Understanding what triggers the interests of customers, including what brings them to a Dealer or OEM website, how long they stay on which page, why they submit a lead form or make other requests, is critical information for marketing success in today’s vast digital landscape.

Car dealers and manufacturers are under extreme pressure to optimize their marketing budgets, making it essential to justify efforts and prove ROI. That starts with determining which media channels entice their targeted consumer to convert, then knowing in real-time how effective various marketing campaigns are. That all said, while metrics are unbiased, the interpretation of those numbers is subjective; analyses must consider the industry, type of users, product, even the campaign medium. There is no one-size-fits-all measurement for success; however, there are a few key factors to keep in mind to optimize any campaign.

1. Define and Reach Your Audience.

In order for your campaign to reach its target audience, you’ve got to know who that is; demographics, location, purchase habits, etc. One of the most effective ways to do this is to use the database you already have, built from customer records, email lists, or past campaigns. This database, also known as your Customer Relationship Management system (CRM) is a powerful source for determining how you want to reach – they are customers you’ve already built a relationship with and, therefore, are likely similar your potential campaign targets.

If you don’t yet have a database built up, think about the problems you solve for your customers and who benefits from the solution. Are those people married or single? How old are they? What area do they live in? Are they manufacturers, consumers, agencies? By narrowing down into these segments, you’ll develop a fairly clear description of you want to reach. Pair that with who you can actually provide your services or products to, and you’ve developed a target campaign audience.

2. Use Data to Provide Relevant Ads and Information.

The goal to any campaign is conversion, whether than means a phone call, an email signup, a purchase, or simply downloading content. By targeting your predefined audience with ads and information that are relevant to those individuals, a conversion is more likely.

Recent studies show that emails triggered by specific customer behaviors yield a 71% higher open rate and double the click rates of non-triggered, mass email campaigns. Consumers don’t want to be a number; rather, they want to be sought after, worthy of your personal attention. Universal campaigns aren’t going to cut it for them, or for your conversion rate.

To do this, you’ve got to know where your customers are coming from and what actions they are taking. Search Optics’ Marketing Intelligence team suggests looking at more than open and click rates or form lead submissions. Consider where your customers were before they completed a campaign action on your site; did they come from your email campaign article, some other website, a Google Search? Did they click on an ad, or your local search link? What terms were being used when they found you? These are the KPIs that not only tell you whether your campaign is working, but where to focus your efforts and dollars to make it work even more efficiently. Use these actionable metrics to adjust your strategy frequently.

3. Utilize the Human Brain.

Metrics offer great insight into the efficiency of your campaigns and that can take your business a long way when optimizing for a higher ROI. Increased visitor referrals from ads or a lower cost per click indicates an ad is working. A higher visit duration average demonstrates that visitors found your content interesting and continued to browse around. A high bounce rate indicates the percentage of viewers who viewed only a single page on your site and were not interested in reading further.

Optimizing metrics, though, does not necessarily mean optimizing those specific numbers; without matching your objectives up with the right metrics, they mean very little. For example, if your desired conversion is for users to land on a page and provide their email in exchange for downloading a piece of content, a low bounce rate doesn’t impact your desired conversion at all. Instead, look at how efficiently the page is converting site visits into downloads, the number of return site visitors, and whether those people opted out when you sent them an email. This clear defining of campaign goals must accompany the interpretation of data to fully tell the story and measure effectiveness of your campaign.

With the fast evolution of technology, interpreting data with a targeted audience in mind is as vital as capturing the metrics. Customers continue to raise their expectations, and, with that, marketers must do the same.

Want to learn more about how analytics can improve your business ROI? Check out UPTRACS^® by Search Optics, the most comprehensive reporting platform available. UPTRACS® provides real-time digital campaign effectiveness with a live dashboard, daily snapshots, and reports customized to measure KPIs that make sense for your business (including calls, form leads, unique visits, and more).