep, in whatever order they choose. This now makes it easy to show Cross Country how their Spanish-language print ads in Los Angeles did vs their Spanish-language banner ads in Chicago and optimize their spend accordingly.
SIMPLIFY REPORTS TO SHARE WITH COLLEAGUES - If you need to share data with teammates that may not work closely with Google Analytics, you can use the tab feature in custom reports to create specific tabs for individual people or job functions. This lets your colleagues see only the data relevant to their activities and helps cut down on confusion and data-overload.
Example: National Pizza has a wide range of online marketing campaigns that it uses Google Analytics to track and monitor. Several people within the organization regularly log in to Google Analytics in order to check on the performance of different campaigns. Now the webmaster can create a custom report with one tab for each of her colleagues. Each colleague gets a custom view with only the data relevant to his or her activities.
Which metrics can I put in my report?
You can choose any metric to build your custom report with. You also don't have to pair them with dimensions, which means there are no restrictions to which metrics you can use. However, when they are paired with dimensions, metrics are subject to certain restrictions. Please see this chart to understand which metric and dimension pairings are possible when designing a custom report. Share your reports with the world
What do you use custom reports for? Send us an email and let us know! Be sure to send some screenshots. Happy reporting!
I think that we, Hispanics, Latinos, or whatever label we are assigned, those of us with roots in Latin America, are strengthening our sense of common identity in the United States. A sense of identity based on pride. What we have in common appears to be overshadowing what makes us different. Our heritage from Latin America has a common cultural influence from Spain, the native peoples of the American continent and Africa, a common language, and beliefs in the supernatural that shape how we look at the world. Now, in the United States our heritage is being further shaped by the "American" experience. Being of Latin American origin in the United States promotes a unique way of looking at the world.
We have found commonality in the being different, immigrant backgrounds, pride in art, music, literature, food, architecture, and, perhaps more importantly, a subjective perception of the world that runs as a common theme in our sense of identity. The largest immigration of Hispanics to the United States was in the past 30 years. We grew from 10 million in 1980 to about 50 million in 2009. Most likely, this growth will continue but now fueled by children born in the United States, and not so much by immigration. Many contend that eventually we will just melt like everyone else has done in the past. I believe that our numbers, our culture, and our sense of difference will keep us distinct to a larger extent now than ever before.
Discrimination has always been a force unifying people. We have experienced that. Being seen as foreigners and immigrants has been a common experience even if many of "us" have been here longer than those who look at us as newcomers. But this pressure makes us strong. This stress is unifying us. Most Hispanics in the US have not had a strong avocation for activism or a need to organize. In my opinion, the time has come. Hispanics are now a strong force recognized by marketers, first and foremost, and by politicians who want our vote. Now we can leave behind anomie and fatalism and see that we have real power. We have money and many of us have a vote to cast. We have become increasingly aware that if we do not unite we will have no power. Look at the unprecedented immigration protests of the recent past.
The time has come for us to gather around what is important. Our sense of cultural identity unifies us in a very special way. We look at personal relationships in very different ways. We look at time and space as continua that transcend our existence. We have a sense of the supernatural that makes us feel awe in a different way. We have gender relationships that work differently. We have dual identities. We are different and also similar.
Samuel Huntington, rest in peace, was wrong. The work ethic of Hispanics is as good as or stronger than a "Protestant Work Ethic." We have demonstrated that since we have been in this great country. We do not want handouts. We want work. We want to achieve.
It looks to me like Hispanic identity is strengthening and becoming a great force in making the United States a greater country. We are here and we are ready to achieve, to be online, to buy products, to serve this great country, and to continue being essentially family people, proud of whom we are and now united by a common experience. We are now ready to organize and be a stronger social and cultural force. This has to be our future.
So, what does this have to do with marketing? Everything!
On Saturday, January 10th, 2009 the AdWords system will be unavailable from approximately 10AM to 2PM PST, for maintenance. While you won't be able to sign in to your accounts during this time, your campaigns will continue to run as usual.
AdWords system maintenance typically occurs on the second Saturday of each month from 10AM to 2PM PST.
We'll continue to update you via the blog as we always have, but please make note of the January 10th date and our scheduled maintenance further down the road.
I had a personal epiphany over the weekend and then turned it into a professional one.
There's no greater reflection of ourselves than observing the actions of those we lead.
It all started when I wished my 5-year-old son would stop yelling first and asking questions later.
Then I realized that he was a “mini-me.”A 3-foot tall version of my impatient, hotheaded self.He wasn’t born with a short fuse, he learned it through watching me.
The same is true for our institutions.As managers or those responsible for the service delivery of our banks or credit unions, if you are unsatisfied with the actions of your staff – first look at the culture that created the behaviors.
Walt Disney understood this:
“People look at you and me to see what they are supposed to be. And, if we don't disappoint them, maybe, just maybe, they won't disappoint us."
- Walt Disney
I don’t believe that Orlando, Florida is the hotbed of outstanding, service-oriented people.If that were true, your experiences outside of Disney would be the same as those inside the park.What Disney has, however, is a clear definition of service excellence and a consistent and unwavering expectation from the CEO to the janitor that this definition is to be lived everyday – with absolutely no exceptions.
Rather than punish my son for his actions, I will make a conscience effort to not disappoint him in MY actions ... then maybe, just maybe, I won't be disappointed in his.
How will you and your management team effect the service culture of your institution?
Take Care,
Eric
OTHER MEANINGFUL WALT DISNEY QUOTES:
“You can design and create, and build the most wonderful place in the world. But it takes people to make the dream a reality.”
“Of all the things I've done, the most vital is coordinating those who work with me and aiming their efforts at a certain goal.”
2008 was an amazing year for the Google Analytics Authorized Consultants (GAACs). These guys are experts with Google Analytics, providing excellent service in areas such as installation, consultation and training. They're located all across the US, which means you can probably find one near you.
We really like hearing from GAACs because they eat, live and breathe GA every day. Once a year, we invite them to Google for an event called the Google Analytics and Website Optimizer Authorized Consultant Summit (GAAWOACS for short... just kidding). This past December over 200 participants from more than 30 countries attended. Vint Cerf keynoted and we had four days full of product information on Google Analytics, Website Optimizer and Urchin delivered by our Product Management team, plus case studies, networking and oh yeah.. lots of food and drinks.
We're not sure who looks forward to it more, the Authorized Consultants or us, but it's clear something's going right when a participant produces a rap about the event! Cheers to Paul Chastain from Just1 a Google Analytics Authorized Consulting company out of Idaho.
Here is the rap. I promised him glory since we're all out of T-shirts. Hope to see more like this next year!
