Solutions for Your Resolutions: Call Attribution and Click to Call

New Year, new you. With 2018 in full force, everyone has a fresh wave of motivation to finally conquer those lingering resolutions they've always talked about. For example, one of the top resolutions for 2018 is to lose weight. What's on your list? Whatever it may be, now is the time to begin working toward achieving both personal and professional goals.

Now is the time to evaluate your company top-down and compile resolutions to complete by 2019. Whether you want to enhance customer service, invest more in data analytics to keep up with the competition or increase your bottom line to meet demands from corporate management, implementing an action plan starts now.

Not sure where to start? Ask yourself the following questions and check out some of our tips!

Which Campaigns Are Working?

Picture this: It's January 1, 2019. Your image in the mirror scares (and delights) you because you look like your fitness idol. You actually did it! You persisted in pursuing your resolution to be in better shape. The only problem is you can't remember any of the last 12 months. What have you been doing that actually worked? How are you supposed to know what to keep doing for next year to continue this progress?

Much like this scenario, good campaigns don't work unless you know what makes them successful. It's crucial to know whether it was the billboard ads you used all around town or simply the pens with unique toll-free numbers (TFNs) that produced an influx of calls and ultimately spiked your ROI. Being able to pinpoint which advertising efforts convert to hot leads will not only help you delegate your department's budget, but it will also send you in the right direction to find more where that came from.

How Are Your Prospects Reaching You?

Imagine you walk to the produce section of your local grocery store but immediately feel the need to take a step back when you see the impossibly large amount of people with carts lining the walls. It's a blur: someone trying to get the last bag of kale, attendants taking too long to restock the bananas. You question your healthy-eating resolution remembering that no one was on the macaroni and cheese aisle when you passed it. As you contemplate leaving, you realize this would be the third year in a row you gave up. You decide to wait a few minutes for it to clear out but eventually become too impatient. Oh well, maybe 2019 will be your year. Cheesecake for dinner, it is!

Your customers feel the same way when they visit your website and can't find a simple way to call you. More than half of mobile users said that not having an easy call option on a website would make them more likely to turn to another brand while becoming frustrated with your brand. Make it easy for your customers to connect with clickable numbers and secure your leads more frequently.

How Can You Use Data to Enhance Marketing Performance?

It's May. As swimsuit season is now here, you realize it's probably too late to pick back up with your forgotten resolutions to achieve a healthy physique, but you decide to do it anyway. Arriving back at the house due to some agonizing side pains after that strenuous run, you look at your smartwatch realizing you've only burned 15 calories... yikes. Time to get back out there! Thank goodness you had on wearable technology to track your progress throughout your run, or you would be back inside binge-watching Netflix.

Now it's time to use that type of granular data to get your business back in shape. Forbes predicts that 2018 will be a year full of technological advancements — one of the main topics of interest is different types of data collection. With only 28 percent of respondents confident that their company is able to measure marketing performance effectively, change is inevitable. If you don't leverage your data smartly in 2018, your organization might not have any resolutions in 2019. You can't make any business resolutions when your business doesn't exist!

Looking for more ways to improve in 2018? Check out these four marketing resolutions.

Lead Management: A Recipe for Success

The Halloween decorations have been put away. You’re starting to hear Christmas music playing on
the radio and in department stores. But wait a minute…what about Thanksgiving? That fantastic time of year when the air is crisp, the leaves are wonderful shades of orange and yellow, and there’s just one thing on everyone’s mind: lead management.

Wait, what?

Yep, you read that correctly. We know you thought we were going to say turkey, but lead management and cooking Thanksgiving dinner actually have a lot in common. Don’t believe us? Keep reading.

You Need Top Quality Ingredients to be Successful

You know the saying “You get out of things what you put into them”? Well that couldn’t ring more true for both making Thanksgiving dinner and lead management. If you put good stuff in (See what we did there? Stuff in…stuffin', as in turkey and stuffing), you’ll get good stuff out.

Cooking Best Practice: Unless you want to upset Aunt Bea and Uncle Joe, don’t sacrifice the quality of your ingredients for the sake of price or convenience. For instance don’t ruin the sweet potatoes by buying the ones in the can. Sure the fresh ones are more labor intensive, but when you put that delectable spoonful in your mouth, your efforts will be totally worth it.

Lead Management Best Practice: To successfully grow your business you need to know more than just the source of your phone calls. You need a lead management solution provider that offers options such as tracking campaign effectiveness, call recording and online lead tracking.

Preparation is Key

Anything worth doing is worth doing well. And if you want to do something well, you have to prepare properly. Whether it’s cooking a turkey or managing leads, you can’t just jump in blindly. Bad, bad things will happen if you do.

Cooking Best Practice:  Give the turkey enough time to thaw. Check. Remove the giblets. Check. Season the bird on the outside and the inside. Check. Set the oven to the correct temperature. Check. Forget any of these steps and it could spell embarrassment when it’s time to carve. Follow these prep steps and you’ll end up with some succulent, food-coma-inducing poultry (tryptophan is no joke!).

Lead Management Best Practice: Who answers your phones and processes your leads? That’s right, your staff. So obviously they should be prepared. If they’re not, they could end up losing leads. 78 percent of potential customers will take their business elsewhere due to poor customer service. Proper training can mean the difference between closing a deal and losing a customer to another dealership.

The Devil Is in the Details

Details. They are so important, yet no one likes to talk about them. Forgetting the details can lead to an epic fail. Remembering them can equal pure awesomeness.

Cooking Best Practice: You put the turkey in the oven. Did you remember that you have to baste it often? You remembered to make everyone’s favorite pumpkin pie, but did you set the timer? And most importantly, did you remember to get the cranberry sauce? See…it’s all in the details.

Lead Management Best Practice: Having the best trained sales reps and the best lead management tracking tools means nothing if you don’t know how they’re all performing. Use an ROI reporting tool to figure out if your advertising campaigns are working. Filter and monitor your staff’s calls to know how they are responding to leads.

What's your recipe for success? Let us know in the comments!