March 4, 2024

An entire generation of marketers have grown up learning the features of various technologies without ever taking marketing classes. Unfortunately, this creates a scenario where the younger generation celebrate marketing victories based on metrics that do not always benefit a remodeling company. The experienced business owner needs to take responsibility acknowledging that some self-declared experts guiding them do not have enough marketing experience, let alone remodeling-specific experience to ensure the metrics being used are those that help get the remodeler more quality leads.

Many younger generation marketers celebrate victories for their customers measuring by volume. The problem is most of the prospects making up this volume will never be a potential customer. Therefore, volume on its own should not be measured at all, let alone be celebrated. While many rejoice increases in website visits and social followers, many times it misleads everyone with a false sense of success.

Misleading Numbers Waste Time and Money

I will use Google Analytics to explain a recent example where a remodeler could not appreciate why new business was so slow. The remodeler’s marketing person was convinced that somehow the over 50,000 to 60,000 visitors per month to their website should be producing sales. The problem began with the sheer volume of deceptive numbers.

After further investigation it was determined that more than half of the visitors were coming from social media where the visitors were on the website for five seconds. People were attracted to click-bait tactics, then simply leaving the website as fast as they arrived. Approximately 20% were coming from all over the world via other search engine optimization tactics. And approximately 30% were coming from all over the United States, again from other SEO tactics. Drilling down further showed us that less than 200 visitors were even from the general area the remodeler works in. Less than one-half percent of all website traffic even had a remote chance of being a prospect. It is frustrating when a marketer feels they are doing a good job when 99% of visitors to the website can never be a customer. A great deal of effort and cost are wasted attracting the wrong people to the website.

Narrow the Prospects

The proper marketing strategy would begin by understanding the 200 visitors who were interested in the remodeler’s services in the territory that they work in. The proper marketing strategy would look to enhance the engagement with those 200 visitors, and then focus on increasing these ideal opportunities to 300 visitors then 400 visitors, etc. From there it is easier to figure out how to close these visitors to become actual customers. Measuring smaller numbers of feal opportunities is much easier at declaring victory to one’s marketing efforts.

Indoctrinated by Volume Compared to Quality

Social media for the younger generation is the poison pill to setting the psyche of many marketers. Influencers like music stars, movie stars, or even those engaged in silly antics, tend to be admired by younger folk. They use a metric of “followers” to create a perceived level of success. That creates the inevitable assumption that simply having a large base of “followers” indicates one can generate a certain level of sales and financial success.

Target and Measure Your Ideal Opportunities

Do not have a marketing strategy based upon creating a massive funnel of leads with the hopes that a good lead will drip through. This incorrect strategy happens many times due to the younger generation starting with the features of technology to implement your marketing objectives. It is much better to have a strategy where your brand is well defined, and then you use the technical tools to be as specific as possible to attracting a lower volume of quality opportunities that are real potential customers. Your goal is to not have false victories using large numbers in your reporting, but real victories using smaller number of acquiring ideal customers.

—By Brian Javeline, president of MyOnlineToolbox, an industry leader for online marketing education and strategy planning

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