Marketing is an inexact science, but one of the easiest and best ways to measure marketing performance is readily available and easy to use. Call tracking provides dynamic insight into customer needs and can help you increase sales while improving customer satisfaction. Here are a few of the best ways to use call tracking as a business resource.
Track the ROI of Your Marketing Efforts
Call tracking makes it easy to know if your latest campaign is having the results you hoped for and which headlines attract the most prospects. Simply by using a different phone number or offer code in you’re A/B testing, you know right away which message inspires customers to pick up the phone. You can use different numbers to track results across channels as well, providing insight into whether you get better results from PPC, direct mail or email campaigns. With call tracking, you know right away where to increase your investment and where to cut your losses or try a different approach. When it comes time for budgeting, you know your marketing efforts have been effective, and you can point to real results.
Identify Sales Trends Early
Using call tracking, you have access to detailed metrics that provide insight into hot products. If you notice an increase in sales of a particular item, you can take steps to replenish supplies well before you experience stock outs that disappoint your customers. Just in time delivery of inventory is easier when you know what’s selling even before it ships. Stock outs mean lost revenue, so anything you can do to prevent stock outs without increasing on hand inventory helps increase revenue and profit margins.
Increase Sales with Improved Targeting
Most companies have a good idea about who their customers are, but call tracking provides even more insight. Not only can you easily identify regions or areas where the product is selling well, you can also increase additional demographic insight such as the age or gender of your customers. By refining your target personas, you can improve the results of your marketing quickly, creating campaigns that bring in revenue. The improved insight helps you target your sales messaging and processes better, and it might even influence future product direction.
Improve Customer Service and Satisfaction
With access to call tracking analytics, you can monitor the questions or issues that customers have. The resulting information could help you create a truly helpful FAQ page, or you might use it to update product features or instruction manuals. For example, if you find that many customers have the same question about using the product, you might want to add the information to your support knowledge base so your CSRs can readily answer the question, or you might look at simplifying the installation process. If customers frequently ask “How do I…?” and you don’t have that feature, that’s a good indication of a customer need that should become part of your future product road map. Whatever the reason for the customer to pick up the phone, every call is an opportunity to gain real insight into your customer’s needs.
In addition, monitoring and tracking calls helps you to understand where your call center team needs more training. Are they able to quickly and correctly answer product questions? If not, training is in order. If they can’t answer questions about lead time, easily track a shipment or defuse an irate customer situation, you need to invest in training. The insight you receive from call tracking is like a treasure map, helping you find your way to better customer service and satisfaction.
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