Digital Marketing Resources Archives – Rocks Digital https://www.rocksdigital.com/category/digital-marketing-resources/ We ROCK Digital Marketing Wed, 27 Mar 2024 16:11:25 +0000 en-US hourly 1 https://wordpress.org/?v=6.4.3 https://www.rocksdigital.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/09/Fav-icon-150x150.png Digital Marketing Resources Archives – Rocks Digital https://www.rocksdigital.com/category/digital-marketing-resources/ 32 32 How to Complete the WordPress Yoast SEO Plugin https://www.rocksdigital.com/how-to-use-the-wordpress-yoast-seo-plugin/ https://www.rocksdigital.com/how-to-use-the-wordpress-yoast-seo-plugin/#comments Fri, 27 Jan 2023 14:30:03 +0000 http://rocksdigital.com/?p=6173 One important plugin to have on your website is the WordPress Yoast SEO Plugin. This plugin will help you to easily SEO-optimize the content you are publishing for posts and pages. It also has settings included to select the title, description and image that appears when you or others are sharing the post or page […]

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Complete the WordPress Yoast SEO Plugin
One important plugin to have on your website is the WordPress Yoast SEO Plugin. This plugin will help you to easily SEO-optimize the content you are publishing for posts and pages. It also has settings included to select the title, description and image that appears when you or others are sharing the post or page on the various social networking sites.

How to Complete the SEO Tab in the WordPress SEO by Yoast Plugin

WordPress SEO by Yoast Focus Keyword

Focus Keyword

  • Look at your post title as well as the content and determine your Focus Keyword or Keyword Phrase.
  • Enter this phrase into the Keyphrase area in the SEO tab.
  • Under the Meta description you will see SEO Analysis. (This bulleted list will tell you if you have used your keyword or phrase in all the right places for optimal SEO. If one of these says “No,” I’d suggest you go back to that area and see if you can find a creative way to add in your Focus Keyword.)

Wordpress SEO by Yoast SEO Title
SEO Title

  • Copy and paste the title of your page or post in this blank.
  • After entering your title, if the green bar under this blank turns red you’ll need to shorten your title until the warning goes away. (This title appears in search engines, and if your title is too long it will be cut off in the display.)
  • When shortening your title, make sure the Focus Keyword is still included within the title.

WordPress SEO by Yoast Meta Description

Meta Description

  • This is a brief description of your post or page that is displayed in search engines. Make sure it will compel the reader to click the link.
  • The Meta description must be no more than 156 characters and contain the Focus Keyword.
  • To complete this Meta description you can often take the first sentence or two from your post or page and shorten it up. (And if you choose, you can write a totally different meta description.)

Once you have filled in the Yoast plugin SEO tab and clicked “save draft,” it will then give you an SEO score – as well as list out the places where your post or page needs work to improve your score. Follow the basic steps outlined here and you’ll be on your way to increasing the SEO ranking of your posts/pages. The preview of your page/post information that users will see in a search will look something like this.

Desktop Result
Desktop result of Google preview for WordPress Yoast SEO Plugin
Mobile Result
Mobile result of Google preview for WordPress Yoast SEO Plugin

Completing the Social Tab Within the WordPress SEO Yoast Plugin

Once you have completed the SEO tab, you can now use most of that information to complete the Social tab.
Facebook title for Social tab in WordPress

Post / Page Title

  • Copy and paste the title from the SEO tab into the Social tab in the blank for the Facebook title. We usually add the website or company name after the title. (Example: How to Complete the Yoast SEO Plugin | Rocks Digital)
  • Copy and paste the title and information you listed in the Facebook area above into the Twitter title.
  • For the Twitter title, change the company name to your Twitter handle (example: How to Complete the Yoast SEO Plugin via @RocksDigital). When someone shares your post from the share plugin, it will link to your Twitter account automatically.

WordPress SEO by Yoast Facebook Description
Post / Page Description 

  • Click back to the SEO tab and copy the Meta description information, then click on the Social tab and paste that description into the Facebook description box.
  • Copy and paste the description you listed in the Facebook area above into the Twitter description.

WordPress SEO by Yoast Facebook Featured Image
Featured Image 

  • In filling out the Social tab within the Yoast SEO Plugin there’s one last step – select the featured image you would like to be displayed when you (or someone else) share the post or page on social media.
  • Usually you’d select the image you added to the post or page as your featured image, but it can certainly be a different image. You have total control over selecting the image that is displayed.

Working through completing the Yoast SEO Plugin can be challenging and time-consuming at first, but it’s worth every bit of effort involved.

This plugin helps you ensure that each post and page is optimized for search. When done correctly, it will help increase your ranking on Google and other search engines.


#HowTo Complete the #WordPress Yoast SEO Plugin by @LissaDuty #RocksDigital
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Writing great content is just one part of the process. The next part is making it easy for others to find it through search and then share it.

Read more about the WordPress Plugins we recommend.

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Free Business Online Presence Assessment Worksheet https://www.rocksdigital.com/free-business-online-presence-assessment-worksheet/ Sat, 22 Jan 2022 17:18:06 +0000 https://www.rocksdigital.com/?p=30337 Start Evaluating Your Business’ Online Presence Today Have you evaluated your business’ online presence lately, or ever? Your business’ online presence includes your website, social media accounts, local SEO, your Google Business Profile (GBP) and your online reputation. Evaluating each of these items may feel overwhelming, but Rocks Digital – in partnership with Reputation Sensei […]

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Free Business Online Presence Assessment Worksheet

Start Evaluating Your Business’ Online Presence Today

Have you evaluated your business’ online presence lately, or ever? Your business’ online presence includes your website, social media accounts, local SEO, your Google Business Profile (GBP) and your online reputation. Evaluating each of these items may feel overwhelming, but Rocks Digital – in partnership with Reputation Sensei – has created an online presence self assessment worksheet to make it easy to complete this evaluation.

Things are always changing in business, that’s just a fact, and it’s important to make sure your online presence is keeping up. This includes regularly making sure that your business’ address, hours and business days are accurate and up-to-date. Your website and social media pages must look fresh and be optimized. Taking these actions is necessary to compete, and will ensure that your business’ local SEO efforts deliver the results you want.

Get Started Accessing Your Business’ Online Presence

Having an optimized online presence is essential for a successful business. Our free online presence self assessment will walk you through each aspect of your online presence, including the following.

  • Website
  • Google Business Profile
  • Rating the business’ online reputation
  • Social media presence
  • Local SEO footprint

Once you complete the self assessment you will learn which areas are doing well – and discover the areas that require optimization and changes.

If your online presence self assessment reveals that your website is not optimized, that means it’s probably the right time to revamp your website.

You may also determine that you need to work on your Google Business Profile, increase your local SEO footprint and so on.

In brief, if you don’t know it’s broken you can’t fix it. Download our worksheet today to get started. Once you complete the form, you’ll be directed to a thank you page to access your download.

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Does the thought of completing this online presence self assessment seem daunting? You can request a digital marketing evaluation online, or by calling us at (214) 989-7549.

 

We are pleased to partner with Reputation Sensei to bring you this insightful online presence self assessment. If you are in the market for a reputation management solution, Reputation Sensei is there for you.

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What You Need to Know About SEO Guide https://www.rocksdigital.com/free-seo-guide-download/ Thu, 29 Oct 2020 05:33:06 +0000 https://dev.rocksdigital.com/?p=21828 If you’re getting traffic to your business’ website, does it really matter if your search engine optimization strategies are not up to par? You bet it does. Just imagine how much more business you would be getting if you were sending all the right signals to Google. Google’s algorithms are smart and get smarter every […]

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If you’re getting traffic to your business’ website, does it really matter if your search engine optimization strategies are not up to par? You bet it does. Just imagine how much more business you would be getting if you were sending all the right signals to Google.

Google’s algorithms are smart and get smarter every day, so they can understand what your website is about at a high level. However, you want them to know about your business in-depth, and about your products and/or services. And if you are a brick-and-mortar or service area business, they need to understand your business at the local level too. This is where SEO comes in.

Search Engine Optimization Matters

SEO does matter for your business website, and when businesses don’t make it a priority, in today’s digital world that is negligence. At Rocks Digital, we know all about SEO. From on-page SEO to technical SEO and off-page optimizations, each component needs special consideration.

In our free SEO guide, you’ll:

  • Learn all about what SEO is and why it matters
  • Dig into how search engines work, along with rankings and page quality
  • Explore how to lay an SEO foundation
  • Find out how to get started

We even share tips on deciding whom to hire to help with your website, plus some must-use tools. Our guide includes a handy checklist and a glossary, too, so you’ll understand every term that is used.

SEO doesn’t have to be a mystery. Download our free guide today.

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Shout out to Advice Local for partnering with us on this comprehensive SEO guide. If you are a digital marketing agency looking for a listing management partner, Advice Local is the way to go.

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Looking to Boost ROI? Here’s How to Use Google Analytics for A/B Split Testing https://www.rocksdigital.com/roi-a-b-split-testing/ https://www.rocksdigital.com/roi-a-b-split-testing/#comments Mon, 13 Nov 2017 15:29:48 +0000 https://www.rocksdigital.com/?p=15900 Before we dive into A/B split testing, remember my last Rocks Digital article? I discussed how to get more ROI from your social media marketing through the use of UTM codes and Google Analytics. Wow! The response to that article was amazing! Thanks for reading! But now we’re going to dig a little deeper into […]

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Looking to boost ROI? Here's how to use Google analytics for A/B split testing

Before we dive into A/B split testing, remember my last Rocks Digital article? I discussed how to get more ROI from your social media marketing through the use of UTM codes and Google Analytics.

Wow! The response to that article was amazing! Thanks for reading! But now we’re going to dig a little deeper into one part of that article that I didn’t touch a whole lot on: split testing to get even better results.

I’ve talked before about A/B split testing ads, and that’s something we should be learning how to do now – and then do it – after our campaign ends (or during, if you’re a pro like that), to gather intel on who bought from us, what they liked and didn’t, and who we should probably be marketing to more often to increase our sales even further.

Let’s Do the Splits – A/B Split Testing

Remember, from my UTM tracking article, when I mentioned in our goals process that we chose Product Page X? In this article, we’re going to talk about how to split test that product page with a totally different page, to find out what our audience not only likes more, but will buy from more often. This is called “split testing” or “AB testing,” or sometimes also “A/B split testing” – but it’s all the same thing.

Now, in that last article, I didn’t discuss testing the product pages or the ads against each other during the campaign, but you should absolutely do that. From my experience, any good campaign lasts a few months, and the amount of data that you can collect from that timeframe is golden stuff. While you are tracking your campaigns you should also be willing to make some changes as well, and create lots of test ads and a few product pages.

To that end, I’m going to tell you to get ready to create 3 different product pages for the same product. Why would you want to have the same product on 3 pages? Simple. People like different things, and you may not really be in tune with what your audience wants to see or read or experience, and that is why we are going to split test 3 landing pages!

First of all, creating a good landing page isn’t exactly super-easy, however, it’s not rocket science either. One of the first things you should do before creating anything for your product ads is to create the 3 product pages (on the flip-side, you could create just 2). So for now, check out some of your competitors’ landing pages – and landing pages that have converted YOU – and find what was most appealing. If it worked on you, it may work on your customers, too.

Designing Moments

Once you’ve narrowed down what you want to try out from different websites and landing pages, talk to your graphic designer and have him/her create a few mock-up designs based on your branding, your product or service – and, of course, your target audience – using those elements you chose from the other pages you saw. Once you have 3 distinct winners, take the mock-ups to your web designer or admin and have them create the pages, unlisted, on your site. You don’t want them showing up in the menus because we need to test them, and unwanted traffic will just mess up our data.

To give a very quick example, here are 2 versions of a web page on my website: one is the original, and the second is the improved version of that same social media marketing services page.

A/B Split Testing - Social Media Landing Pages

Before Optimization

A/B Split Testing - Social Media Marketing Services Landing Pages

After Optimization

Now, just based on these images, which do you think converts better? I bet you guessed it: The newer one does a lot better.

This is what we want to know when we are creating your landing pages and then, your ads. We create the 3 different pages using knowledge about our target, and research on what helps people convert on a landing page – then we use our ads to figure out what kind of ads work on our target. (Or create 2 different landing pages, making the test smaller.)

All the Testing and Reporting

The best way to test a LANDING page is to, of course, direct traffic to this page or pages. Knowing your target, you should be able to place these links in places you know they’ll probably (most likely) click on them, such as Facebook or on LinkedIn. Since those two platforms have different audiences, it might be good to use two different landing pages, and then switch the links at a specified date to determine which platform liked which page better.

You determine this, of course, by conversions – but also by going back to our handy, dandy Google Analytics report!

By looking at our Acquisition > All Traffic > Social > Landing Pages report, you can see which networks brought you the best kind of traffic. The active, engaged kind. Not the bouncy, short-lived kind.

A/B Split Testing - Acquisition All Traffic Social Landing Pages

These are the landing pages that people have clicked through to on your website from Social networks. If you add a secondary dimension, by clicking on the “Secondary Dimension” button, type “Social network” into the text box and select the first option, you’ll see it adds a column listing which social media networking was responsible for what pieces of traffic to each landing page.

A/B Split Testing - Social Network Acquisition All Traffic Social Landing Pages

 

A/B Split Testing - Acquisition All Traffic Social Landing Pages Secondary Dimension Social Network

Now we just need to see how they interacted with our landing pages. Click on the URL of one of your landing pages for this campaign and it will show you another report on which social media platforms sent traffic to that page, and how well that traffic acted on your site.

A/B Split Testing - Acquisition All Traffic Social Landing Pages Secondary Dimension Social Network Landing Page

While we can’t see the fun information on this report, like bounce rate, we CAN see average session duration and pages per session. These are still pretty valuable numbers, because if you have a high session average, then people are probably not bouncing away. If you have a higher pages per session, people are also probably not bouncing away. You can also double-check this by checking the All Traffic > Channels > Social report. And voila! You can see bounce rate, new users, and even conversion data.

Acquisition-All- Traffic-Channels- Social

 

Segmenting Your Data in A/B Split Testing

Now this won’t be directly for the traffic for your landing pages, so let’s create a segment, to make this easier.

At the top of the page, click “+Add Segment” then click “New Segment.” Now click on “conditions” on the left-hand side of the menu. Here, you’ll start adding filters for your traffic to tell Google that you want to see traffic information for just the traffic that matches the parameters you are setting.

A/B Split Testing - Adding segments

 

A/B Split Testing - Setting Up a New Segment

In the first box, change “ad content” to “source.” You can type “source” into the white box at the top of the menu that opens. We’ll leave “contains” as it is. Now begin typing in a name of a social media platform. “Facebook” is my first one.

A/B Split Testing - Ad content box

 

A/B Split Testing - Contains Facebook

Now click “OR,” and another filter box appears, and we’ll change the settings to this one to say “source” “contains” “twitter.” And click “OR” again. Fill in more filters until you have listed all of the social media platforms you are using to promote your landing pages.

A/B Split Testing - Or contains twitter or contains

Once you have finished this, click “Add filter.” You’ll want the boxes to say something different this time, so the first box should say “Landing Page” and the second box should say “Exactly Matches.” In the text box, type in the URL to your first landing page. Click “OR” and add the second (or third) URL for the next landing page (mine are pretend landing page URLs).

A/B Split Testing - Landing Pages Exactly Matches

When you’re finished, be sure you’ve named the Segment at the top of the page, next to the blue save button, and then click “save.”

This will take you to a report comparing the traffic we just segmented to “All traffic.” Click on the arrow next to “All traffic” at the top of the page and click “remove” to remove that segment data and clean it up, so you can read the segment we just created.

A/B Split Testing - Landing Pages Traffic

As you can see, this information gives us the data from the landing pages we included in the segment, and breaks it down for us by social media platform. Wonderful stuff.

Now just add a secondary dimension for landing pages, and you can now see which landing page goes with what social network. And since the segment is saved, you can use this report anytime that you want/need!

A/B Split Testing - Segmented-Secondary Dimension Landing Page

 

A/B Split Testing - Segmented-Secondary Dimension Landing Page Report

 

Master Testing and Tracking via A/B Split Testing

Of course, some of this information is similar to when you run social media ads, but I definitely recommend using the UTM tracking method I mentioned in my UTM article for simple reporting.

Now that you have information flowing in about your landing pages, you’ll be able to figure out which pages convert better, and then you can start creating similar pages to further test the copy, the images, the layout, etc. This is what A/B split testing is all about. Testing. Every. Thing. All The Things.


Give ROI a Boost! Use #Google Analytics for A/B Split Testing by @R3SocialMedia #RocksDigital
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Will you now refine your A/B split testing? Has this article clarified the process? Let’s hear your thoughts in the comments!

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Getting Started: How to Track Social Media ROI with Google Analytics and UTM Tracking Codes https://www.rocksdigital.com/google-analytics-utm-tracking/ https://www.rocksdigital.com/google-analytics-utm-tracking/#comments Tue, 05 Sep 2017 15:14:39 +0000 https://www.rocksdigital.com/?p=15447 When most companies start thinking of their digital marketing, they immediately turn to social media – as opposed to Google Analytics. Many now know how much time and effort it takes, along with the amount of money it takes to make a campaign, but everyone doesn’t know how to make it all work together. However, Google […]

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How to track social media ROI with Google analytics and UTM tracking codes

When most companies start thinking of their digital marketing, they immediately turn to social media – as opposed to Google Analytics. Many now know how much time and effort it takes, along with the amount of money it takes to make a campaign, but everyone doesn’t know how to make it all work together. However, Google Analytics can be a cohesive and powerful tool to make this happen.

In this article, I’m going to discuss how to tie all of your social media platforms into one seamless campaign using Google Analytics to track the results, so that you get the biggest “bang for your buck.”

Before Getting Started with Google Analytics You Have to Set Your Goals

First things first, you need to know the end-game. What is the purpose? What are you trying to achieve? Is it more sales? Is it a larger audience? A different audience? Plan out some time and make sure you know what you are going to be working for! Many times for a small business (or really, any business) the goal will be to increase sales, so that’s what I will focus on in this article. Just be intentional. Write down the goal.

Plan Out the Attack

Next, we need to plan out the attack. Part of this will include figuring out what happens on what platform, and even what platforms you’ll be using. It’s not much different than planning a 5-year business plan; small bites. Work backwards here. If our goal is more sales, what do we need in order to do that? What has to happen before we reach that goal? People have to pay for our service/product. Look at it this way:

Item 1 > Item 2 > Item 3 > Item 4 > GOAL: Increase sales.

In this line, we are looking for Item 4. So let’s say Item 4 is “People are buying our product.” Let’s make that note.

Item 1 > Item 2 > Item 3 > People Buy Product > GOAL: Increase sales.

Alright. Now, again, working backwards, let’s figure out what we need to do for people to be buying our product. It’s probably already listed on the website and the website is already configured for sales. Great. So we need to be sending people to the website. But what page? What product are you selling or attempting to get more sales on? Some of this may seem like a lot of kindergarten stuff, but I promise, getting a good outline and plan of attack will help in the long run, especially if you have people like me helping make it happen for you. One document or photo will help keep everyone on the same page and moving along.

So, Item 3 should be “Send more traffic to product page X.” Easy enough.

Item 1 > Item 2 > Send More Traffic to Product Page X > People Buy Product > GOAL: Increase sales.

Now how do we move people to that page? This is where a simple answer that we’ll break down later will get us going. The answer in our example will be “Push product X page on social media.” Now, we’re not going to worry about the How right now, just the plan. We’ll get into the How later.

Item 1 > Push Product X Page on Social Media > Send More Traffic to Product Page X > People Buy Product > GOAL: Increase sales.

And finally, Item 1: What needs to happen before pushing the page on social? What do we need? Answer: A manager or point-person for our social media! As the owner, you may do this yourself, or you may choose a salesperson, since they know the product intimately. Just make sure this person has the time available to do what needs to be done, and knows how to do it.

Delegate Social Media to Person A > Push Product X Page on Social Media > Send More Traffic to Product Page X > People Buy Product > GOAL: Increase sales.

Add the Details

Now that we have a plan, we need to go back and detail each item so we know who does what, and what exactly that each item entails. This is where the How comes in.

Delegate Delegate Social Media to Person A > Push Product X Page on Social Media > Send More Traffic to Product Page X > People Buy Product > GOAL: Increase sales.

Delegating the social media or taking it on yourself also means figuring out who has the usernames and passwords. Who has the access you need? Which pages or accounts are you going to be using? Based on the most recent research, the largest chunk of each daily audience is as follows:

Pew-Research

Image credit: Pew Research Center

Knowing this helps when you plan out where to spend your time and money. Please visit the research link provided above for the additional data, you’ll need to plan out your campaign. You also need to take into account what age groups are using each, to determine if that is indeed where your target audience lies. It’s nearly a year old so we are all eagerly awaiting the new research, but until then, this report does help us.

Each Item Has Its Own Tasks

So, you see how Item one (where we delegated platforms) worked. Item 2, Push Traffic to Product X Page, will also have its own tasks. Now we know what platforms, but how are we going to push our link to those pages properly? What etiquette is appropriate for each platform and each audience on that platform? We can’t come off as spammy or else people will simply ignore our messages.

So now you have a little homework to do, unless you know your audience so well that you can answer these questions already:

  1. Does my audience like daily, weekly, bi-weekly, or monthly reminders?
  2. Do they prefer links, photos, videos, or text posts – or a combo?
  3. How often is too often to post on this platform?
  4. Do my customers leave frequent reviews I can use to push the product?
  5. Can I use a contest or some other creative motivation to get people to buy the product?

Answering these questions can get you started. Be sure to keep each platform’s general etiquette in mind. This is easier if you’ve been a user, so delve in and use the platform yourself on a personal account so you can be more in-tune with your audience and the platform. Once you’re able to post your link on the platform without being a spambot, people will start to listen and click your link.

Note: I’m not discussing ads in this post, but that’s another possibility to push out your product on the different platforms. You can refer to my other posts for more information about Facebook ads.

Google Analytics – Analytics Everywhere!

Item 3, Send More Traffic to Product Page X, is easy enough. We’ll need to set up UTM links for our campaign, and then we just need to be able to peek through our analytics for our website.

When creating a UTM, or Urchin Tracking Module, we want to probably use the same link, but attach different platforms to it, so we will be able to differentiate the traffic later, which we’ll discuss. But they are easy to create, and Google gives us a tool to make it super-easy.

google-analytics- builder

Screen capture: Roxanne Roark

You’ll add the URL to the product page, since that’s where we are sending people in the first box, asking for the Website URL. Campaign Source will be the platform, such as Facebook (or you can use an abbreviation like FB, just make sure you’ll know what it stands for). Though it doesn’t require it, you’ll also need a Campaign Medium. This is to represent the traffic, such as is it coming from an email? From a banner ad? In the image below I’ve put in social. The last bit that Google wants (or perhaps needs) is going to be the Campaign Name.

google-analytics-campaign-builder-1

Screen capture: Roxanne Roark

I named it fall sale. It can be whatever you want, but in order to present our information correctly, it needs these three pieces filled out. Once you are done, you’ll see the URL in the bottom box and you can click “Copy URL” from there to paste it into your social media! Create a different UTM for each platform, and you’ll be able to find out which platform is making you the most money when we look at the data.

Diving into the Google Analytics Data

To find the data we’ll be collecting on our website, most people do this through Google Analytics. Setting up a goal to find out that our traffic from social media is sending traffic to the right page AS WELL AS converting them into customers is pretty simple. We’re going to focus on someone going from our social media to the product page then buying something.

The easiest way to do this is build a URL we can track, set up the goal for a destination page (because we know what page our customers will end up on after going through a purchase), then go into a report to see what platforms they came from.

In your Google Analytics, go to the “Admin” tab on the left-hand side of the page. Select the correct Account, Property, and View for your website. Under the “View” column, click on “Goals.” Click the red “+ New Goal” button to get started.

google-analytics-new-goal

Screen capture: Roxanne Roark

You’ll see the various templates, but just select “Custom.”

google-analytics-custom-goal

Screen capture: Roxanne Roark

Then select “Continue.” The next “page” will let you name your goal. Be sure it’s easy. Then we will select “Destination.”

google-analytics-goal-description

Screen capture: Roxanne Roark

Google states: “Use destination goals to treat a pageview or screenview as a conversion. Enter the screen name or page URL in the Destination field. Specify the match type as Equals to, Begins with, or Regular expression.” For our purposes, use “Equals to” and type the URL for your confirmation or Thank you page after a purchase has been completed. In the image below you’ll see “/thanks.html” representing the confirmation page URL.

google-analytics-goal-details

Screen capture: Roxanne Roark

Also in this image, you’ll see that I’ve added a pretend Value of $20.00 because I’m imagining we’re selling a $20.00 item. Add the correct value for your item in this box, and Google can help you track how much money in sales you’ve racked up based on this goal, per platform.

Track the Attack with Google Analytics

Using Google Analytics and by looking at the campaigns report, we can also find out if we’re reaching Items 3, 4, and 5.

Delegate Social Media to Person A > Push Product X Page on Social Media > Send More Traffic to Product Page X > People Buy Product > GOAL: Increase sales.

Now since I haven’t actually created this goal, I won’t have any photos of this. But this article does have some good advice about this topic and also shows you what it will look like. I’ll show you how to get there.

In your Google Analytics, you’ll click on “Acquisition” on the left-hand side, then “Campaigns,” and next “All Campaigns.”

google-analytics-report

Screen capture: Roxanne Roark

Here you’ll see your campaign tracking! But breaking it down further, we can get the information by platform by doing one of two things: clicking the “Secondary dimension” and choosing “Social > Social Network,” or by simply clicking the “Source” primary dimension on the top of the columns.

google-analytics-UTM

Screen capture: Roxanne Roark

Now you’ll see the campaign broken down by platform. But I would use “Source” rather than the “Secondary dimension” until you’ve created multiple campaigns (with different names).

But either way, in this report, you’ll be able to see the goal conversion rate (how well the traffic converted) and the goal value, which is the total value of the goals accomplished via traffic from that particular platform (i.e., how much money those platforms earned based on your efforts).

google-analytics-goal-value

Screen capture: Roxanne Roark

Testing All the Things

Finally, after you’ve run a few of these types of campaigns, you’ll be able to look at all of the data and figure out if you’re reaching your goals, since Google Analytics makes it pretty easy for us to check that out! Testing other products or services, pages, images, etc. and platforms will help you find out if this kind of marketing is helping you. And if you plan ahead, you’ll be able to move seamlessly through your campaign and make sure that all of your social media marketing is well thought-out, which is crucial for any campaign.


Tracking #DigitalMarketing ROI w/ #Google Analytics and UTM Codes by @r3socialmedia #RocksDigital
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Did you learn something new about Google Analytics and tracking ROI? What’s your next step? Jump in and share your thoughts in the comments below!

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Needing a Free CRM? A Helpful How-To on Using Streak’s CRM Integration with Gmail https://www.rocksdigital.com/how-to-using-streak-gmail-crm/ Tue, 25 Jul 2017 09:00:28 +0000 https://www.rocksdigital.com/?p=14966 One of the challenges of being a business owner/entrepreneur is finding tools that work and that won’t break the budget, and that includes tools for CRM. Once in a while you actually find a free version of something that works well for your current needs and when you do, you might move into the premium […]

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Streak CRM
Alexander Supertramp/shutterstock.com

One of the challenges of being a business owner/entrepreneur is finding tools that work and that won’t break the budget, and that includes tools for CRM. Once in a while you actually find a free version of something that works well for your current needs and when you do, you might move into the premium version.

Right now, my favorite tool in that vein is Streak (relax – this does not involve sitting in your office sans clothing!). Streak bills itself as a CRM for Gmail. It works with Gmail accounts, both regular Gmail and the G Suite.

The Benefits of Streak for CRM with Gmail

There are several uses for Streak, so I thought I’d share a few of my favorites.

The schedule feature comes in really handy for night owls like myself who don’t necessarily want people to know we were awake writing blog posts (*ahem*) emails in the wee hours of the morning (it’s a boundaries thing).

Streak 15

 

And the tracking isn’t just your standard read receipt, it tells you each time it is opened. This can be handy to know for follow-up conversations because it can give you a sense of how fresh your communication is in the mind of the client.

CRM Lead Tracking with Streak

One of the primary features is that it allows you to track leads:

Streak 1

 

Just open up a new Sales/CRM option, or use the Business Development option.

Then put your emails into the pipelines:

Streak 2

And you end up with something like this:

Streak 7

You can change the colors of the different stages, add new stages, and delete stages. Plus you can see when the last email was within a particular project from the pipeline view.

On the sidebar within an email you can see a number of key pieces of information:

  • The stage
  • The size of the deal
  • When the deal should close/did close
  • The source of the lead
  • Any contacts associated with the lead
  • Notes section

Streak Has You Covered on Collaborative Projects as Well

Collaborative Projects? Streak’s Got You Covered

But what if you don’t track clients/leads? No worries, there are other uses for Streak. You can use it to track projects, especially projects in collaboration with others where you may be waiting on elements from other people. Streak makes it easy to see where things are so that email doesn’t get buried and you don’t have important things fall through the cracks.

Streak 13

And I like that I can color code things, so I know that (in the example above) if something is in yellow or orange, it means I need to check up on it once in a while. Invaluable if you have a lot of projects going at once (or multiple clients) and you need to keep track of multiple projects.

CRM Helpdesk Queue? Streak Can Do That

Another possible use for Streak is to make a helpdesk type queue out of it:

Streak 14

 

So, if you’re a support person of some type (customer service or maybe tech support), you can sort the emails you receive into different categories to make sure that you don’t forget to find out why the sprocket didn’t get to Boise, or to track sending Bob the new cup holder for his computer. (Please tell me that there’s a tech support person out there who laughed at that!)

Bloggers Take Note: Streak Can Help Track Writing

And finally (for this post anyway) if you are, perhaps, a blogger, you can use it to track your writing:

Streak Capture

 

This can come in really handy if you have several blogs or guest-blog a lot. It can also help you to track inquiries for guest blogging gigs.

Streak Tiers and Costs

As I mentioned, there is a premium version, and if I had to cite one downside to Streak it’s the pricing for premium features. It’s around $40/month per user for the first paid tier and around $80 per month per user for the Enterprise version. I’d really like to see them have another tier with a price point of around $10 per month to keep it affordable but practical for the small business/solopreneur power-user.

Fortunately, the free functionality has worked well for me, and I do recommend Streak if you need more organization in your email.


How-To on @Streak #CRM from #Gmail by @LauraDarkstar #RocksDigital
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Have you tried Streak for your business? Share your thoughts on this CRM tool with us.

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