Understanding the user's intent is the key to success in marketing and advertising. Since it's difficult to crack the user intent code, you can use user data to solve the sales riddle. Your message should match with the people's needs and wants. And Google Ads has been developed to help you with this.

The only platform that can compete with Google in terms of sheer vast user data is Facebook, and Google wins hands down because of its ever-increasing search query volume. The latest data by Statcounter suggests the share of searches on different platforms is heavily tilted in favor of Google and its properties.

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Search query becomes a powerful indicator of intent as it reflects the searcher's state of mind. It proves that Google Ads is the king of all the ad platforms when it comes to creating adverts based on user intent.

Therefore, Google Ads is still the most popular advertising platform compared to Bing Ads and social media platforms such as Facebook, LinkedIn, and Twitter, etc.Now, it's crucial to understand the paid search metrics that matter the most for marketers. This article will provide you with the top 10 Google Ads metrics that marketers are using across the globe.

1. Impressions

Impressions are simply the number of times an ad appears before a user. Usually, it's flashed either by Google or Google Display Network. However, it can't be determined if every time an ad is shown on a SERP, it's indeed seen by a user or not.

2. Clicks

Clicks is a highly relevant metric as it reflects the active responses your ad receives. When your ad catches someone's attention and they feel compelled to click the blue link, it's known as a clickā . It will still be counted as a click even if users aren't able to reach your website after clicking the blue link, because of issues such as poor Internet connection or a 404 error.

3. Cost

Money is an important consideration as it decides whether you're able to achieve your goals within your budget or not. It tells you how expensive your campaign has been so far.

4. Average Cost Per Click

This metric tells you how expensive the clicks have been in your campaign. Divide the overall money you've spent on your campaign by the number of clicks you have received and you'll find out the CPC.

5. Conversions

Conversion is a metric that shows whether a user has taken the desired action or not after clicking the blue link. It can be a newsletter sign-up, filling up a subscription form, web page visit, a pdf download, a survey, landing page views, or simply impressions.

6. Impressions by Campaign

Impressions by campaign is used when you need to compare the performance of different campaigns. Classify the total number of impressions by each campaign you ran and you'll receive the numeric value of this metric.

7. Click-Through-Rate (CTR)

CTR is a critical metric that tells you the rate or ratio of people actually clicking your ads out of those who just happen to see your ad. Divide the total number of clicks by the number of impressions your ad receives and you'll get the CTR.

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8. CTR by Ad Groups

When you run Google Ads, you divide the ads based on the set of keywords targeted. These divided segments are known as ad groups. So, CTR by ad group stands for the CTR of each ad group.

This metric helps you discover the keywords and topics that have the necessary volume to generate results.

9. CTR by Campaigns

When the click-through rate is studied with respect to individual campaigns, the metric is known as CTR by campaigns. This metric helps you in multiple ways. For example, you get to know which keywords, ad groups, and campaigns are yielding the best results and generating engagement.

10. Cost Per Conversion

This is one of the most critical metrics that determines which strategy to continue with and what to chuck out. It gives you the average cost per conversion in a campaign. To determine this metric, divide the total cost of the campaign by the number of conversions.Remember, conversion is not always referred to as a prospect turning into a paying customer. A conversion is the attainment of anything that you set as your campaign objective, such as a signup or download, etc.

Track All Your Crucial Paid Search Metrics in One Place

As discussed above, there are several crucial metrics that marketers need to track for an actual assessment of your campaign performance. However, it can be a nightmare to track them separately. One way to remove this hassle is to go for Google Ads Integration into DashClicks' white-label platform. It lets you visualize your campaign performance in a single dashboard with the help of graphics and tables. It also allows you to generate ad reports instantly for your own review purposes, or share them with your clients along with your branding on them.

Google Ads Integration with DashClicks' White-Label Platform

When you avail DashClicks' Google Ads Fulfillment service, you get access to our white-label platform trusted by thousands of agencies worldwide for its quality Google Ad services.

Google Ads Campaign Interface

When you implement our Google Ads Integration, you get detailed reports at the ad sets and campaign level. These reports facilitate you to analyze numerous pieces of random data by presenting them at a granular level. They also provide you with the insights into the campaigns and ad sets that are performing at the top and what you need to do to further improve their performance.

KPI Reporting and Campaign Monitoring

What sets this platform apart from others is the fact that it allows you to get the desired KPIs with a single click. So, you don't need to dig through loads of complicated datasheets. Differentiate between what's performing and what's not without getting into the tedious process of analysis and manual reporting. With Google Ads Integration into our White-Label-Platform, you can streamline everything and save hours of productive time from being wasted in manual processes.

Search and Shopping

Another feature of our Google Ads Integration is that you can combine both search and shopping ads through it. You can easily separate both types of campaigns to discover the ones that are delivering the best performance and ROI. With it, there is no place for guesswork and exporting numerous reports to understand the campaigns.

Conclusion

DashClicks' white label Google ads service is a boon for all kinds of agencies worldwide. With Google Ads Integration into our white-label platform, agencies get re-sellable plans that lead to huge profit margins for them. We also don't force you to choose a bundle of services and allow you to select only the ones you need. Automated ordering makes the entire process of getting the fulfillment services easier than ever. It ensures quality services, satisfied clients, and recurring revenue. Click here to get instant access to the platform.

Facebook ad campaigns can be unpredictable. Sometimes you work rigorously and still are unable to achieve any significant results. Some of the campaigns turn out to be so ineffective that you don't see any noticeable leads, impressions, or sales regardless of your hard work and the tactics and strategies you employ.

So, what to do when you see that your campaign isn't moving in the right direction? In this situation, reporting and tracking become crucial. It allows you to adapt and learn from your campaign and make necessary changes to achieve desired results.

In this article, you’re going to learn:

• Track data on your current and previous Facebook campaigns
• A deep analysis into the most relevant metrics by using campaign breakdowns
• Generate automated reports for your campaigns
• Overview of campaign objective and advertising objectives
• Add the metrics to a report
• Examine data at the ad set and campaign level
• Collate Ad Set results at Ads level
• Analyze frequency data
• Analyze frequency and data at the Ad level

So, let's dive in.

The sales funnel is relevant even in Facebook ads. Ad objectives and content are chosen according to the target user's stage in the sales funnel. The goal is to create the desired impact on users. It can be raising awareness, generating sales, or raising consideration.

Let's discuss an ad campaign to understand its objectives. Open your Facebook Ads Manager account and analytics dashboard and click the buttons in the following order.

When you click on the Create button, a separate window will open where you can choose your campaign objective.

The metrics will change according to the campaign objectives. So, the metrics for a sales campaign will be different from brand awareness. The emphasis should be on the metrics that can denote ROI on the ad. The metrics will also change according to the targeted stage in the sales funnel.

The first stage is the sales funnel, also known as the upper funnel, and it denotes the stage where a business tries to attract the audience. The second stage is the middle funnel, also referred to as the consideration stage, and this is where your target audience converts into qualified leads. The lower funnel metrics measure conversions and sales because a prospect becomes a paying client.

Hence the best metrics for the upper funnel can be click-through rate or impressions. The most relevant metric for the lower stages can be the cost per lead, which denotes the ROI on the campaign. The less cost per lead you achieve, the more cost-effective your ad campaign would be.

The selection of Facebook ad metrics to track the campaign performance mainly depends on the purpose and logic behind the metric.

We will try to explain it here. But, before we do it, we will explain how the Facebook Ads dashboard works.

How Does Facebook Ads Dashboard Work?

Facebook Ads Analytics Dashboard allows you to track your paid campaigns. It also helps you analyze what works and whatnot. So, it serves as the best tool that provides you deep insights into how to optimize your future ads and increase their ROI.

How to Create an Ad with Facebook Ads integration?

Facebook Ads integration allows you to amplify your marketing campaigns by tapping into social media audiences. With Facebook Ads integration, you can create ads for Facebook and set a budget for them. Facebook allows laser-sharp targeting through its various targeting options.

Make sure you follow Facebook ad requirements, or else Facebook can reject your ads.

How to Integrate Facebook Ads?

1. Look for Menu > Integrations.
2. Look for Facebook Ads integration and Click Details over it.
3. Click Connect.
4. And the integration will start.
5. Enter your login details and start the integration process.

How to Create a Facebook Ad?

To create a Facebook ad, take the following steps.

1. Look for Menu > Facebook Ads.
2. Click on Create ad.
3. Name the ad campaign.

How to Create an Ad in the Conversion Funnel?

Follow these steps to create an ad directly in the Conversion funnel:

1. Look for Menu > Conversion funnel
2. Choose your Conversion funnel
3. Click on Create an ad.
4. Name the ad campaign.

How to Add the Metrics to a Campaign Report?

To create your view of the Ads metrics, use the customize columns function.

Can you see the bulleted list of metrics in the picture above? These are the metrics you can choose for your custom view in the Facebook Ads Manager.

On the same screen, if you look at the list on the right side, you'll find a list of Facebook campaign ad metrics that you already use.

The items in this list can be dragged, removed, or arranged in the order you want.

If a suitable metric isn't available in the given list, create a new one by clicking on Create Custom Metric.

Now, we will explain how we add metrics.

For precise tracking, the following four metrics are pretty significant:

1. CTR (Link Click-Through Rate): This Facebook ad campaign metric is relevant for precisely tracking link clicks and not all the irrelevant clicks while monitoring the campaign performance.
2. CPM (Cost per 1000 impressions): The metric indicates the effectiveness of an ad.
3. CPC (Cost per Link Click): It gives us an idea about the ROI.
4. Frequency: The number of times a user views a particular ad.

You can search each of these metrics through the search field and check them as they appear in the search results. This way, you can set up your custom view to analyze Facebook Ads data.

Facebook Ads Integration with a White-Label-Platform

You can use DashClicks' Analytics app to manage your ad campaigns and collect leads on a single dashboard through Facebook Ads integration. It makes ads management easy.

Use DashClicks Agency opportunity and offer Google and Facebook ads services, among others. It has the following three features.

A. Facebook Ads Campaign Interface

Dashclicks displays granular level reporting for campaigns and ad sets to help you thoroughly analyze and review your ad strategy. It's challenging to analyze multiple pieces of disorganized data unless it's presented as meaningful reports that help identify which ads are performing better than others. With the help of DashClicks' InstaReports, you can also specify the best performing ad sets and the ad strategies yielding the best results.

B. KPI Reporting and Monitoring

Managers don't need loads of data. They need the KPIs that matter the most. After your Facebook Ads integration with the DashClicks' white-label platform, you get the desired KPIs with a single click. These metrics will help you dive into the nitty-gritty of ad analysis within seconds. Say goodbye to the old-fashioned tedious manual reporting and analysis. You'll find everything in one hub.

C. Facebook and Instagram Integration

With DashClicks' beautiful interface, you don't need to pull and export multiple reports to analyze your ads' performance. Pull and report on Facebook and Instagram metrics simultaneously, all at one glance.

Agency owners use InstaReports to generate multi-channel business reports on the fly for their prospecting campaigns.

Analysis of the Results At the Campaign Level

It is the most popular method to check a campaign's performance. The relevant metrics are impressions, reach, results, and Cost per Result. If you want more adjustments, analyze data at the ad level.

First, determine how much you can afford to invest in your ad campaign. You can decide this amount based on the niche you are operating in and your business requirements.

Paying a high Cost Per Click or Result isn't logical when promoting a free webinar or boosting branding. It won't pay off. On the flip side, if you are selling a premium product such as VIP coaching or a high-end course, paying a high Cost Per Result may be justified.

Similarly, we can also track data at the ad set level.

Analysis of the Results At the Ad-Set Level

Let's begin by pressing the Ad Sets tab.

Even if some ads perform better than others, it won't signal a campaign success. Good results of an ad set don't mean that the campaign is achieving its desired objectives. If you dive deeper, you'll find that Impressions and the Cost Per Result are useful metrics here.

You need to keep a tab on your overall ad spend and keep low-paid ad sets running. You should control your spending by paying a higher amount per Result to allow this to happen. It becomes even more critical if the ad-set yields more results.

If you want to make a cost projection and are clueless about it, use Ad Set Budget Optimization. Doing a campaign budget optimization wouldn't be helpful here.

To do that, go through the following steps.

Find the Campaigns tab>>Press the Edit button>>Uncheck the Campaign Budget Optimization box.

If you don't check the campaign budget optimization, you let Facebook decide which ad-set to focus on and spend more funds on. However, if you uncheck it, you get complete control over which ad to focus on and divert your funds.

You can also check the Ad Set Optimization option. Another option is to create different Ad sets with similar ads running. So, the change in results would not be because of the ad variation but due to the audience.

Pro Tip: To see normalized Cost Per Result, you may require at least 50 events, such as conversions and purchases. So, you can delay your budget decision till you complete this many events. If the number of events is less than 50, your budget estimation may be slightly skewed.

How to Compare Ad Set Results at the Ad Level?

Regardless of the number of ad sets running, Facebook will pick only one to utilize the budget and get more reach, even if it's a bit expensive.

Sometimes Facebook chooses a particular adset simply because it has more ads. More variables and formats mean more data to analyze and, therefore, more leads. It also allows Facebook to serve people's needs with greater flexibility.

Besides the number of ads, another crucial consideration is frequency while analyzing Ad Set level data.

What is the "Frequency Metric" in FB Ads?

Frequency is an exciting factor while running ads. You might have seen irritating ads appearing over and over again while using Facebook. It often leads to user frustration and ad fatigue. Apart from that, this will increase your Cost per Result, squeezing your budget faster.

To prevent this from happening, reschedule your ads as soon as the frequency value crosses two. It's possible to analyze frequency at the Ad set and Ad level.

Frequency again becomes a crucial metric when running retargeting campaigns. You don't have a vast audience compared to the primary ads while running "retargeting" ads. When running several ads, your frequency may go down, but it will increase if you have a high budget. Increased funding becomes a prerequisite since you target a smaller audience during a retargeting ad. You can use Ad Set Budget Optimization to resolve this issue.

How to Analyze Data at the Ad Level?

If you are looking for the ads data, go to the Ads tab. You can easily find the specific ad sets with the most impressions and reach.

Many factors can cause the difference in the engagement levels for different ads, such as background, colors, message, etc. You can remove the ads with poor results and divert your resources to the best-performing ads.

Now imagine another scenario. Spot the ad with higher reach and lower Cost per Result. You must be wondering what caused such gaps in ad performance even though the target audience is the same. Let's analyze this.

Visibility and size of the various elements on the ad, such as logo, etc., can also be responsible for this variation. For example, smaller icons have more visibility for users familiar with your brand. A large logo can be distracting and difficult to identify and differentiate. If you dig into why some ads aren't performing that well, you can vastly improve your future ads. Once you form an opinion, test it by adding new test ads.

Now, test an ad within an ad set to see why it's performing better than others.

You will achieve a higher click-through rate if the featured images in the ad are known faces for your target audience. A straightforward ad strategy analyzes different ads and adds the features of the best performing ads in your next ad. Combine the best ad features identified after a deep analysis. Still, the best performing ad would be the one with reduced Cost per Result.

How to Analyze the Frequency at the Ad Level?

Now, you'll learn to monitor the frequency metric at the ad level. You can't dramatically increase the frequency value by just multiplying the number of ads running. So, when frequency increases, the Cost per Result should go down. It would be a folly to pause an ad even if it's generating leads and attracting eyeballs. It's time to halt an ad set at a high frequency when the cost per click increases.

However, you can still tweak that ad for better performance, and in most cases, this strategy will work. There is no need to pause an ad that's performing even if it's less than other ads.

To tweak an ad, you can analyze it as explained above. Take care of the user perspective while making any changes to an ad.

Conclusion

We have summed up some practical strategies and tactics you should know as a marketer. You can create a few templates for a fair analysis of the ads if you're still a beginner. But, once you understand how Facebook's ad platform works, you can create your custom views and custom metrics for better analysis. You can download various pre-made templates from the Internet. If you can collect more data about your customers, you can create custom ads based on those insights into user preferences. The objective should be to minimize the Cost per Result.

Facebook also offers a fantastic feature known as Facebook audience interest suggestions. You can use this feature to create laser-sharp targeted ads.

If you want to boost the performance and ROI of your Facebook ad campaigns, you should consider hiring our white label Facebook ads services.

Share the metrics you would use in your custom view. Is there any metric that works better than the ones we have mentioned above? What else would you do to analyze Facebook ads data? Let's know in the comments.

Studies indicate that you have about five minutes to make contact with a lead if you want conversion.

Yet, you probably take hours if not days to catch up on your recent list of submissions. That means the individual likely forgot about you, found another brand, and already made a connection.

If your lead management system's results sound like this, you need better solutions.

Here are six tips for better inbound marketing lead management you can start implementing right now within your company.

1. Segment All of Your Inbound Leads

When you run a digital ad campaign, you're likely to get clicks and submissions from a variety of users.

From there, your sales representatives look at the contact data, then try to verify email, prepare their pitch, and attempt to touch base. They repeat this process until they've exhausted their list.

This approach is a mistake.

Though interest in your products or services is a common denominator, not all of your audiences will share the same characteristics.

According to a survey, 62% of marketers purport to utilize segmentation to better communicate with leads. The reason for this is that highly-personalized advertisements show a much better response rate than general-purpose ads.

You can segment your inbound leads in the following ways:

• Marketing channels used
• Age
• Gender
• Income levels
• Occupation
• Interests/hobbies

When you filter your leads into one or more of these pools, your team can build a better picture of that persona.

For example, a local landscaping company likely does business with all local properties including homes, businesses, and even municipal buildings. However, they would want to tailor specific ads to target homeowners and business property owners respectively for best results.

Fortunately, most advertising platforms like Facebook Ads or Google Ads will automatically gather data when available.

Of course, you can further qualify any leads by asking the right questions on your landing page's submission form. If your offer applies to customers of a certain income threshold, you may wish to ask for an approximation in addition to their contact details.

You'll need to test and balance this to avoid overburdening potential leads with too many questions that ultimately drive them away.

Finally, you can better optimize inbound lead management from all platforms by utilizing superior inbound management tools. One such type of software is the Inbound app offered through the DashClicks platform.

Inbound allows users to integrate their campaigns from a variety of third-party tools including:

• Facebook Ads
• CallRail
• ClickFunnels
• Instapage
• Kartra
• ManyChat
• PhoneSites
• Unbounce

Instead of checking in to each of these accounts, all of your leads will automatically show up in one unified dashboard.

From there, you can set the campaign to automatically delegate lead responsibilities to specific sales reps or via round-robin assignments. This serves to help speed up response times and avoid overburdening your sales teams with more leads than they can handle.

2. Remarket to Specific Buyer Personas

After you've done the work of segmenting your audience, it's time to get to work on creating better-optimized campaigns.

We highly recommend creating individualized PPC campaigns designed to attract segmented users.

While this may seem difficult at first blush, it's easier for content creators due to a better understanding of the target. Instead of trying to make ad copy that works for everyone, they can freely write messages to one specific type of buyer.

Customers can and will identify when your copy is speaking to them personally. Once you have their attention, you seal the deal simply by listing the benefits they can gain by shopping with your brand.

If you're working with a limited ad budget, you may need to score leads to determine which types of campaigns you wish to pursue first.

You can score leads and audiences by the weight of actions taken when interacting with the campaign. Clicking on an ad is meaningful, but filling out a form or responding to an email is more significant.

Finally, remember that segmenting your campaigns will improve your ROI overall. That means a smaller cost-per-lead and more budget available to use toward more unique campaigns.

3. Create Highly-Targeted Landing Pages

This is more a continuation of the last tip but bears noting nonetheless.

Your ads should not only target specific audience segments but should direct them to highly personalized landing pages.

The landing page equates to an in-person or over-the-phone sales pitch. Any representative with experience will tailor their approach to what they know about that individual or group.

Using this same practice when designing a page, uploading images, and writing your copy will result in:

• More clicks
• Longer session duration
• More form signups
• Better email marketing metrics

Furthermore, any sales representatives assigned to this specific campaign will already know about the leads they're dealing with ahead of time. This grants the opportunity to continuously analyze and refine your sales tactics for that audience segment.

4. Implement Chatbots for Superior Response Times

While we already acknowledged the importance of a quick response, there are limits to every sales team.

Thanks to modern tech and a bit of know-how, you never need to worry about leaving potential leads in limbo.

There are countless chatbot platforms available for marketers and business owners to implement in no time at all. Sites like Chatbot and ManyChat provide you with all you need to set up your bot script and get the leads the information they require.

This is superior to leaving users with a message like We'll be in touch soon on your landing pages as nothing beats instant satisfaction. Furthermore, you leave users feeling empowered by keeping them in the know and directing them to resources that can help with their purchasing decision.

Chatbots not only help users feel heard but can help you to continuously qualify leads that have already demonstrated a high level of purchasing intent.

Tools like ManyChat are among the list of previously referenced integrations that you can incorporate into your DashClicks account for better lead management overall.

5. Offer Trials or Demos

What's better than getting a lightning-fast response?

Taking away something useful for absolutely zero cost.

Successful marketers know this, and that's why so many ad campaigns and landing pages come complete with some form of lead magnet.

A lead magnet is any free item or service that offers immediate value and benefit to the lead simply for providing their contact information. The less information they need to provide, the more likely the lead magnet is to swing the conversion in your favor.

Lead magnets do not need to be particularly elaborate or expensive to put together. A common tactic is to put together short eBooks that help educate the customer about aspects of your brand. For example, real estate agents often push eBooks that teach buyers what to look for when shopping for new homes.

However, the best type of lead magnet is one that allows the lead to sample the product or service.

Offering something that doesn't hurt your brand's bottom line can make for excellent conversion tactics. These might include:

• Free classes
• 7-day free trials
• Trial-sized products
• Free professional consultations
• Free software demos

There's no better way to sell a product or service than to let it speak for itself. Think of ways that you could create a free, cost-effective experience for leads to make more sales.

6. Nurture Real Relationships

Finally, the best tip of all is to treat each new lead like the individual they are.

This can prove to be difficult for unprepared teams, but there are technologies available to help with audience nurturing.

By real relationships, we mean going above and beyond the standard marketing messaging.

When customers show interest by filling out the forms on your landing pages, send out a message addressing them by name thanking them for their time.

If customers take the time for a call and hear your pitch, let them know that their time is valued and appreciated. Showing your customers that they're worth more than their wallet goes a long way in not only landing a sale but building customers for life.

Improving your ROI is not just about capturing leads for less ad spend, but building a relationship that increases customer lifetime value.

Other tactics like sending exclusive sales and discounts to loyal customers are another great way to help them feel appreciated while providing an incentive to make additional purchases. Customers love to know that their business is more valued than someone new to the scene.

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Better Lead Management is Readily Available

With so many platforms and automation tools available, poor lead management should never be something that holds your business back.

Not only do PPC platforms like Facebook and Google automatically provide segmented data, but platforms like DashClicks can also help unify all of those metrics into one place.

With all of this personalized data on your side, your paid ads and content teams should have an easier time curating ad content and landing pages for specific groups. The better focused your content is, the more likely you are to drive conversions.

Finally, valuing the customer's time is essential. Make sure to be quick with your response times by having reps ready to call or a chatbot ready to point users in the right direction. Strong lead magnets will also help leads remain engaged and empower them to make informed purchasing decisions.

You can refine all of these tips in a way that works best within your existing lead management system. The better you are at establishing and nurturing relationships, the more likely you are to improve your ROI over time.

A quality marketing report can make or break a relationship with a client.

Due to the varying timetables of how long it can take to get results, you need meaningful metrics to make an impact. Clients need to be able to understand those metrics in a way that makes sense and promotes further action.

Let's define what a marketing report is, how often you should present one, and the six most important things you need to include.

What is a Digital Marketing Report?

A digital marketing report is a collection of data that illustrates how your marketing efforts are helping a business achieve its goals.

You can generate and present marketing reports weekly, monthly, quarterly, or any other period that fits the agenda. Many marketers will present different marketing reports for different timetables that focus on short-term or long-term goals respectively.

What’s included in a marketing report can fluctuate depending on you and your client’s unique goals. Therefore, any report might include:

• Website analytics
• Social media analytics
• PPC campaign metrics
• Email marketing data
• Any other data that demonstrates where you are concerning the objective

However, if you utilize any marketing reporting tools, you’re likely to find yourself overwhelmed with data. Even though certain channels might provide a wealth of metrics, it does not mean you need to include everything.

Doing so will often confuse your client and obfuscate the hard work that your team accomplishes within a given period.

Though sorting through the data can be challenging, it's much easier if you understand your objectives. For the most part, however, there are the six most essential things that virtually every marketing report should include.

Let's get into it.

1. Your Objectives (with Supporting Research)

Before you begin taking any course of action, you always start by defining your goals and objectives.

Likewise, your client needs a reminder of what the goals are for the period. This will ensure that any following data will make sense and be understood in the context of those objectives.

You must always clearly define your objectives and avoid making any vague, unclear promises. Examples of poorly-defined goals might be:

• Get more followers
• Make more sales

While we can understand the overall idea of those points, it’s fairly difficult to define something so broad. Instead, we can give our clients a better sense of progress by precisely describing what we are attempting to achieve:

• Increase monthly website traffic to X amount by X month
• Improve organic rankings by X amount
• Reach X number of conversions on a specific social media platform

The platforms we use will provide in-depth metrics that communicate these finer points. In most cases, those numbers show the true journey of progress while ultimately serving grander goals like gaining more followers or generating more revenue.

Furthermore, you should attempt to support your objectives by providing research that supports those actions. As an example, marketers understand that LinkedIn is a powerful platform for B2B businesses. If you're trying to help your B2B client build traction on LinkedIn, you can include data that supports why this objective benefits them.

A quick and excellent way of generating excellent research data is through the use of DashClicks' very own InstaReports software.

Marketing reporting tools like these can instantly retrieve live data about a business in seconds. This self-contained report focuses on website data, social media, online reviews, SEO, and paid ads performance. You can use that data to highlight pain points and back your active objectives in those respective areas.

Once your client understands what you're working toward, they're ready to listen to review the next items.

2. Monthly Website Metrics

A business's SEO data is essential for every marketing report. Improving website rankings improves organic performance, meaning lower monthly spending.

In other words, your marketing team should always be working to improve the client's SEO and website performance.

There are numerous free tools for tracking metrics for any domain. The most popular is Google Analytics, which encompasses everything you could ever need to know about a web page or the entire site.

However, GA provides an immense amount of data, not all of which is necessary to illustrate your points to your client. Here are a few key metrics you’ll want to highlight:

• Daily, weekly, monthly website traffic
• Number of unique visits
• Traffic by source (how are visitors finding the site?)
• Page clicks
• Average session duration
• SEO page rankings

You'll want to spend more or less time on specific points depending on the goals for that reporting period.

If the goal is to simply boost brand awareness and traffic, highlighting unique visits as well as their origin is helpful. Highlighting areas of strong performance is what a client wants to see and will make a positive impression.

However, a great marketer won't shy away from the negatives. If you notice a trend in poor numbers for specific pages, make it known. This is an opportunity for growth and improvement, which serves to help the client's overall goals.

Including both positives and negatives also helps the client stay involved and proactive regarding their success. It also inspires their confidence in you when you are actively looking to improve instead of resting on your laurels.

Finally, we would be remiss not to highlight that tools like Google Analytics allow you to create custom conversions for the website. These will allow you to better track progress toward specific goals you have regarding the user experience. Not only does it drive your efforts, but it better communicates what you're accomplishing in the marketing report.

3. Performance Metrics by Campaign

Your digital marketing efforts will extend across many channels in addition to the website.

Examples of these channels might include:

• Email marketing campaigns
• Social media
• PPC campaigns
• Blogs

The marketing tools you’re using for any of these channels will also provide their built-in analytics tracking. Similar to Google Analytics, you’ll want to pull relevant data from the platforms you’re using to run campaigns.

A. Email Marketing Metrics to Include

Email marketing reporting is fairly straightforward and should highlight your reach and conversion rates. Data points to include are:

• Number of emails sent
• Number of emails successfully delivered
• CTR (clickthrough rate)
• Subscriber data
• CVR (conversion rate)

It helps the client to know not only that emails are going out to real contacts, but that those emails are being read by the recipient.

When users open those emails, subscribe to the listing, or convert, it’s transparent that your marketing efforts work. Likewise, a low CTR or a spike in unsubscribers could indicate that the campaign needs some attention.

B. Social Media Metrics to Include

If one of your core goals is to boost brand awareness on social, you’ll want to include some data in your report. This is also applicable if you’re running paid social ads or relying on your following to boost numbers in other areas.

Some key metrics you might include are:

• Follower counts
• Engagement rates
• Shares
• Ad or promoted post CTR
• Audience demographics

More followers, impressions, and engagement means that your social media content is making an impact. Likewise, shared content means an extended reach at zero additional cost to you or the client.

Additional insights about your audience on social media might motivate new campaign ideas depending on your findings.

C. Paid Ad Metrics

This is a necessity if you’re currently running any type of paid ad campaign on search or social media. Paying for clicks doesn’t come cheap, so you need to show your client that their money is being spent wisely.

Essential metrics to include are:

• Cost-per-click
• Conversions & conversion rate
• Cost-per-conversion
• CPM (cost per 1,000 impressions)
• CTR
• Total spend
• ROI / ROAS (return on investment, return on ad spend)

You'll want to highlight similar data for each platform that features a paid ad campaign for your client. Comparing and contrasting performance on different platforms can sometimes highlight where the client's money is best spent.

Something else to consider is highlighting ad creatives that are performing well. It's not uncommon to have creative differences between parties over what they want versus what gets results. Showing off the specific ads with the data leaves both parties with a better understanding of where to go moving forward.

Also, underperforming on other platforms is not always cause to pull all ads. Instead, you can use negatively trending data to promote new ad campaign ideas for the next period with your client's final approval.

You can quickly and seamlessly track all of this data for each platform within the DashClicks Analytics app. Users can integrate platforms like Facebook Ads, Google Ads, CallRail, and others at no cost. You can even track keyword rankings and other vital SEO data at the same time for all of your reporting needs.

4. Leads and Customers

Marketing data from the previous areas is important. It shows that your content is reaching new audiences and connections are happening.

However, many of these metrics can amount to little more than vanity if you're not capturing quality leads. Those leads then need to convert into customers.

In other words, your client is going to want to see the bottom line from all of the previously reported data. You can do this by highlighting:

• Qualified leads by channel (where are we capturing leads?)
• Marketing qualified leads (leads that show engagement and interest)
• Sales qualified leads (leads show motivation to spend)
• Cost-per-action (money spent for each action taken by a customer throughout the marketing process)
• Cost-per-acquisition
• Customer lifetime value (money spent by customer versus the cost to acquire)

Your marketing channels will provide you with the necessary, but these data points will likely require a bit of basic math on your part.

For example, calculating a particular cost-per-action would mean comparing your total expenses versus the number of conversions. A low CPA will indicate that you are reaching engaged customers at a lower cost. A high CPA could indicate that you need to better qualify customers or simplify the process of getting a customer from awareness to checkout.

We recommend placing this data toward the end of your report for two reasons. First, the prior data provides the necessary context for your lead and customer data. Second, your lead data acts as an effective summary of all of your efforts within each marketing channel.

5. A Full Marketing Report Analysis (In Layman's Terms)

All of your reported metrics now need an easy-to-understand breakdown. Your expertise is a big part of what they're paying you for, so now's the time to educate.

Though your client may be able to extrapolate their ideas from the numbers, they still want you to pull it all together and complete the story.

For this reason, your summary and analysis should:

• Explain positive results and highlight continued strategies
• Get ahead of negative snapshots and address the circumstances
• Propose new strategies or ideas to sustain or improve results
• Highlight exceptional achievements

Adding the final color to your marketing picture will better help nonmarketers understand the ebb and flow of the industry. Without your informed explanations, you leave clients to draw their conclusions, which can end up problematic even when there’s no cause for concern.

Likewise, a willingness to confidently address shortcomings outright can replace frustrations with new confidence. As with any customer service, letting the client know you're aware and engaged can alleviate short-term concerns.

Just be sure that your team communicates a plan to address existing issues so that you don't find yourself reporting poor results each period.

6. Future Plans and Strategies

Now that you've had your opportunity to tell the story, the client will be wondering one thing: what's next?

A solid marketing report should conclude with a clear outline of planned strategies and actions between now and the next reporting period.

Those strategies will now be informed by all of the data presented previously in the report. However, as a precaution, make sure to call back to key reporting points to keep your analytics fresh in the client's mind.

With this, the client has an idea of what to look forward to within the coming days and weeks. They're informed and empowered to connect with you if they have questions or concerns about any of your marketing efforts.

Your plans should also reiterate existing goals or propose new ones based on what fits the bill. That way, you can point back to data from the previous month and easily demonstrate progress from period to period.

How to Determine If It Belongs in a Marketing Report?

Before we conclude, we'll leave you with a few pointers that can help sort through marketing data. By asking yourself these key questions, you'll be able to eliminate irrelevant data that fails to serve your report.

A. Does the Data Explain Our Progress Towards Marketing Goals?

As discussed above, platforms like Google Analytics or Facebook Ads provide a wealth of information.

This data provides value, but only if it tells you something about your immediate goals.

For example, if you're attempting to increase website traffic by X percent for the month, stats like individual page rankings are not necessarily relevant to the topic.

Throwing in these additional facts will likely distract from the important conversation. However, a metric like bounce rate may be relevant if the website experiences a period of unusually high bounces. You may sometimes need to use your discretion and ask if this data is of immediate importance to the task at hand.

B. Is the Data Easy to Understand?

In this article, we've used a strong amount of marketing vernacular that you're like familiar with. However, the same is often not true for those that operate outside of the industry.

You want to ensure that your report contains basic vocabulary that's easy for all parties to understand. When taking the data from your analytics platform, restructure it in a way that speaks to the common person.

C. Does the Client Need to Know This?

This final point can be tricky if done improperly.

Even expert marketers will experience a rise and fall within certain metrics. Because we have expertise and insights into trends, we know when a red arrow is a cause for concern.

The same is not always true for the client and seeing negative trends will generally be a cause for alarm. Seeing numbers pointing down can end up dominating the report, even when much of your news is largely positive.

For this reason, think carefully about whether or not certain numbers need to be acknowledged or highlighted in the report.

Note that this is not an opportunity to evade talking about genuinely poor performance. Use your judgment to tell the difference and use your expertise to keep your client's concerns at ease.

Use This As a Template for Your Marketing Reports

Marketers will virtually always want these six categories somewhere within their weekly or monthly digital marketing reports.

However, remember that these ideas serve as a general template. The exact metrics you want to include will depend upon:

• The types of marketing channels being used
• What types of campaigns you’re running
• The client’s immediate marketing goals

Nevertheless, these categories will consistently point you toward the correct numbers that directly address progress. It’s then up to you to provide context for your analytics so that your client can understand where you stand even without insider marketing knowledge.

Your marketing efforts run on the client's budget, so you owe it to them to ensure they're educated. However, you have the power to tell a clear and cohesive story that they won't be able to discover themselves. Use that opportunity to show your strengths, plan new strategies, and omit obfuscatory data.

Remember, you can improve your reporting process right here at DashClicks by taking advantage of our free marketing and reporting software. Signing up for an account is completely free and you can integrate your third-party accounts at any time.

Demonstrate growth, highlight revenue increases, and get to the bottom line. This keeps clients happy and keeps them returning to your team for marketing services every month.

Welcome to episode eight of Whiteboard Wednesday. In this episode, Chad Kodary, CEO of DashClicks, discusses creating an efficient live chat at scale.

For absolute beginners, live chat appears like a tiny little bubble either on your website's bottom right or bottom left. When you click on it, you open up a live chat where your team answers questions in the back end. The team in the backend also handles all the incoming tickets.

Benefits of Using Live Chat Software

Live chat is known to increase conversion, speed up sales funnel, improve service quality & customer experience on the website, and reduce response time.

Different software tools enable live chat on websites, such as Intercom, Zendesk, HubSpot, LiveChat, etc. But, in this session, we will explain how to offer excellent customer service and create a live chat experience that helps your business scale.

We'll also discuss how to create an experience so that your customers get immediate help and never leave the live chat session empty-handed.

So, today, we will Whiteboard some cool tips & tricks, and tactics that you can implement to create an efficient live chat system.

We at DashClicks use Intercom for our live chat. So, we'll share our experience while using and improving our live chat system - Intercom. To create a better live chat experience and scale this, you should create triggers.

How to Use a Live Chat Software?

The best way to generate inbound leads is by using live chat triggers.

A. Use Triggers

So, when a visitor (call him Bobby, the painter) comes to our website and spends more than 10 seconds, it is a trigger for our website DashClicks.com, and a live chat option would pop up with a greeting message flashing on it. You can either use an old greeting or ask a question here. The idea is to start a conversation with this visitor.

Source: Ep. 8 ā 04:45

You can ask ice breaker questions such as:

• Are you interested in XYZ?
• Hey, what type of industry are you in?
• Hey, what service are you looking for?

You can also set triggers on certain pages. For example, if a specific page that a visitor is on is for a marketing agency and talks about SEO services, you can set a trigger based on how long they’ve been on your website and the page they’re on.

If somebody spends more than 10 seconds on a specific page, such as an SEO service page, you can ask them, “Hey! Are you looking for SEO services?”

‘Yes‘ or ‘no‘? It sets the ground to initiate a conversation.

2. Segment the Conversations

Segment the live inbound conversations that you’re having. Like the IVR, when people open up a live chat, they might have different queries and purposes. So, people may have questions regarding sales, billing or invoices, tech support, etc., when they call software companies. These can be the three major categories people go to live chat for.

Source: Ep. 8 ā 08:28

So, when they visit the website, and the little live chat bubble appears, you can use routing. The bots in the live chat software use questions to initiate the trigger and decide the right team to which you can transfer the chat.

Separate buckets are created in the back end to transmit the conversation to the concerned teams. For example, the questions about invoices and billing are transferred to the accounts team, those about technical glitches to the tech support team, and so on.

How to Handle Random or Vague Questions?

Sometimes, people ask general random questions that don't fall into any category. Or maybe the bot is not able to understand their question correctly. Such queries are assigned to a support person in the backend, who probes a little deeper to decide where the query should be routed.

Such queries are generally routed to any of these three categories based on the nature of the questions. This process works very well here at DashClicks where we receive hundreds of tickets every day. We have set up this bucket system with Intercom, the live chat software.

With the bucket system in place, these queries are segmented and sent to the right inboxes. We automatically make routing rules for every inbox and round-robin the tickets to the specific reps.

Pro Tip: If you receive less than ten tickets a day, you don't need this strategy.

How to Scale the Live Chat System?

To scale the live chat system, you need to know the following metrics.

1. Time Taken to Answer

This metric indicates the time taken by the rep to answer the live chat ticket since the time they open the live chat while visiting your website. At DashClicks, our target is to keep it under one minute. It's crucial because nobody wants to wait for more than a minute to get their queries answered, and if it happens, they are very likely to bounce off to another alternative.

Source: Ep. 8 ā 12:10

2. Time to Close

It relates to the time taken by the reps to close the ticket. But, it's tricky as in the case of tech support, the representatives may take days or even weeks to close the tickets. Sometimes, there is a billing issue where the reps have to look into the records. If it's a tech support issue, the agents might need assistance from the development team. We don't average out the time taken to close the tickets as we usually respond, and provide answers quickly, to most of the queries. Calculating the average time taken to close the tokens will only increase the standard handling time.

3. Customer Satisfaction

Customer satisfaction is a crucial metric, and you should strive to achieve a 90% or above customer satisfaction ratio. Intercom, the live chat software that we use, sends an email to the customers asking them for the customer service ratings. Apart from giving a rating between one to five, customers may also leave a review for the service reps. At DashClicks, we review these ratings every week and ensure that ratings don't fall below 90%.

There are many other metrics too, but these are the three major ones that decide the efficiency of your live chat support.

Final Words

To sum up, the following helps you make sure that you have an efficient live chat system set up:

1. Triggers going out to start conversations
2. Segmented departments for each type of ticket
3. A plan to route to round-robin efficiently so that reps can get equal distribution across tickets
4. Making sure that these metrics are maintained:
5. A good response time, ideally less than a minute
6. A good average time to close a ticket considering both the speed and quality of support
7. Above 90% customer satisfaction ratings

I hope this blog post was helpful in guiding you about scaling your live chat department. Start implementing it right away, and tell us your experience in the comments below.

To read the next blog post based on our weekly Whiteboard Wednesday sessions on YouTube, keep following this space.

Have a fantastic day!

Paid search is the most common go-to strategy for brands looking to grow online.

The problem is that without proper knowledge and experience, you’ll quickly find yourself pumping funds into PPC campaigns unnecessarily. The reason for those inflated costs might not be because of direct competition, nor is it because others are playing fair.

Sometimes aggression is necessary with a paid search strategy, but it’s defense that wins championships in top spot marketing.

Below, we’ll highlight one of the essential keys to defending the top position on Google search that you’re not currently using in your digital marketing strategies.

What is Paid Search Monitoring?

Paid search monitoring is the process of actively observing user bidding behaviors on terms trademarked by or related to your brand.

While one might assume that only your company would have a reason to bid on branded keywords, particularly aggressive competitors have other ideas. They’re poised to benefit from bidding on your terms by actively harming your marketing efforts.

A branded keyword refers to any term or phrase that describes your company and/or trademarked products and services. For example, “iPhone” is a branded keyword that belongs to Apple.

While general keywords related to the industry are fair game, there are strict rules to protect your brand from search sabotage when it comes to branded keywords. However, your team needs to have an active role in catching these violations before they have a chance to cause real damage.

Why Do Competitors Bid on Branded Keywords?

There are several reasons why a third party might actively bid on your branded keywords. These reasons include:

• Actively driving up your cost-per-click by active bidding
• Harming your UX by directing your users to unrelated content
• Stealing clicks to sabotage your marketing efforts

In other words, it’s irrelevant whether or not a bad actor wins the top spot for your branded keywords. If they succeed in increasing your monthly paid search costs, the work is already done.

However, it’s very important to understand that not all trademark infringement is intentional or hostile.

If you work with partners that actively resell on your behalf, it’s very easy for that partner to hurt your paid search efforts. The same goes for any companies that actively utilize an affiliate program to extend their marketing reach.

When one of your affiliates or partners is unaware of the rules and regulations, it becomes easy to steal clicks by using your brand’s IP in their paid ads. This results in the same negative effects, causing you to lose clicks and negatively impacting your UX.

What are the Rules for Branded Keywords in PPC Ad Campaigns?

Google dictates its advertising policies regarding trademarks in search ads here

There are a few key passages to take note of when preparing your new paid search monitoring strategy.

A. Google May Restrict the Use of Trademarks in Ad Text

To actively combat the misuse of branded keywords, Google reserves the right to restrict or remove PPC ads that utilize your trademarked terms anywhere within the ad. This includes the title, the body, images, meta descriptions, and anywhere else you could provide such a term.

B. Google Does Allow Authorized Advertisers to Use Trademarks

Google will allow other parties to utilize branded keywords if you, the trademark owner, authorize a partner or affiliate as an advertiser.

Your resellers and affiliates may use branded keywords provided that:

• The ad and/or landing page is dedicated to selling products or services related to your branded keyword
• The ad and/or landing page provides accurate information regarding the items related to the trademark

C. Google Does Not Allow Use of Trademark for Competitive Purposes

Last, but not least, this rule protects your brand from aggressive competitors.

A competing brand may not utilize your branded keywords in the title of an ad or the text to direct traffic to a competing product or service. This is the most likely scenario that occurs any time a bad actor intentionally bids on and uses your terms to create a harmful effect.

However, it is critical to note that no rules are preventing a user from simply bidding on keywords.

So long as the competitor is not violating the rule of actively using the term in the ad, they may attempt to bid on and rank for these keywords at any time.

While you can get rid of ads that violate this policy by filing an official complaint, you’ll need to get your hands dirty when it comes to honest competition. Otherwise, competitors can still dominate search results for your terms so long as their paid search strategy outperforms yours.

Image Source

How Can I Monitor Paid Search Effectively?

Now that you have official documentation regarding Google’s paid search policies on your side, you can start to actively monitor your trademarked terms.

You essentially have two options when it comes to addressing a legitimate trademark violation.

The first is to ensure that your paid search team actively monitors essential keyword bidding and traffic regularly. It will be easy to identify unusual bidding activities. You can then review who is using the term and how it is being used within the paid advertisement or website.

If you notice a violation, you can contact the webmaster directly. Inform that in an official way that they violate trademark use and Google’s advertising policies. In some cases, letting the third party know that you’re actively monitoring and protecting your brand can be enough to deter this behavior.

Alternatively, you can submit a complaint to Google directly, especially if the other party does not comply. Because this is such a common issue, Google warns that it may take time to review all submissions due to the high volume of complaints.

For this reason, it may be in your best interest to actively contact the other party in the meantime to expedite results.

Use Automated Tools to Monitor Paid Search

Despite our best efforts, some bad actors are just crafty enough to sneak by your paid search team’s active perception.

Because cheating the system is so effective, Google’s policies aren’t enough to deter all parties. Some will simply adapt and begin running ads to your trademarked terms in other locations or during unusual hours. This is a common tactic advertisers use to slip past your defensive strategies.

For this reason, relying solely on manual monitoring is generally not enough in 2022. You need automated solutions that can actively check the web for infringement. Sites like Adthena or BrandVerity promise to quickly detect infringement from competitors and partners alike.

Research your options to see what’s best for your brand or agency.

Create a Guideline Manual for Partners and Affiliates

Finally, every brand that relies on partners, resellers, or affiliates must create a definitive guideline book for advertising.

These guidelines should dictate:

• Policies enforced by search engines & paid ad platforms
• Rules & regulations unique to your brand & partnership programs

In this booklet, you’ll want to clearly define the acceptable use cases of trademark terms in partner advertising. It also helps to provide examples of what is not acceptable and explain how and why such actions can harm your company.

Furthermore, you should clearly define the possible repercussions for violations, whether it be termination of the partnership or additional legal action. Then, ensure that all partners or affiliates willfully sign this agreement before proceeding.

In most cases, trademark infringements from partners are unintentional and the result of misunderstanding the rules. If you do have any bad actors in your ranks, enforcing these guidelines will go a long way in ensuring they steer clear of actively harming your paid search strategy or brand reputation.

Defend the Top Position on Google Search

Your trademarked terms are your most valuable. Not only do they belong to your brand exclusively, but they’re also the most direct path for users to find your products and make a purchase.

Competitors know this and may actively attack those branded keywords to make advertising more expensive and actively hurt your average customer’s experience. Both can provide significant setbacks for your paid search strategy and lower your overall rankings.

Get intimate with Google’s advertising policies and make sure that your paid search team dedicates part of the week to actively monitoring third-party activity. It’s important to clamp down on violations quickly before they have an opportunity to hurt your ROI or domain authority.

Everyone wants the top spot. But, don’t forget that reaching number one means that you must actively defend yourself to stay there. Stay true to your strategy when it’s working, protect your trademarks, and keep reminding customers why you deserve to have the top position on Google search.