PPC Optimisation for Leadgen – Is it anti-marketing?
Having read the blogs, text-books and general commentary on PPC marketing, I’ve noticed a gaping, giant, black hole of a gap in modern PPC learning literature. You see, when you read books on how to increase your Google ROI, 9 times out of 10, the examples used are classic E-Commerce or clicks and mortar sites. Lead generation marketing, however, is in my view, a completely separate marketing discipline and should, therefore, be regarded as such in the world of PPC. In some leadgen campaigns, every logical, classical principle can be turned on its head. Why? Because the aim of the game in leadgen is often about quality, not quantity.
The Hidden Cost Of Quality
Leadgen PPC is not just about getting conversions, it’s about getting certain types of conversions, or even a certain mix. It’s a bit like running an E-Commerce campaign with a requirement to maintain a minimum Average Order Value – if every lead you get is going to cost, say, 15 mins sales time, the cost per lead can be significantly higher than the spreadsheets might suggest. With lead generation, the E-Commerce metrics of Google Analytics (RPC, Revenue, ROI) are replaced by sales funnel metrics that are stored in the internal CRM of the sales force, often hidden away from the PPC agency. To make life even more challenging, this CRM is often manually updated and prone to error/abuse caused by the pressure and targets of the sales environment.
So with all these variables lying between the investment into Google and the return from the sales person, how on earth can we go about optimisation this process, let alone measuring it? It is difficult but, given the right approach, very achievable.
‘Anti-Marketing’
Recently, I have been trying to increase the ROI of a client of mine who uses a traditional sales funnel. The PPC funnel basically goes:
£ -> Click -> Conversion -> Qualified lead for sales rep to call -> Meeting -> 2nd Meeting -> Sale
Every stage of this funnel carries a cost, whether it is the cost of the click or the cost of employing a salesperson to call, chase and have meetings with the leads. This cost needs to be calculated or approximated but accuracy here isn’t the be all an end all. But when the PPC consultant comes in and hikes up the CTR (and your costs) and comes back with a pile of leads that you can’t sell to (but spend time and money trying to do so), you’ll be able to say you learnt the leadgen PPC lesson the hard way! This is why I refer to PPC leadgen marketing as anti-marketing. It is often those with the lower CTRs, with thoughtful, screening ads and landing pages that get the best ROI – and the happiest (and smaller) sales forces! And to get there, you’re going to need a personal, consultative approach from your PPC agency. Personal selling requires personal marketing!
David Bushell
