Only focusing on paid ads? Then you are losing money

Are you only driving traffic via paid ads? If so then you are losing money and at the same time leaving money on the table and I will tell you why and how. Over the last 10 years of being in digital marketing I have managed budgets from £500 per month to 30 million per annum and have seen how you can suffer from not having a holistic strategy and can experience a low ROI (return on investment) from your marketing spend if not done with a 360 strategy.

You can easily understand how it is possible to reduce the effectiveness on your marketing spend if you are not optimising for multiple channels when you understand how the user behaves. If a user is only going to participate within the one channel (where you are advertising) then you will not lose money through advertising on only one channel but will instead leave money on the table (leaving users in other channels unaware of your product and how to purchase). If however, a user is able to do their research outside of your advertising channel such as a customer of Amazon who is shopping online and then running a few searches outside of Amazon on Google, then if you are not present or marketing where they are looking, are leaving negative reviews to stand proud within the search engines or have competitors products on show, then you will reduce your likelihood of a sale, reduce your conversion rate and not grow your business.

So why does this happen?  Because users on the whole are completely computer and internet savvy.  They will do their research online and outside of the first tab or browser they are looking to purchase in. Whether that is for reviews, vouchers, complaints, competitor products, comparisons, videos and everything in between.  So if you are not actively guarding and or influencing the information that users find when they go to research your product (in their user journey of purchasing your product) then you are missing a huge trick.  Imagine if you are paying for ads on Amazon which are driving traffic to your products and then users are doing research online, off from amazon and see information about other products which are “better” than yours, then you have wasted your money on the original click inside of amazon, your conversion rate will be low and you lose the sale.

There are many levels to online marketing, building a brand and a solid business.  Step by step you can work on increasing your 360 strategy and in turn increasing your conversions, sales and relationship with your customers.

Having managed Google PPC accounts spending over £1million per month you can clearly see the interaction of paid search, organic (SEO) and other channels.  Users come in and out of the original channel and look to find your product on other channels as they consider and in some cases compare.  When visibility is reduced temporarily on the other marketing channels the CPA (cost per acquisition or sale) increases. As users cant find you and your product on other channels.

Ultimately you want to gain your customers data, email address and own the relationship. When managed correctly, you can build a following for your product and brand and as and when you release new products you can use your relationship to drive very low CPA sales and the touch of button. You don’t own the relationship or have the ability to market to your customers if you only sell via a distribution channel. You are helping the distribution channel to grow, not your business and brand.