Back in the early days of GitGrow when we had our heads bent down –creating our product – we knew we needed to simultaneously get our online presence/ corporate site ready. Our focus was on the product – “A product isn’t finished until somebody is using it.” Our website was made quickly; we tried to keep it simple. Our marketing efforts were at its minimum (product was still not where we wanted it to be) but with mostly referral traffic we’ve gotten about 300 signups in the last 6 months. We realize that the numbers are not ones to blog about, but we’re energized by the percentage of signups/conversions which is at 6% (the range for conversions is 0.5%-11%). Isn’t that what marketers these days are shouting out from rooftops — get away from measuring traffic and look at conversion numbers.
Bottom line – the quality of traffic to you site matters. Why? Because that’s what leads to sales and customer retention. We are trying to move from being naive to becoming sophisticated in our marketing efforts (a journey that every start-up needs to take).
It is pretty hard work these days – need to invest time, money, planning and measurement .
With money and resources being limited, it needs to be done as optimally and effectively as possible – we don’t have deep pockets. Hence scrutinize/review marketing methods extensively. Also small companies want to be data driven but find the overheads of data collection and analysis onerous. When surveyed (sample size 100) companies that had an online presence, here’s what we found:
- Companies spent an average of 4-8 hours a week on analysis initially and that trickles down to 1-2 hours if the analytics tool does not give them the insights they are looking for. Frustrated companies feel that “real insights” from web analytics is tough to find and are scarcer than hen’s teeth.
- Some blog/media informational sites look at data once every one in a while i.e if they don’t monitor the number of reads by articles and categories which then leads to daily analysis.
- All small companies get started with Google Analytics (since it is “free”). SaaS companies usually add KissMetrics or Mixpanel to the mix. Ecommerce companies set up extensive tracking to review the information twice a day(if not more often) with Google Analytics.
- Less than 10% of the companies using Google Analytics have goals setup.
Marketing activities pursued are mostly defined by anecdotal data and by asking trusted friends who are entrepreneurs. The penchant for experimentation exists early on but is not sustained, the advice received is largely applicable to an industry vertical but not to the specific business.
Most companies start with the level of sales they want to achieve, divide it by the average order value and from there extrapolate the amount of visitors needed to achieve the sales using typical conversion ratios of 0.5%-10%. They then look for the top three marketing methods being used by companies in their industry vertical. That helps them determine the marketing mix. Now comes the toughest part – content that is hard hitting and distribution that is unique. There is a science and an art to both creation of content and the distribution of it.
This is where we come in. At GitGrow our endeavor is to make the science of marketing drop dead simple with tips and recommendations that are delivered directly to your teams! No more searching and reading endless marketing blogs and articles, especially ones that are not relevant. No more sleepless nights where you worry about missing out on the latest in a fast changing world with shifting trends. We are here to ensure that you read appropriate material at the right time, and take action.