NB: This is a guest article by Ross Fobian, director and co-founder of Adinsight.
There is a tremendous amount of online data available to help the travel industry carefully measure their search marketing, SEO or PPC campaigns.
As an industry we now have the ability to track pretty much everything online. Data which ultimately tells us the path to conversion.
But, what happens if some of your customers decide they want to talk to you before booking their flight or holiday:
- How do you track them?
- How do you know where they have come from?
- What path they’ve taken?
- What keywords they’ve used to get there?
So often, the missing link of all data tracking is when one of your prospects chooses to pick up the phone to complete the buying process.
However, this data is out there. Data which tells you which users called you, which keywords they used, which ad they responded to and the traffic sources they used to get to your site.
Tracking this data does not need to stop when a person picks up the phone. Call tracking technology enables you to see exactly which keywords led to conversions, the value of those sales and how users interacted with your website before, during and after a phone call.
How does call tracking work?
By adding a small amount of code to your website a unique telephone number is dynamically generated for each visitor. The telephone number provides important data such as the keywords used to get to the site, the page the user was on at the time of call, date and time as well as the value of the call.
The quantity of numbers that you will need for your site will vary depending on the volume of traffic that your site receives. You can set up Call tracking with different types of numbers, including freephone and local.
In order to identify between phone calls that are leads and those that are not you can set parameters that enable you to accurately measure the value of the call based on its duration.
So, for example, a call that lasts longer than one minute has probably passed the IVR (Interactive Voice Response) and will be a quality call. The call can also be recorded so you can hear the outcome of that enquiry.
Call tracking can integrate with Google Analytics, AdWords, your CRM or other analytics tools or reporting suites you may be running. By tracking offline phone call conversions within your analytics system you will be able to tell which ads are working and which ones aren’t.
Picturing the results
When a phone call is made the code executes a virtual pageview in Google Analytics and attributes it to the user’s data so that the entry source and activity on site can be combined with the phone call.
You can see how many users from each source pick up the phone, as well as where they have been on site, where they are based and which channels are resulting in calls.
By combining phone call data from all marketing channels you can understand your return from each channel much more easily.
The nature of a travel company’s products can result in prolonged purchase decisions as customers often require assurances that the holiday is tailored for their needs.
This thirst for further information can drive customers to ask questions directly to their experienced travel consultants by phone. Some also have a number of non-transactional websites that require customers to call the phone number displayed on the website in order to book their holiday.
Combining phone call data from all marketing channels enables you to understand your return from each channel much more easily.
NB: This is a guest article by Ross Fobian, director and co-founder of Adinsight.
NB2: Phone image via Shutterstock.
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About Special Nodes
Yes but at over $1 per click is it financially viable for the cut-throat travel industry budgets?
Ross, you should come work for us…you have the call tracking pitch down!
We’re seeing an explosion of growth in the digital marketing realm and travel is a hot topic. The secret is out…phone calls can be tied to clicks/keywords.
Imagine someone searches on Google, clicks a paid ad, clicks around the site, and places a phone call. For most folks, that phone call is in the dark. It may or may not have ever happened (especially if you ask the client!)
Now imagine that same situation but within minutes of that phone call, you know the exact search query, keyword clicked, click trail on the site, a phone call was made, AND listen to the phone call recording. Poof! Call tracking to makes marketers more intelligent.
As Ross says this data is out there now.
Jim we have installed our Call Tracking for a number of Travel Clients and they are now really benefiting from a full understanding of the customers journey .
For example a customers might land 10 times on their site, phone the call center a couple of times then finally purchases from a call back from a Sales Agent.
Then for a lot of our travel clients they use a first click weighted attribution model to distribute the sales value over the different marketing sources, whether it be PPC, SEO, affilate or whatever.
In this multi touch world it is not just viable to install this technology its ESSENTIAL, if you want to be competitive, especially in PPC.
Call tracking is definitely becoming a must-have for anyone who really wants to know how their ad dollars are being spent and where to spend them in the future.
The next step is to close more sales. Our LogMyCalls call tracking service not only provides reports and insights into where calls have come from, but then provides tools to listen to those calls and improve performance of call reps.
Several of our clients have kept clients they would have lost otherwise by 1) showing that the ads the client was running were actually generating phone calls, and 2) showing that the lack of improved sales was that the client’s phone reps weren’t closing sales effectively. And just like Mike said above, this data can be accessed right after the call. In fact, imagine being notified every time a specific ad generates a call for you so you can follow up.
Jim, more than ever it has become crucial for the travel sector to utilise the various tools out there including call tracking. With the margins being squeezed and the cost of advertising going up it is crucial that these businesses optimise wherever possible.
Although this is not true for all of the travel sector, many convert a large percentage of their sales over the phone, which makes using call tracking solution a no brainer. Especially when you look at the cost of running such a solution compared to the potential savings made.
One of the TUI Travel brands used AdInsight Clarity to increase revenue by 30% and another used it to cut their PPC spend by 50%. These are just some of the fantastic results we have seen in the travel sector, with many more great results in other sectors as well.
Jim’s point is a fair one, especially as Google Analytics often reports a call from pay per click ad from a mobile device and charges for it, even if the number was activated by mistake by the user.
We have been working with a few travel companies, and though we cannot influence Google’s pay per click to call pricing structure, we have establish goals and events to show proper leads rather than accidental phone calls which have been highly accurate and earned positive feedback from our clients.
Maybe Jim, we could do the same for you?
Yes the number can be clicked on by accident, just like any other link and AdInsight does track the conversion when it happens. However the important thing is not the accidental click but the cost per conversion of the campaign, which will be different for every business and testing is required to see if it is worthwhile.
The $1/£1 per call is only the price when using a Google tracking number and a visitor calls it from a desktop device (e.g. manually typing the number into a phone). If the user calls by clicking on the number Google just charges based on the click, as it would for normal clicks. Also some businesses will find that the $1/£1 per call is lower than their average CPC.
where do call tracking companies get their numbers from? Does anyone know?
Anne,
There are a number of phone service providers across the country who purchase blocks of numbers and sell those to third parties. Call tracking companies like LogMyCalls.com acquire their numbers through these telephony suppliers. Phone service providers are ranked into various tiers. A Tier 1 company is the best. They own and manage major communications trunks that allow data to travel over what is known as a backbone. Other providers may be Tier 2 providers. They contract with Tier 1 companies and connect to the backbone through them.
LogMyCalls acquires its numbers from a Tier 1 provider where all of the lines are hosted. Other call tracking companies will often contract with Tier 2 companies (or lower).