Online advertising is a key player when it comes to your marketing plan with many different options available, all with their own benefits. However, with such a variety of options out there, it’s important to measure what works best for your business and what doesn’t to help you spend your budget wisely.
We’ve listed five key statistics below to help you measure the effectiveness of online advertising so you know when to ramp up certain types of activity and when to call it a day on methods that are generating little or no interest.
1) How many people have actually seen your advert?
The first stat to measure is the number of people who have seen your advert. This will help you gain a bigger picture on the reach of your advert as the more times it is seen, the more exposure you are getting online. Plus, if you use targeted advertising in order to reach people more likely to buy from you, then you can be assured that all of these views are from your ideal customers.
2) How long have people spent viewing your advertising?
Certain types of online advertising, such as sponsored content (also known as native content; a form of paid advertising that looks like it’s naturally part of the website it is displayed on, for example a paid-for article on a news site), use dwell time as a key statistic to measure success. In other words, the longer someone spends viewing your advertising, the better it is as they’re taking the time to actually read and digest the content you’re providing.
This is a great statistic to help you gauge how engaged people are with your advertising and can provide key insights into topics that resonate with your customers and topics that fail to strike a chord altogether. This means you’ll have a clearer idea of the types of adverts that engage more people, helping you to shape your future plans so that you invest in online advertising that will drive results.
3) How many people have clicked on your advertising?
Sometimes, the main aim of your online advert is to drive people to your website to find out more about your business. Measuring the number of clicks (or click-through-rate) is a great indication as to how many people have engaged with your advert and taken an interest in what your business has to offer.
These clicks will enable you to measure the total visits to your website during the campaign which allows you to see the amount of interest generated from that particular activity. It gives you more of an overall view as to how well your campaign is performing and you should expect visits to rise steadily over the course of the campaign.
It’s also useful to track which channels attract the most visitors to your website. This will help you refine your online campaign by investing more in channels that are driving more visitors. For example, if your social channel is your highest performer in achieving visits, it might be worth increasing your social spend to really make the most of an engaged audience.
4) How long have people spent on your website page?
Having a high click rate and large visitor numbers are brilliant, but if people leave your website straight away without taking any other action (also known as the bounce rate), all the hard work you have done getting people to click your advert will have been wasted. Ensure that what you are advertising is linked to your website or landing page so that there is a clear connection. For example, use the same design and creative on your adverts that you use on your website; this will ensure the customer journey is consistent and recognisable when they arrive on your site.
Also, have a look at the content of your landing page and make sure it’s relevant to what your advert is promoting. If you’re shouting about a discount code in your online advert, make sure it’s easy to find out how to claim the discount when a visitor clicks on the ad. By making your messaging consistent and relevant, you should notice your bounce rate improve.
5) How many visitors have converted to customers?
It’s important to drive people to your website and keep them engaged whilst they’re there, but the final key stat to measure is the number of people who have converted into a customer. You can find this out quite easily by asking customers how they heard about your business when buying, or even counting numbers of people using a discount code which is only accessible via your advertising.
The beauty of online advertising is that it’s completely trackable and it’s a much more measurable way to find out what’s performing well in your campaigns and what isn’t. By monitoring these five key stats, you’ll soon be able to spot trends and glean insights into the types of online advertising that work best for your business.
If you don’t have time to manage your online campaigns though, there are other providers available that can help to do this for you, including our own online advertising service.
For more information on how online techniques can help improve your marketing, take a look at these articles:
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