Phone tracking

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Telephone tracking is a method of monitoring the success of advertising . It is based on the technical possibility of measuring the behavior of callers and thus corresponds to the conversion tracking used on the Internet in telephony . Both methods offer the possibility of clearly assigning a customer response to a specific advertising medium on different channels .

Methods

There are currently two technical methods for phone tracking. In addition to an exclusively web-based function, it is possible to evaluate phone numbers using a telephone server solution. There are also some software vendors that help advertisers with phone tracking.

Callback function

The callback function is exclusively web-based. Here are the Internet - users on the site of an advertising company driving a phone number to, under which he would be called back. As soon as the user confirms the connection request with a click of the mouse, the technology behind it automatically arranges a telephone call between the advertiser and the interested party.

At the same time, a cookie is used to save the online advertising material that led to the success of the telephone. As a web-based service, this process is limited to advertising on the Internet.

Number tracking

In contrast to the callback procedure, the number tracking does not contain any web-based functions, but is based on a telephone server solution. As a rule, the advertiser is provided with a large number of service numbers for customer feedback, although landline numbers can also be used. In this way, every print ad, every online banner and any other advertising medium communicates an individual telephone number as a response element.

If a prospect calls one of the service numbers issued, the call is forwarded to the company by the telephone server and the number used is used to measure the advertising material to which this target customer contact can be traced. Similarly, in search engine marketing , the exact keyword that triggered the advertisement and through which the customer came to the website is always displayed. By simultaneously evaluating the telephone calls and assigning the service numbers to the individual advertising measures, this method of telephone tracking also overcomes the media disruption from classic advertising, online marketing or public relations measures to telephony.

Telephone tracking software

The media break between offline and online advertising measures described above can be resolved using special tracking software. There are providers of tracking systems that measure the user journey or conversion chain (ie the sequence of clicks that take place until conversion) across all advertising channels. Most systems, however, are limited to the online area and neglect the advertising contacts in the offline world and thus important parts of the user journey. It could e.g. For example, a user first clicks on an advertising banner or a Google Adwords ad and gets to the website of the online shop. Then he makes a call, enters the URL of the shop on the internet before finally making a purchase. The offline channels such as telephony are not mapped in the usual web tracking .

There are already a few providers of tracking systems that consider the telephone as a response element to marketing measures. A special telephone tracking tool provides support here. The operator of the website, e.g. B. an online shop, first integrates a JavaScript code on its page. If a user clicks on an advertisement, a cookie is assigned to him. A dynamic telephone number is then displayed to the user on the website via the Javascript code. When the user dials this number, the incoming call is assigned to the user and the last ad clicked on by means of a server-to-server connection between the telephone tracking software and the telephone provider.

In Google Adwords, Adwords call metrics is currently being tested on the US market . This new feature for the Google advertising system offers the possibility of providing a free service number or a local number that is displayed in the AdWords advertisements.

application areas

Inquiries over the phone often come in, especially when it comes to high-priced, advice-intensive products such as cars or insurance. The calls take place relatively far at the end of the click chain and even accelerate the purchase process in some cases. Telephone tracking plays an important role in correctly assigning these calls and the sales generated by them to the advertising channel. In addition, the importance of the call in the purchase chain can be shown and its position determined. For example, if you take conversion chains that contain a call, it turns out that this is usually immediately before sales. At the same time, it can be determined whether the shopping cart tends to be higher if the customer has called beforehand, or whether the conversion chain is shorter when participating in the call, as the customer's purchase security is increased. These and other analyzes are possible with the help of telephone tracking and lead to a new evaluation of the telephone channel and thus of the marketing measures in this area.

In the area of ​​search engine advertising from Google Adwords, phone tracking can assign calls down to keyword level. This information can be used for campaign management by e.g. B. the cost per click bid for keywords with a high call rate is increased. Without the possibility of telephone tracking, the origin of the sales generated via the telephone would be lost. For example, sales are posted through the call center, but cannot be traced back to the marketing channel. A bid management system can perform this work automatically and with high statistical accuracy and optimize it according to individual cost-per-call goals. A connection to a bid management system is necessary in order to optimize cost-per-call and ROI goals .

Use

Telephone tracking opens up new perspectives on the performance of online marketing for the marketing manager. So far, a telephone contact interrupted or ended the click chain, so that in principle no correct cost-per-order could be calculated. This media break hurdle is eliminated with phone tracking. In addition, this tracking method solves the problem of correctly assigning telephone orders. Online retailers will initially benefit from the new technology. You get a detailed insight into the interaction of online channels and the telephone. If these sales were not taken into account, the CPO would be significantly higher and the respective keywords would possibly be classified as unprofitable.

In addition, agencies can use telephone tracking to show their customers the advertising success of their marketing measures in the telephone area. So far, agencies have not been able to explain when a buyer called and bought because of an advertising banner.

Limits

Despite some advantages, phone tracking is also reaching its limits. In order to be able to assign every call to a keyword, a correspondingly large number of telephone numbers is required, for example. With around 3 million page impressions per month with a number block of 500 telephone numbers, measurements can be made for around 45 minutes down to keyword level. With a higher number of impressions, phone tracking is still possible, but becomes more blurred because the phone numbers are only assigned at the ad group or campaign level. If the numbers are distributed accordingly, it can at least still be analyzed which ad or campaign the user last clicked on. However, some providers circumvent this challenge by changing the size of the number pad.

Another disadvantage for many customers is that the numbers displayed are not easy to remember. Many regular customers keep a provider's number in mind. The automatically generated phone numbers could deter these users. The problem can be avoided by e.g. For example, individual phone numbers can only be assigned to customers who access the site via Google Adwords ads.

Cookies are another obstacle to the use of telephone tracking. If a user deletes them or does not allow them, both telephone and online tracking are prevented and no data can be collected about this visitor.