Re: How do you measure success in online advertising?

From: Michael Martinez <Michael_at_xenite.org>
Date: Wed 23 May 2001 11:15:20 -0500

MICHAEL MARTINEZ <michael_at_xenite.org> ALSO WROTE:

>If there is one thing I have learned how to do, it's
>drive traffic to a Web site. I had traffic coming in
>from so many quarters I couldn't tell if the
>advertising was paying for itself.

TO WHICH JOHN GASKILL <gm_at_info-central-usa.com> REPLIED:

>Then chances are the advertising was not
>designed to do a selling job was it? It did not
>sell something specific at xenite.org which you
>could then monitor for a rise in sales? Unless
>you are getting paid for people to visit your site,
>the secret to success is not driving traffic, but
>driving sales.

There is no way I would pay for a generic listing
on Xenite.Org. The ads I bought for specific content,
mostly for my book. People clicked through to look at
the information about the book, and the ads made it
clear that is what they would find.

However, the book was being promoted in other ways.
The book continues to sell even without the paid listings.

MICHAEL MARTINEZ ALSO WROTE:

>If the information I needed to determine whether the
>paid advertising was worth the money I paid for it,
>it wasn't immediately obvious to me.

TO WHICH JOHN GASKILL REPLIED:
>What was not obvious? If your ads work, sales go
>up. If your ads don't work, sales stay flat or go down.

Which ads were working? That is what is not obvious.

MICHAEL MARTINEX THEN WROTE:

>But the bottom line for me is that I couldn't measure
>the impact of the paid advertising. I still can't. And
>I'm not fond of making shots in the dark.

TO WHICH JOHN GASKILL REPLIED:

>Get a flashlight. Read John Caples' tome, now in its nth
>edition, "Tested Advertising Methods." Learn to make your
>advertising pay and be sure of how much it is paying.

You're missing the point here. The paid advertising
accomplished what it was supposed to accomplish: it
generated click-throughs. If there was a failure to
sell, that occurred on the two different Web pages where
the book was being pitched.

Michael Martinez
 Science Fiction and Fantasy info_at_xenite.org
  Visualizing Middle-earth, a book for all Tolkien fans
    http://www.xenite.org/



Received on Wed May 23 2001 - 11:15:20 CDT