eMarketing Blog

By Katie Fish

After two long days of Google Analytics training put on by the eMarketing Learning Center and the NWIRC last month, local marketing and web gurus now possess not only tired brains, but the ammunition they need to analyze their web data and use it to optimize their organizations’ websites.

In addition to that, they’re actually prepared to pass along this info and explain it to their management teams and co-workers. (And, as we business people know, sometimes that’s the hardest part.)

Company websites are often a product of many different people’s opinions, including upper management, marketing, IT and even graphic design. They are designed, implemented, and managed with multiple ideas, goals and objectives.

For example, the graphics design team wants it to look fantastic. IT doesn’t care what it looks like - they just want it to work. Marketing wants everyone to fill out their customer satisfaction survey. The CEO wants a picture of a lampshade on it for no apparent reason.

In reality, the website should be designed and managed with the customer in mind. What does your company want customers to do when they come to the website, and how can you make it as easy as possible to accomplish those goals?

Tuesday and Wednesday, Erie professionals had a unique opportunity to attend two GA training sessions facilitated by Dorcas Alexander, a Certified Google Analytics Trainer from LunaMetrics in Pittsburgh.

GA101: Beginner Analysis Training and GA201: Intermediate Analysis Training were held Tuesday and Wednesday from 8:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. in the Jordan Room at Knowledge Park. More than 25 professionals attended each seminar, which covered almost the entire scope of what Google Analytics is - from the basics of setting up an account, to discovering who your visitors are and what they do, to analyzing data to discover issues or problem areas.

The training also covered GA’s new interface and most recent features, like Google’s Website Optimizer, real-time analytics, and flow visualization.

So what was the most important lesson gleaned from these GA training clinics?

Simple: Measure, Analyze, Act. (In that order!)

Your website is too valuable to play guessing games with. Don’t make random changes just because someone in your organization “wants to try it” or thinks it “sounds neato.” Make changes based on actual data that is collected from actual visitors to your website. Google Analytics lets you do exactly that.

Numbers are boring, and alone, they mean very little. Google Analytics enables a business professional to take those numbers and craft a story they can relay to their management teams and co-workers about what is happening on their company websites - both good and bad.

Professionals who completed the GA training now understand how this tool makes all the various opinions of people within a company irrelevant. The data is the key to understanding who’s on the website, where they came from, and how long they stayed. It tells you what they did while they were there, and when and where they decided to leave. It points out problems, issues, successes, and failures.

For example, after the GA sessions, professionals can now to go management and say, “We have an issue on our website. The data is showing us that out of all the people who click on “Create an Account” only 20 percent of them actually do, while they rest of them completely abandon us. This tells me that something is wrong or challenging to visitors within the “Create an Account” form that they are required to fill out. Let’s test a shorter version and see if we get more sign ups.”

That’s not an opinion. It’s not an arbitrary suggestion that came out of nowhere. It’s a solid suggestion that stemmed from analyzing and interpreting web data. Making changes to the website should always be about the customer and making the goals you want them to accomplish as straightforward as possible. Don’t hope they get from point A to B - give them a specific path and use GA to follow them through it.

If your main goal is to get visitors to sign up for your e-mail list so you can funnel them through to the sales department, but they have to click five pages before they find it, your sign-ups may be much lower than you’d like. Using GA, you can find out how difficult it is for them to find it by following their path through your website, seeing how much time they spend on certain pages and finding out when and where they leave. You can then move the sign up to a more prominent place (like the homepage) and use GA to determine if it improved your conversions.

Business professionals who completed this training are going to spend far less time in meetings arguing over changes to make to their websites from now on - I guarantee it.

(It’s kind of hard to argue with numbers, you know?)

McInnes Rolled Rings is an excellent example of a manufacturer using an integrated media marketing approach.  Their primary goal is to get the product in the hands of the customer as quickly as possible.  The combination of an optimized website and other e-marketing techniques has enabled their reach into global markets.  Improved timely delivery of their product and has pushed this company way above its competitors.

Profile

McInnes Rolled Rings located in Erie, PA, supplies seamless rolled rings in carbon, alloy and stainless steel ranging from 4” to 72” to industrial Original Equipment Manufacturer (OEM) customers in North America, Europe and the Middle East.  Markets served are power generation (steam, gas and wind turbines), mining, gas and oil, off road transmissions, marine, aerospace and general fabrications.  McInnes has been in business since 1992.  Their web address is www.mcinnessrolledrings.com.

 

Role of Digital Marketing

Ten years ago before e-marketing, McInnes relied mostly on sales brochures accompanied by sell sheets they gave to outside sales representatives to spread the word about their business.  It was a one dimensional marketing approach that depended solely on representatives to generate leads and inquiries.  Today, McInnes attracts 90% of new customers via the Internet.  They use targeted mailings, search engine marketing (SEM) and primarily focusing on search engine optimization (SEO), in addition to the sales representatives to drive potential customers to their website.  Their goal is to generate opportunities to quote new items.  They believe in trying new approaches to see what works.

The Web and Speed

McInnes’ message often comes back to the same key point - speed.  How fast can the product be in the hand of the customer?  While McInnes uses an external hosting company to maintain their website, all content is produced and updated by an in-house marketing team.  Graphical changes are designed in house, but made by the hosting company.  The marketing team is responsible for all company marketing materials, including website graphics, mailings and any marketing materials, which they have found to be a quicker, more efficient and cost effective method than outsourcing the work to an external company.  McInnes’ website is updated daily with current delivery times being offered.  It features a graphical flash calculator, telling what current delivery times are.  This is just one more way McInnes emphasizes their company value of a timely delivery.

The website is considered to be dynamic to show the flexibility and responsiveness McInnes has in their industry.  News articles are added monthly to demonstrate what is going on at their company and in the industry as a whole.  They see their website as a reflection of their sales team. 
The online inquiry transition to a sale comes back to speed.  The goal at McInnes is to respond to each and every inquiry the same day, within 4-8 hours.  They believe every customer wants a fast and accurate answer and strive to meet those demands. The McInnes website helps support that their position on speed and the customer.
SEO is a major component of McInnes’ marketing strategy.  They feel that this is one area that needs constant monitoring and adjustments.  They use Google Analytics is used to track their website in search resultls, keyword usage, visitors and the pages they visted to help them make changes, and feel that it is only valuable if managed correctly.  SEM efforts are tracked weekly, if not daily.
McInnes has a short video on their website, but does not utilize any other multimedia technologies at this time.   While e-marketing plays a vital role in the success of the overall marketing campaign, past marketing techniques can’t be ignored.  Many inquiries still come via phone and fax, so it is important not to completely shut out old technologies.  Sales and a strong customer base prove that all marketing efforts are paying off.  Without a combination of marketing techniques, McInnes feels they would not be nearly as successful as they are.

Challenges and Lessons

• SEM and web analytics need to be monitored constantly and adjusted accordingly.  
• While it is important to incorporate new technologies and e-marketing trends into their marketing, it is important not to forget basic marketing tools. 
• E-marketing is about trial in error – new ideas have to be implemented to see what works and what doesn’t.
• There is less risk when trying new things online.  Adjustments can easily be made with very little cost.