- February 2, 2016
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Ecommerce Wholesaler Recovers from Poor Integrated Marketing ROI
SUPPLY.com, an ecommerce wholesaler, faced a problem shared by many integrated marketers: large advertising spends and no way of tracking what worked, as this MarketingSherpa case study explored.
The Challenge
David Gallmeier, who handles marketing and development for the online wholesaler of lighting, kitchen and bath fixtures, determined that it lacked a way to determine which of its digital advertisements created a profitable return. This was an even bigger problem because most of its sales and leads funneled into the call center.
The Campaign
Gallmeier launched a keyword tracking campaign that included online and call center sales, as well as a five-part revamp strategy.
- Evaluate the current system. Gallmeier applied basic arithmetic to fill in the missing sales gaps, including metrics such as web traffic, PPC revenue and total sales.
- Rebuild online ads. SUPPLY.com couldn’t account for 30-40 percent of its sales revenue and set out to overhaul the tracking system for its online ads. Gallmeier took the company’s entire product catalog and adapted it to online campaigns to modernize tracking.
- Automate the process of building and tracking campaigns. If you’re not familiar with marketing automation, get to know its potential here. Automation allowed SUPPLY.com’s PPC campaigns to run smoother by “building campaigns and being able to track them on a scale that obviously couldn’t be done manually,” Gallmeier said.
- Implement a call-tracking campaign. Gallmeier bridged the B2B marketer’s biggest gap in the company’s marketing strategy: tracking the ads that led to its call center sales. The team:
- Installed a site code to monitor and link specific web traffic to specific calls
- Replaced the company’s main phone number to a user-specific number, which remains on the site for the duration of the visitor’s session
- Directed customers to SUPPLY.com’s customer service line
- Build an in-house model. In an ongoing step, Gallmeier applied what he learned throughout the entire project to create an in-house revenue recognition model.
The Results
The upside to the 18-month project is an integrated marketer’s dream: SUPPLY.com was able to cut its overall online spending by 60 percent, while still maintaining the same level of sales. Quantifying ROI and eeking out the most from each tactic is the holy grail of integrated marketing. In addition to the lessons offered by SUPPLY.com, we offer five ways to prove ROI, and improve PPC landing page conversions.
