What conversions are you tracking – Pay Per Click Conversions
As I write this post, I think about the many times I have had meetings internally about what a conversion rate is. However, I did not think to tell them actually how to calculate this.
Your conversion rate is nothing more than the sum of the thousands of efforts and paths that prospects take through your site. Please Beware of averages. There is no such thing as an average person. That is why your average conversion rate is a rough indicator but virtually worthless as a way to focus your conversion optimization. Also note there is no “industry standard” either. I probably get this question at least two times a week. You can look at Hitwise, Compete and Comscore for good information. But realize if you are looking at a specific sub-directory, i.e. www.mycompany.com/store, you won’t likely see your e commerce area, but rather your actual www.mycompany.com domain being compared to your competition – not a good comparison at all.
Looking at your conversion rate is certainly not the first thing one should do to evaluate the immediate success of your brand new campaign, but eventually you should take a good look at really understanding your conversion rate – by reading the what is your true conversion rate written by Bryan Eisenberg, well known for good analytics learnings.
Next time your asked “what’s our conversion rate?”, be sure your actually tracking conversions. I had the unfortunate task to work with an agency last year, who is no longer with us and has since been bought out, and when I asked them about our conversion tags, they replied with “we don’t use any, what do you mean?” That’s a red flag right there my friends! In learning more and more about PPC, my first rule for any PPC campaign, especially ecommerce, don’t ever launch the campaign until and unless your conversion tags are in place and have been completely tested. If you chose not to apply or wait to include the tags, your wasting your daily/monthly spend on “visits” – you will never know how many of those visits ever converted to a sale, which I hope, is why you activated a PPC campaign in the first place.
Peace out – enjoy and convert!
Leave a Comment September 19, 2009