Conversion Tracking

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Tips & Advice to help you make your decision on Conversion Tracking

Conversion tracking is a way to increase the productivity of Internet marketing and advertising. It is implemented by embedding a snippet of code in a Web page that will tell you which of your marketing or advertising devices converted a viewer's Internet surfing into action. Conversion tracking is a type of Web traffic analysis that is most often tied to keyword searches. The rate of conversion of keyword searches is the number of people who placed an order after using a particular keyword to reach your website, divided by the total number of people who used the keyword to reach your website. Multiply the result by 100 to establish the conversion rate for the keyword.

The value of conversion tracking to your business cannot be overstated. Conversion tracking provides you with the information you need to correctly allocate a limited Internet marketing and advertising budget. You would still be able to tell how much traffic a keyword search directed to your site without conversion tracking, but you would not know which keywords were most often used by the searchers who ultimately made a purchase. It makes sense to invest your budget for purchasing keywords in those words that generate the highest conversion rate. Read more about conversion tracking from the links on this Business.com page.

Measuring and Monitoring Online Ad Results

Measuring and monitoring online advertising is much easier than measuring traditional advertising campaigns. Because you can track every click on every search ad, banner ad and link, you can effectively measure, monitor and evaluate which online ads are working and which ones are not. Once you know what works and what doesn't, you can better determine where you should be spending your money online. Follow these four steps when measuring and monitoring online ads:

Use the free measurement tools provided by search advertising giants like Google and Yahoo.
Purchase software that can help keep track of online ad campaigns and provide comprehensive reporting.
Hire an online advertising marketing firm to oversee your online advertising budget and monitor results.

Google and Yahoo's free tools

The biggest online advertising outlets are Google AdWords and Yahoo search ads. Both offer online advertisers targeted search marketing to reach specific audiences. The pay-per-click search ad model they offer comes complete with online monitoring and measuring tools. All you have to do is sign in and pull your reports.
Try: Use Google Analytics and Yahoo's Marketing Console to track the performance of your online campaigns.

Software helps track ads

If you have multiple online ad campaigns running simultaneously, you may end up spending more time monitoring each campaign than running your business. Fortunately, there are a variety of software solutions that can help track every online advertising dollar you spend and monitor results.
Try: Use NetTracker Web Analytics or JAZreturns to help monitor online campaigns. Find a list of over 25 software solutions at ClickZ.

Hire a firm to monitor and measure ads

As a business owner, your most valuable asset is your time. Using a reputable firm that can monitor and measure online ads is the same as having your very own online advertising staff, but without the personnel costs.
Try: Let BigBrushMedia, SmartSearch B2B or SendTraffic help monitor and measure online ads.

Use an online advertising calculator

It's impossible to monitor and measure online advertising results if you don't know what a click is worth. Once you determine how much you have to spend on an online advertising budget, you can better determine what a pay-per-click ad is worth to you, depending on what the lead will cost.
Try: Use ClickZ's Online CPM Calculator to determine the costs, cost per 1,000 impressions (CPM) and the number of exposures when figuring your online ad budget.

The worst thing you can do when creating an online advertising campaign is not monitor it.
Don't just measure your online advertising. Keep track of your site analytics to see how online advertising is affecting Web traffic.
Monitor everything from click-through rates to conversions to the success rate of each search ad.
Monitor and measure online advertising results at least once a month.
If you use Google AdWords, take creative direction from the ad with the highest click-through rate.