Here’s a recent press release from TelMetrics and we’ve seen similar reports from other providers such as Call Source.
The trend they’re talking about is how many more advertisers are now tracking phone calls to better determine the effectiveness of their ads.
The Internet is so trackable other forms of advertising need to prove their worth and one way to do that is to put tracking telephone numbers in local print and broadcast advertising so you can see how many calls each campaign generated. It’s a very good system and even allows you to record the calls to hear what happens at the retailer.
We’ve done this several times now with some of our Google local search campaigns and the results are fairly scary. First, a decent percentage of calls go unanswered, more than you think. Secondly, once the call is answered it’s not uncommon for the retailer not to know much about the brand promotion and, worse yet, to even discuss other brands with the caller.
Our takeaway has consistently been that if you have a brand that is trying to drive online shoppers into a local retailer the best way to do that is to keep the consumer online on your dealer microsite or landing page for as long as possible. The more information you can give the consumer the better and the less likely they are to be sold off.
That’s another advantage of Local Search advertising in that you have all the time and space you need to tell a complete story.