Phone-Up Ninjas
Reid Wakefield,   2/16/2010 at 9:25 PM
Filed under:  Industry focus

One of our partners has rolled out a great new service that combines our call measurement technology with his consulting / coaching expertise. Phone-Up Ninjas was founded by Jerry Thibeau, who has been involved in the automotive industry for nearly 25 years. He's offering a full range of training services to help car dealerships handle phone calls and sales opportunities more effectively.

One of the common refrains we hear from busy dealerships is, "I wish our guys had the time to listen to every call that comes in or goes out of our dealership." Jerry has developed a really cool solution that takes the responsibility off of the dealership staff. The Phone-Up Ninjas team hand-selects calls that offer good teaching opportunities, and then Jerry splices himself into the recordings of these conversations. Check out this example of an online coaching session.

Dealership phone call training

There are two main things I like about this approach. (1) It's really cool to see someone building a mash-up with our services. I believe there are tons of opportunities that are just waiting for the right people to come along and incorporate this new technology into an existing expertise. Jerry has really nailed this. (2) Most managers will acknowledge that their dealerships could do a better job of communicating with prospects. Sales consulting has always been viewed as an expensive and time-consuming burden, and GMs are skeptical that the lessons will "stick" once the coach has left the building. Jerry's approach is the perfect counter to all of these objections.

The Six and a Half Commandments of Displaying a Phone Number on a Website
Reid Wakefield,   10/28/2009 at 11:19 PM
Filed under:  Industry focus

David Mihm started an interesting conversation about the pros & cons of using call measurement numbers on an advertiser's website, ultimately suggesting that maybe the advantages aren't worth the risk of jeopardizing the advertiser's organic search rankings. This is a valid concern, but a properly-constructed dynamic website tracking number will not have any negative affects on a company's Local Search rankings. The javascript will know to make itself invisible when a search bot is crawling through, the advertiser's anchor phone number will be recognized by the machines, and life goes on.

How an advertiser chooses to display his contact information is a far more important topic. Since we've witnessed (and measured, of course) every approach imaginable when it comes to showing a phone number on a website, we're ready to come down from this digital Mount Sinai and share the following commandments.

Commandments

1. You Shall Properly Choose Between a Toll Free and a Local Phone Number

  • This is a simple choice. If your business is looking to attract out-of-market callers, use a toll-free number. Examples: car dealer, pet supply company, resort hotel. If you're trying to attract local customers to your local business, use a local phone number. If you're not sure which category you fall under, then just pick one and don't worry about it. Most people are calling you from their cell phones anyway and don't care what your number is.


  • 2. Remember That No One Knows What Number You've Been Using for the Past __ Years
  • We've heard people say, "Everyone in town knows my number. I don't want to use something new on my website because it'll confuse people." My response to that is, "What are the last 5 businesses you've called? From memory, what are their phone numbers?" No one ever knows. I don't even know my own phone number, much less Paul's Plumbing.


  • 3.You Shall Not List Multiple Phone Numbers for Multiple Departments
  • It's a lot easier to contact a business when there's only one choice to dial. We've worked with plenty of companies who listed multiple numbers, and they tried every trick possible to get people to call the right number. It never worked; inevitably callers dialed the first number listed (or the biggest font). If you don't have an operator to answer and route calls that come in to a single phone number, then use a bridge greeting to efficiently route callers. We've studied these results exhaustively, and we're very confident about recommending this approach to our clients.


  • 4. You Shall Not Use a Vanity Phone Number on a Website
  • Vanities (phone numbers that spell words) should only be used for ads that allow a short window of exposure to the viewer. I'll begrudgingly admit that vanities can be helpful during 15 second TV ads, billboards and radio commercials. That's it, though. If your message isn't going to be yanked away from the viewer, don't force the caller to spell out your phone number.


  • 5. A Website Shall Display a Prominent Phone Number at the Top of Every Page
  • If your website's primary goal is to generate a phone call, then don't make the visitor search for your number. Best Practice is an 18 point heavyweight font in the top right corner of each page. Besides being easy to find, this placement also conveys the message that you actually want the visitor to pick up the phone and talk to you.


  • 6. Fear the Consequences of a Phone Number Embedded in an Image
  • The alternative idea would be Love Thy HTML. If you stick your phone number inside a graphic file, you're causing two main problems. First of all, guys like me can't access the number to do a dynamic replacement with a tracking phone number. Secondly (and more importantly), the search engine machines can't read your business's phone number. All they see is the image file, but they're unable to parse out the phone number listed as part of the picture. As the search engines become increasingly more intelligent about discovering a company's contact information, you'd be needlessly penalizing yourself by making your phone number invisible to non-humans. Display the phone number in basic HTML.


  • 6.5. You Shall Not Settle For Simply Displaying the Phone Number in Basic HTML
  • As an extension to Commandment Number Six, you should ask your web designer to provide intuitive labels around your phone number in the HTML code. Enclose the phone number within a span tag (what is a span tag?), and then give the element a label like "phone-number." This will allow tracking programs to interact with your phone number without messing up videos or other scripts on your site. It will also help the search engines get the lay of the land as they crawl through your site (are you picking up a theme here?).


  • We'll continue to update this list as other ideas emerge and get measured.

    (image from Joey deVilla's tremendous Global Nerdy blog)

    Giving credit where credit is due
    Reid Wakefield,   10/6/2009 at 10:50 AM
    Filed under:  Industry focus

    A few months ago Wired told the story of Jorge Hirsch and his frustration with the way academic papers (and their authors) are valued. Link: The Genius Index: One Scientist's Crusade to Rewrite Reputation Rules.

    It's definitely a worthwhile read, but my main reason for tracking down the article was a conversation we had with a publisher the other day. Like Hirsch, the publisher was frustrated because he's getting shortchanged by conventional methods of assigning credit. His banner ads are creating a brand experience for his advertisers, but the advertisers are judging the value based solely on click-through rates and direct responses.

    Consider this example that we recently used to remind car dealers about the importance of continuing their marketing efforts beyond just Google.

    Honda billboard

    • Is This Billboard the Greatest Ad Ever Designed?

      It would be odd to hear the dealership's marketing director say, "That billboard outside of our entrance is the last piece of advertising that people see before entering our dealership. Therefore it should receive credit for every person who walks in."

      Strangely enough, this is how most businesses evaluate their website traffic. Here's an example: a potential car buyer discovers a vehicle on AutoTrader.com. He notices the car is being offered by XYZ Honda. Since XYZ has been popping up on a lot of the searches he's been running, the buyer goes to Google and searches for XYZ Honda in Phoenix. As soon as he hits the home page, he calls the first phone number he sees, asks if his preferred car is still on the lot, and then makes an appointment for a test drive.

      Who should get credit for that phone call: AutoTrader.com or Google? Most marketers are giving all of the credit to Google. Alert marketers are recognizing that both sources should receive a share of the credit.
    We still don't have the perfect solution for measuring the impact of branding efforts, but I know we're making progress. Just as Jorge Hirsch has struggled to get the academic community to recognize the flaws in the current ranking and measurement system, our first step is to help advertisers understand that a more holistic view is needed. Smart marketers should no longer limit their efforts to direct response platforms. Then our next challenge is to team up with the publishers and show them why.

    Now Hiring: Director of Communications? Product Evangelist? Marketing Strategy Manager?
    Reid Wakefield,   10/2/2009 at 11:17 AM
    Filed under:  Company news

    Help Wanted!

    We're creating a new position, but we don't know what to call it. In fact, we still haven't even nailed down exactly what the position will entail. But I can say with confidence that this is the perfect opportunity for a dynamic person who wants to roll up his / her sleeves and make a meaningful contribution to a rapidly growing company.

    The Position

    For 21 years, we've been a quiet wholesale provider of marketing analytics software. Our partners love us, and we appreciate all of the new relationships we've built as a result of referrals. There are a lot of interesting companies we'd like to be working with, so it's finally time to introduce ourselves to the world. How are we going to do this? That's for you to decide. Here are some initial ideas we've come up with:

    • Engage with bloggers and industry thought leaders to share our vision for marketing's future
    • Organize our internal marketing efforts to ensure we're telling the right stories
    • Represent our company as an evangelist for Marketing Intelligence
    • Analyze trends and shifts in the marketing industry so our product can stay ahead of the curve
    • Develop and implement a Public Relations strategy
    You will be regularly meeting with the other leaders at our company (Operations, Product Development, Business Development) to help form a cogent vision of where we're headed and the best way to get there. This isn't a job that can be done properly in a private office with the door closed (which is a good thing, since our office is just one big open space).

    The Ideal Candidate

    There is no list of required experiences for this position. We're certainly impressed when we come across someone who has attended a great school or held important positions at related companies. But we're more interested in the actual lessons that were learned along the way. We're looking for an All Star, and we believe the key ingredients are (1) enthusiasm and a strong sense of initiative, (2) an eagerness to learn, and (3) broad intelligence.

    This is going to be a very important position for our company, so we're taking this search very seriously. We're not sleepwalking through the motion of filling a meaningless spot with an ordinary person who just needs a job. Likewise, I hope you'll extend some effort on your introduction to us. Tell us about specific experiences that showcase the three traits listed above, and talk about why you feel prepared for a role that combines marketing, operations, technology management and visionary thinking. We're anxious to read anything you're willing to share.

    The Next Step

    Please reach out to me via email (rw@centuryinteractive.com) and let me know that you're interested. If we both agree that you might be a good fit, I'll follow up with some additional questions. Then we'll bring the finalists to Dallas to meet with Konrad, Jennifer, Marcus, me and the rest of the team.

    Details

    • Full-time position
    • Based out of our office in Dallas, TX
    • Competitive pay
    • Start date is flexible
    • Light travel (probably twice per quarter max)
    • Inquiries will be kept confidential

    Misleading analytics
    Reid Wakefield,   9/16/2009 at 3:51 AM
    Filed under:  Industry focus

    Our automotive users spend a ton of money on Google AdWords and other pay-per-click platforms, so we've been introduced to some great new partners who manage these ads for the dealers. Our hope, of course, is that the Search Engine Marketers will use our conversion data to improve the budget allocation process for our shared clients.

    Dealer Marketing Magazine

    This is nearly a year old, but I recently found a great post on Dealer Marketing Magazine's website. Michael Sweigart gives the Top Ten Ways to Waste Your Automotive Search Engine Marketing Budget. (Don't you love it when the title saves you from having to provide further explanation on the article's topic?)

    One item in particular jumped out at me:

    • Mistake #4: Ignoring analytic reports and focus on traffic
      Ninety percent bounce rates on pay-per-click ads mean that 90 percent of your customers leave almost immediately. If you are not looking at analytic reports then you are spending money on the wrong keywords, ads, sites, etc. It is unthinkable that anyone would ignore such great, free data. With a good analysis you can buy more good words and fewer bad words.
    I agree with the larger point being made, but we're seeing lots of evidence that disproves that first sentence about bounce rates. Keyword terms like "acura oil change" and "nissan pathfinder parts" don't always lead to long website sessions. If the visitor hits the home page and decides the dealership looks legit, it's common for a phone call to immediately come from the first landing page. Even though a typical analytics package will tell you this type of visit "bounced" and had no value, a phone call is often times the dealer's ultimate goal for a website lead.

    The opposite scenario also plays out. A generic term like "trucks" (which Sweigart warns about) might generate long website sessions, but this is to be expected of an early-stage researcher who uses a broad term. If the dealer is overly-reliant upon a standard analytics package, those visits might appear more attractive than they should because of the long engagements.

    Thanks to Dealer Marketing Magazine for an informative article. We'll keep working on our side to provide tools that help dealers and other search marketers avoid these common mistakes.

    Jennifer talks about driving phone calls from your website
    Reid Wakefield,   8/31/2009 at 9:31 AM
    Filed under:  Industry focus

    During our time at the SES Conference in San Jose, the guys from SEO-PR caught up with Jennifer to discuss some of our services.



    Search Engine Strategies in San Jose, Booth #509
    Reid Wakefield,   8/7/2009 at 10:20 AM
    Filed under:  Company news

    We're excited to have a presence at this year's big search engine marketing conference. If you're going to be at the show, please stop by and shoot darts with us for a few minutes. Make sure you pick up your t-shirt.

    StupidSEM.com

    We're asking professional search marketers if they're stupid. It seems harsh, but it provided a good excuse for handing out I'm With Stupid t-shirts. Even if you're not going to be at the conference, I hope you'll take a minute to go through the quiz we've prepared: Are You a Stupid Search Engine Marketer?

    StupidSEM.com