ROI Measurement

Take a step back and look at your marketing strategy.

    * You’re promoting your business online, in print and at in-person events ― but is each channel connecting you with the qualified, high-value prospects you want?
    * Prospects are clicking to your Web site ― but are you converting those leads to new business?
    * You have a client-development budget ― but is it based on hard data about which strategies are working for your firm?

Bottom line: are you getting good value for your marketing dollar?

Factoring return on investment, or ROI, into your growth plan is one important way to ensure that you are. ROI measurement helps you zero in on key information ― how prospects find you, how successfully you’re converting them, which strategies are cost-effective ― that can save money and expand your client list.

It’s a three-step process:

1) Tracking leads generated and other information for each channel — Web, print ads, broadcast and others — that your business maintains.  
2) Evaluating which channels are delivering quality prospects and which tactics need fine-tuning.
3) Modifying your marketing effort based on that information.

For Web-based marketing, the good news is that there are powerful analytical software programs, (which often are included when you sign up with a Web-site provider) that can help you assess:

    * What site content is most valued by visitors.
    * Which keywords, search engines and other referral sources generate the most visitors.
    * How many client intake forms are submitted from your site.
    * Total visitors and page views.

That’s good information for isolating under-performing site content, making search-engine-friendly edits and getting “bang for the buck” from online ads and paid placements.

Lead tracking doesn’t have to be fancy. Assign your receptionist to record telephone inquiries. Create a new-client information sheet for word-of-mouth referrals. Just keep it consistent (capture the same information from prospects no matter how they reach your firm) and sustainable enough to incorporate, long-term, into your practice management.
I'm going to make a change to this (I wrote it a while back for small law firms). Your lead tracking should be much more advanced in 2010. Separate phone numbers are pretty cheap now, get some you can track how many calls you get from each source. Use specific intake forms for your different online advertising campaigns. For a very small investment, you can track results from all of your advertising.

With that data in hand, you can take the next step and calculate which marketing channels are delivering the best value in terms of:

    * Lead quality. One channel may drive a high quantity of leads to your business while another delivers great quality (higher rate of conversion or average value per client). Your journal ads may primarily reach the corporate market while individuals find you online.
    * Cost per lead. For each channel, compare the amount you’re paying per lead. Cost per lead for television and Yellow Pages, for example, often is higher than Web-generated leads.
    * Lifetime value. Consider the big picture — the lifetime value of a client, not just the value of the matter on your desk. Could this client develop into a long-term relationship? And generate multiple referrals for your firm in the process?

Of course some marketing strategies — volunteerism, sponsorships — may score low in financial terms but still deliver by generating name awareness and planting the seeds for future business.

Moving forward

Ultimately, the goal of ROI measurement is to make better, more informed marketing decisions: to invest more where you’re seeing results and rethink strategies that aren’t delivering.

Online, that could mean improving your visibility on the legal directories and search engines that drive your Web site traffic with the highest profitability. Or revamping less-visited areas of your site.

By taking ROI into account and using tools like Web analytic software, you can base these decisions on solid data rather than guesswork.

And that can translate into more new clients and a better return on your marketing budget.

What do you do?

This is something I wrote aimed at law firms, but it hits the apartment marketing industry as well:
I thought of this on my way to work this morning, when I got to a stop light and saw a small sign that said “Squeegee Squad” and had a web url that I could not read. And my first thought? What do you squeegee? Why do I need your services?

Now think, a potential client lands on your website, and asks: “What do you do?”

“Well, since my company name ends with ‘Attorney at Law…,’ isn’t it pretty obvious?”
Not so much…
With tens of thousands of law firms out there, (seriously, go do a search for law firm, I got millions of  results) you need to separate yourself.

This is why you need a ‘positioning statement’ on your site. Some attorneys do a great job of this. “California Criminal Defense Attorneys” has a strong, short description on their home page, with the flash in the banner further highlighting the firm’s strengths. This personal injury firm created a tag line that separates themselves from their competition, “Not All Attorneys Can Rise Above the Pack.”

These positioning statements help visitors make the decision to stay on your site, and contact you to determine if you are the one who can handle their issue.

What have I done that's floating out there?

So I did a Google search for myself (how vain...)

But I did find some interesting writings that I did while at FindLaw - Thomson Reuters, that still hold true today, so I thought I would post those.
From Eight Guidelines for Ethical Online Marketing
There's no single, "one-size-fits-all" set of ethics rules that apply to every online marketing activity.

Apply the same standards online and off. Here's a straightforward one to start. Most of the ethics standards governing your print ads, brochures and other traditional marketing tools also apply online.  

Tell the whole story.

Keep expectations in check. Do your homework and include the disclaimers and factual background required.

Substantiate comparisons. Statements measuring one's services against another's run afoul of the ethics rules in many states if they can't be factually substantiated. Avoid (or clearly document) comparisons to other companies — even implied comparisons, such as billing your firm as "the most experienced in the _____."

Educate yourself. We'll save the most important for last. Even if you outsource your online marketing activities, you're ultimately responsible for staying informed about the guidelines that apply in states where you do business. Online sources of information include:

Staying educated on these ethics guidelines is one important step in building and maintaining a productive, long-term online presence for your law firm.

Video on your site?

One of the things I have heard often over the last year has to do with adding video to a website. katemats at SEOmoz did a terrific write up about getting started in online video. As with all of your marketing, make sure you have a call to action.
One thing that comes to mind as I look at online videos, is how they might temporarily give landing pages a new purpose: a page with a specific url and content relating to the video, with a url that will only be used in the video. If you make sure to non-index the page, this should also help you track how effective your videos are at converting eyeballs to visitors (this, of course, assumes you are using one of the video sites out there such as Vemo or YouTube).

New Phone

I know I'm a little late to the Android party, but I picked up my new phone yesterday, HTC Hero. My T-Mobile contract came up, and I have made the jump from Balckberry.
So far...I like it.
I will follow-up after I completely figure it out, get the apps that I want loaded, and test out DoubleTwist.

Any suggestions on what I can do, should try, make sure to not do?

Buzz

So the about about Buzz.....and every other not-so-cleaver snarky line.
I'm just not sure about it.
I don't really use it. At first I was hooping it would be more like Hootsuite, bringing all of my social media together. But alas, it is more like a v-bulletin forum. And there are already plenty of those.

Are there any heavy users out there? (besides spammers)