Surely I Can’t Be The Only One…
August 14, 2008 on 11:56 am
Filed Under:Web
In my time in this industry here in Perth, I’ve noticed a disturbing trend. While I’m not naive enough to believe that it’s a new one, I’m still bothered by it.
I keep hearing from business owners, current and prospective clients mostly, that they are almost completely unaware of what kind of revenue their Web Marketing investments are bringing them.
This is not their fault.
Well, not completely anyway.
Again, maybe it’s just me being naive, but shouldn’t telling your client how you’re doing be just another part of the services you provide?
We work in an intimidating industry. Not as intimidating as Wall Street Brokeraging or Contract Killing, but what I mean is that most folks don’t understand 90% of what web professionals do, and the other 10% only know because they’ve either been burnt by a firm and wanted to learn for themselves or they used to actually work in the industry too.
As Web Professionals (web designers, web developers, web marketers) we swoop in and do things that the client doesn’t really understand nor have the time to learn and do themselves, and many have been using that to hide their actual level of service from the client.
Think about it, why is it the client’s responsibility to find out how well YOU are doing for THEM?
In another industry, well let’s take Stocks for example, your broker has to keep you up on how they’re doing for you, and they better be doing it well or you’ll dump them and find another one.
This industry should be no different.
As a Web Marketing Professional, I choose to not only give my clients all the information they ask for and make myself completely transparent to them, but I also suggest to them metrics and benchmarks that they might not have thought of and tell them they should measure me against those as well.
If I’m not getting them a good ROI, then they should know why. If it’s because I’m not doing my job well enough, they should dump me and move on, secure in the knowledge that they now have all the right questions and checklists for their next Web Marketer to ensure that they’re going to get their money’s worth out of them.
As I remarked to a higher-than-average potential client in a meeting earlier this week:
"You should always know how your website’s ROI, otherwise what’s the point in spending money on it?"
Surely I can’t be the only one that feels this way. Somewhere out there, there has to be ethical professionals that actively encourage their clients to be constantly ensuring their value to them.
You’re right, but the notion of measuring website ROI is one that most clients find hard to grasp. That won’t change until the industry educates its clients.
Given the web industry’s overall performance so far in educating its own market, in language the market can understand, I wouldn’t hold your breath waiting for it to happen.
It’s a big topic. But basically, if even 10% of the energy that we web industry people spend waving our hands at each other via blogs and forums was channelled at the client base (assuming the client base was interested) things might begin to change.
Comment by James Bull — August 14, 2008 #
Great post.
Measuring ROI on online advertising can mean completely different things to different clients. A lot of them are set in their old ways though and don’t see how online marketing is different to offline.
Your comment about “knowing your ROI - otherwise, what’s the point” is spot on the mark.
Comment by Adam Guerin — August 15, 2008 #