Getting the best value from your marketing in 2022

Marketing efforts to get new customers cost money, either in the form of resource budgets or media budgets (or both). This metric, known as the Customer acquisition cost [CAC] is an important commercial metric that calculates the total sales & marketing effort used by the number of visitors that convert or buy a product / service. This figure, along with Customer Lifetime Value (LTV), are probably the two most effective and comparable marketing metrics used.

Understandably most digital marketing managers also like this overall average cost to be broken down by each acquisition channel. This allows them to assess the effectiveness of each, with the usual groupings given by digital analytics applications including: 

• Paid Search - visitor clicks on a paid advert in a search engine results page
• Organic search - visitor clicks on a link in a search engine results page that can be improved using Search Engine Optimisation techniques
• Referral - visitor clicks on a link (usually not paid for) in another website

Note: when explaining this topic I should always mention the Direct channel. This is when no channel can be identified by the analytics application used  e.g. the visitor types the URL director into the browser or when the source cannot be determined). For some sites a large percentage of Direct visits can either be an indication of brand recognition or a reflection of significant offline marketing activity; but for others it could simply highlight a tracking issue with a few key inbound links.

Organic search can have the lowest CAC

Typically Organic Search still delivers a lower CAC than other marketing channels, such as paid search or display advertising. 

This has been explained in detail in many posts, e.g.

https://www.growthcollective.com/blog/customer-acquisition-cost-ads-seo

https://firstpagesage.com/seo-blog/seo-roi/average-customer-acquisition-cost-cac-by-industry-b2b-edition-fc/

Although my own word of caution when calculating CAC is that all costs must be counted (e.g. media, agency management, in-house staff coordination, etc.) not just some, if you are to properly compare "apples with apples".

What is a good bounce rate?

This is an interesting question I thought I'd answer, primarily following a series of debates with friends and associates in the digital industry.

For those unsure what exactly is meant by the bounce rate, it is usually defined as those visitors to a site who only view one page of the same site in any one browsing session. The metric is calculated by dividing the total number of visitors by those who only view one page and then expressing this as a percentage. 

But is a high or low bounce rate a particularly good or bad thing? Let's take an example....

Imagine a company has a website that showcases their products and uses both SEO (Search Engine Optimisation) techniques as well as Google Adwords for Pay-per-click digital marketing. When investigating bounce rates from their digital analytics we see that visitors from organic search engine sources have an approximately 40% bounce rate. This compares with a rate of around 55% for those coming from pay per click adverts over the same period.

Surely the bounce rate generated from the organic source is healthier? As less people come to the site and disappear straight away, this must surely mean that they are 'better' users is some way?

Or to flip it around, doesn't it therefore follow that the paid PPC campaigns are delivering less value than those from search engines?

Not necessarily.  

 A different bounce rate from different acquisition sources makes sense if you consider these factors:

1.      The landing pages for paid and organic traffic could be different.
Search engine optimisation is not an exact science and depending upon the search terms used, the page displayed in the search engine results pages (SERPs) might well be different from the one you really want them to go to. This may also be different from search engine to search engine. If this is the case, it is likely your paid efforts are pointing visitors to the page of your choosing and one that may well be optimised for this purpose.
Note: this may well mean that the users’ paths to complete their required goals are different and could affect the conversion rate.

2.      The paid advert copy might be different from your organic listing
Now far be it if for me to suggest that any upstanding company would deliberately mis-represent their site in PPC adverts to potential visitors.. but I have seen examples where the Ad Words copy significantly differs from the content of the target page. Now I’m all for experimentation to understand the optimum copy in each circumstance… but when the paid advert content sets an expectation with the person about to click on an ad, don’t be surprised if they bounce straight out if the page doesn’t meet those expectations.

3.      Different visitors use different searching techniques.

I know that I have differing browsing behaviour depending upon: the frame of mind I'm in, the device I'm using and the amount of time I have. And I'm sure I'm not the only one. Online users also click on different paid placements depending on whether there are other PPC adverts displayed and the quality of the organic listings displayed alongside or below those precious Google Adwords ads.

Whatever your bounce rate, you should always take whatever steps you can, not just to minimise it, but to focus on optimising your collective set of site KPI’s and maximising the commercial opportunities your online presence gives you.

Does content marketing work just on your own sites?

I've been considering the question recently about where it is possible to carry out content marketing. Or to turn this into an actual question: "Can content marketing activity only be done on your own sites?"

My initial answer to this question was a clear "Yes, all CM activity needs to be done on your own sites". Or to put it into more 'consultant speak'... Content Marketing activity only utilises 'Owned' digital sources and does not involve 'Earned' or 'Paid' ones.
Note: Owned online properties are those where you have the ownership and means to change the content. Company brand sites, eCommerce portals, brochureware sites, Facebook pages (where your organisation manages what is posted there) and campaign microsites are all included in this definition.

However, whilst writing a blog post to this effect and therefore thinking it through in more detail... I realised that this initial response might not the correct one. Most content marketing efforts do start on your own sites, but ignoring the paid and earned sources means you are missing out on a significant amount of content marketing potential.

To try and explain my thinking, I've pulled the following quick diagram together:

This diagram tries to explain the following:

1. Your owned properties can be used to push content into the earned space. E.g. Via the use of social sharing tools you can extend the reach and impact of your content.
2. Your earned media can help shape influence and therefore build traffic to your owned media.
3. Paid media can help to directly bring traffic to your site.

This might be presented in some other way that conveys value or link juice more, so as-always I reserve the right to revisit this diagram in some other blog post.

The hybrid roles created by digital

Let's face it, there's lot's strange and merged job descriptions knocking around the online / digital industry. Here's some you may have come across:

• Developer evangelist
• Strategic online project manager
• Chief Digital Officer
• Owned, Paid and Earned Marketer
• Programme Architect

These are all job roles I have seen in the last 12 months (although some of these may be familiar to regular readers as I blogged about the Chief Digital Officer one only a few months ago).  And to be totally transaparent, I've even applied for a consulting role as one of these... although I'm not going to admit which one it is.

 

To some people in the industry these newly-invented titles might seem unnecessary and even a little ego fluffing... but there's no doubt that the new economy is creating new types of jobs that have never arisen before.

 

I think this trend is only going to continue and admit to a slight curiousity as to what wierd ones will appear in the next year or so.

Combining paid, owned and earned media

In a post from earlier this year, I gave my thoughts on the blurring boundaries between paid, owned and earned media http://press20.blogspot.co.uk/2012/04/paid-owned-and-earned-blurring.html . I was therefore very keen to read the report from research and advisory company Altimeter Group on 'The Converged Media Imperative'. This paper lays it out clearly, that brands now need to combine the different media channels of paid, owned and earned to get the most from them.
http://www.altimetergroup.com/research/reports/how-brands-must-combine-paid-owned-and-earned-media 

Now to me, this is hardly a revelation and it is great that this report has been published. My post from last April suggested that rather than there being definitive boundaries between the three, there's significant cross-over. And this is the point Altimeter have explained too. In fact our models of this integration are incredibly similar, see below:

My diagram to show the blurring

(The star representing press releases)

Altimeter's diagram showing the convergence of paid, owned & earned

the corporate layers - an idea developed

In a recent post I started to work through my thoughts around the development of McKinsey's company software layer concept. I mentioned that I thought there was at least one obvious omission (e.g. web services) and that a single layer to explain it all was too simple.

So now I find myself putting forward an evolved version of this idea, unashamedly taking McKinsey's model as the basis of it.

Corporate layers

View more PowerPoint from Hayden Sutherland

As you can see from my embedded presentation there are now five proposed layers rather than just two.

1. Core business processes
2. Web services & API’s
3. Owned media such as website(s), Apps, Kiosks, etc.
4. Paid media such as online advertising (PPC, etc.)
5. Earned media such as Social, Word-of-mouth, etc.

Although I believe the lines between owned, paid and earned are now becoming increasingly blurred, there is a place for each of the different communication media in my new model.

Paid, Owned and Earned - blurring boundaries

I recently put some thoughts together for a client on the blurring boundaries between paid, owned and earned media. Take a look at the presentation below on my initial thoughts on this (note: this isn't meant to be comprehensive, as some of this is client-specific)Paid Owned & Earned : The blurring boundaries

View more PowerPoint from Hayden

This theme has also been mentioned by Rebecca Lieb from Altimeter Research, who has given some more specific examples of how the boandaries between these three different media classifications are now very blurred.
http://www.imediaconnection.com/printpage/printpage.aspx?id=31333

To me its clear that both clients and their agencies must eventually integrate all three of these media to get the maximum return on investment (of resource / time and money).