Wait, Was That a Click or a Conversion?

Wait, Was That a Click or a Conversion?

Reader Comments (16)

  1. I totally agree, the profile of your typical ‘clicker’ might be very different to the profile of your typical buyer. But doesn’t the eCommerce tracking feature in Google Analytics do this conversion tracking already? It tells me where all my conversions come from, including social media sites.

  2. Any suggestions on pro/enterprise level social media management software that has conversion tracking? Typically, we advise clients to do this using Google’s custom URL builder, Free (or inexpensive) Social Media Management software, and Google Analytics.

    In my experience, I’ve found that most of the Enterprise level social media management applications are drastically overpriced. Could you expand on this post by providing some tool recommendations?

  3. “produce customized short links for each social post you create”

    I think you don’t always need the customized short link, especially if you are just promoting a regular blog post. But the moment that content comes with some kind of action item (like downloading a white paper or registering for a webinar) it is definitely worth tracking!

    • Nick

      Would disagree with you there. If you regularly publish content on other peoples sites (like here at Copyblogger) and include links back to your own site (to allow readers to dive deeper into a topic) the end goal is traffic and brand impression.

      You get the brand impression by virtue of publishing on the other company’s platform.

      But to understand the traffic driving factor, you need to have trackable links. This way you can determine if your efforts are driving traffic, or as I note above, convertable traffic. Further, by using the tracking links you can then understand traffic driving at the “campaign” level as well as the outpost level and then diving down even further, you can begin to understand what type of content drives traffic to your site from each of your outposts.

      This helps you develop better targeted content for those guest posts vs just blasting the same content (more or less) across all outposts where you have publishing privileges.

  4. Great article and case study which makes a very good point. People often make the mistake of assuming that the platform with the highest click through will give more conversions. Getting the actual conversation data is very crucial, otherwise you may start making incorrect assumptions and start going down the completely wrong track. Most of the advantages of online is its capability of tracking and evaluation, so it would be a pitty not to use this capability…A click through, even if it doesn’t convert, provides brand awareness which is not a bad thing, but equally it might not be your campaign intention…Thanks again!

  5. I totally agree. Clicks are fun and easy, but they aren’t where the action is. When the rubber hits the road, we need conversion data. Nice post!

  6. Hi Tom,

    Conversions drive business.

    Clicks are good – the more the better – but of course, good mainly in the ego building department.

    Conversions grow your business and put money in your pocket.

    Smart post!

  7. Great food for thought! One thing I always ask people when they’re calculating their ROI in social media is how they’re calculating their ROI in their online reputation. If your online reputation isn’t in good standing, the likelihood that any of these conversion calculations for better ROI in social media will be unsatisfactory. Good ORM should always be in any social media strategy.

  8. Shit.

    I’ve been dropping the ball. Thanks for the solid information! Time to step up my tracking game and see what’s what.

  9. Hi Tom,

    They both go hand in hand. It’s all a numbers game. The more clicks you have will ultimately lead to more conversions. That is, if your Call to Actions etc are set in place. Really good info.

    Steve

  10. You can now get that exact data in Google Analytics, in the recently added Overview & Channels report, in the Acquisition section

    Very usefull stuff to track opt-in flows or specific e-commerce conversion rate

  11. Hey Tom,

    You do realize Google Analytics actually does provide conversion tracking, right?

    You can set up a goal, add some code and then start tracking.

    We use it over at Social Media Examiner to see what social channel is leading to the highest percent addition to our newsletter.

    Just food for thought

  12. Great post.
    As a Piwik user, I would highly recommend it as an alternative to Analytics. Now I know that there might be a few people that can highlight features that GA has that Piwik doesn’t, but I personally find that many of the features and graphs provided by Piwik are not matched by GA…
    Just my 2 cents worth… 🙂

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