Analyzing Your Advertising Campaign

Organization. It's one word that many people don't equate with an effective marketing plan, but successful Netrepreneurs understand that it is one of the most important keys to success. Consequently, most people end up with inconsistent results because their plan isn't set to a schedule, and instead use the "I'll get to it when I can" approach. 

An easy way to overcome this problem is to design a schedule that will allow you to do specific tasks on pre-assigned days. But before we look at such a plan, let's take a look at two ways to determine whether or not your current advertising campaign is working. 

Look at the Numbers
Just because your site is drawing a lot of visitors, that doesn't mean your advertising is effective. Sales are the goal (in most cases), and there are two key numbers to look at to determine yours. 

First, you should look at your conversion rate. To do this, take the number of purchases in a set period of time, and then divide that by the number of unique visitors to your site. For a site that sells moderately priced items, a 2% conversion rate is considered good. 

Next, you'll need to determine whether or not your customers are coming back to buy again. Every business has a different buying cycle--the amount of time in between purchases--and your goal should be for your customers to return to your site every time they want to make a purchase. For instance, if your site sells a service that is needed monthly, how many of your customers return to do business month after month? 

Once you have a grip on how well your campaign is working, it's time to reevaluate your efforts, and then set a schedule. For instance, if, when looking at your numbers, you find that your retention rate isn't as high as it should be, then you'll want to schedule customer service maintenance into that plan. In order to best utilize your time, you should set your schedule according to days, weeks and months. 

The Plan
Every advertising business plan will be different, according to what does and doesn't work for your particular business, but here's a sample plan of a schedule. 

Daily
1) Unless you use an auto responder, e-mail should be checked and returned on a daily business. Remember, customers use the net for convenience, and they want a response--fast. 

Weekly or Bi-Weekly
Do the following items on a weekly or biweekly basis. Monday is a good day because the week is fresh, and you can usually accomplish these tasks before the week's business starts "intruding" on your time. (Call it Marketing Monday) 

1) Newsletters to opt-in customers are an excellent way to generate business, so make it a point to send yours out every week. Again, you can automate this process to save time. 

2) To make sure that the content on your site is fresh, change it every week or two. 

3) Write articles about your subject of expertise and then submit them to e-zines for publication. Be sure to include links back to your site. 

Monthly
1) You should re-evaluate your affiliate and banner programs on a monthly basis to determine whether or not they're working. Also, investigate monthly to see if you can find a better deal. 

2) Use your monthly marketing day to attend to your offline advertising needs. Is it time to reorder more mouse pads with your company logo on them, or should you pull the ad in your local weekly that isn't drawing in customers? 

3) If you have product or management news, write and submit press releases making the announcements. 

In short, by keeping your marketing campaign on a strict schedule, you'll increase your profits because you'll constantly be in-tuned to the pulse of your business.