It is crucial for every marketer to accurately track his
advertising results. In the direct marketing industry, marketers
track the responses to their direct mail pieces so that they know
which ads work, which headlines are winners and which products
sell.
For the online marketing world, it is just as important to track
your ad results. Knowing the exact response rate to your
advertisement enables you to know how well it performed and this
knowledge can help maximize your profits.
If an ad is not performing satisfactorily, improve upon it.
Change the headlines, ad copies, graphics or layout and re-test
the ad. If the problem lies with the medium which you are using,
dump it from your campaign.
Always test your ads on a smaller scale before launching the full
campaign. That's how successful marketers do theirs.
Tracking your ad results also allow you to verify that the
publisher has delivered his part of the deal fully, especially if
you are paying on a per-click basis.
The most basic way to track online ad results is to measure
clickthrough - how many people clicked on your advertisement.
There are other vital measurements such as conversion ratio. But
measuring clickthrough is good for a start. I have outlined two
methods of tracking clickthroughs below:
1. CGI Scripts
If you have access to your own CGI directory, I recommend
LnkinLite, a small yet powerful CGI script that tracks clicks to
your site in the background. Get it at
http://www.dtp-aus.com/cgiscript/lnkinlte.shtml
LinkinLite is the best free click-tracking software I have used.
Another CGI script you can try consider is Prolinkz
( http://www.prolinkz.com ) but it will set you back by $45.
2. Online Tracking Services
Online tracking services count clickthroughs through their own
servers. The service is usually free. Some require monthly fees
or you have to upgrade to paid versions for advanced features.
Here is a list of free online click tracking services:
Hypertracker
http://www.hypertracker.com
Linkcounter
http://www.linkcounter.com
Here are the paid ones:
Statcruncher
http://www.Statcruncher.com
Adminder
http://www.adminder.com
Roibot
http://www.roibot.com
The clickthrough rate for banner ads usually range from 0.5% to
3.0%, 3.0% to 5.0% for ezine ads and between 1.5% to 10.0% for
text links if strategically placed.
Regardless of which tracking methods you ultimately choose to
use, you need to track your advertising results. It is one of the
crucial steps to marketing success!
About the Author
Chee Wee is a widely-published marketing consultant. He helps
small and medium-size businesses to market successfully online.
Learn how a startup site gets over 200 million pageviews monthly
without spending a penny on advertising. For FREE info, email him
at mailto:publicity@internetmarketingfocus.com