MYOPPC Basics – Defining Marketing Goals and Setting Targets.

This next topic in the MYOPPC Series deals with Defining Marketing Goals and Setting Realistic Targets.

Note that we’ve not even looked at AdWords, Yahoo, Campaign Structure, Set-up etc.  this will come, but as I mentioned it’s important to get the foundations right and have a clear picture of what you want to achieve.

I’m also assuming that you already have a web site and a product or service to take to market. If not, no problem – we can cover that stuff later. Additionally some of you may already have an Adwords account running and are keen to get onto the ‘good stuff’.  Great!…

Drop me a note in the comments section at the bottom of this post – Say Hi! – And if you like, let me know what the biggest challenges are that you are facing with your online marketing or PPC Campaign at the moment.

I can try and work some ideas into future updates that may help you!

Moving on to ‘Conversions’ and ‘Success Events’…

Defining Conversion / Success events

In the previous post we talked about high level business goals in order to put a bit of perspective against why we might be running a PPC campaign. The next step is to take these high level goals and then translate them to specific ‘desired outcomes’ that we would like to see on our web site.

This is actually a very simple, yet often under utilised, step.

Now I’ve no doubt that some of you are saying “yeah, yeah, we know all this stuff, we run a business…” Well good for you, but be quite and let me finish… this is important!

Be sure that the Objectives & Goals for the business are articulated in tangible ‘events’ that can be measured eg.:

• Sales
• Leads
• Sign-Ups
• Page Impressions
• Downloads

Setting Targets
Again, this may sound straight forward, but sure to set realistic and measurable targets for your PPC campaigns.

What these targets are will depend on a number of factors, the obvious ones being, Industry and competition, budget, and the sites ability to covert, etc, but set a target for each stage of the campaign, and look to define stretch targets as well to ensure that you get the most out of the channel.

Example:
New Business – Retail Site:

Goal: Increase Sales:
Success Event: ‘Purchase Complete’ page
Target:  ROI Neutral from PPC in 3 months
Stretch Target: ROI positive in 3 months.

Realistic and measurable is the key here. Do not set yourself up for failure. This is especially important in a new market or new product offering where there may be a number of unknowns, no matter how much market research has been conducted.

After month 3 however, the target may change based on initial results:

Example: You hit the ’Stretch Target’ and the campaign was ROI positive in 3 months, achieving 10% ROI (for every $1.00 in you got back $1.10) New Target: Lift ROI to 50% in 3 Months.

Key Performance Indicators (KPI’s) & Stakeholder Management

OK now some of you may be thinking, “Come on, I’m a small business who am I supposed to communicate this stuff too? I’m the only stakeholder here.”

Valid point, but I always think that it’s a good rule of thumb to verbalise the goals and targets you’ve set for you marketing campaign to someone (no, not the family dog).

Naturally, if you’ve a business partner, share the goals with him or her, but if you’re a Sole Trader, chat to your Husband, Wife, Partner or Friend. Explain what you’re doing and what you’re setting out to achieve. If nothing else this can help motivate you as you press forward with your marketing campaigns.

If you do work for a slightly larger business, it is imperative that the business owners, or your manager, are aligned around the goals and targets you have set for the PPC campaigns. If the business understands what success looks like, it will make your job easier. Along that same train of thought, if the business understands success, and you don’t meet your targets, you’ll have a solid foundation upon which to explain what it was that went wrong, and more importantly be able to better communicate what the next plan of action might be.

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