This week I asked our marketing manager to spend a bit more time analysing how the different advertising mediums are performing for West Yorkshire Windows. The results she supplied made very interesting reading.
The bulk of our advertising budget has been split between TV, radio advertising and online marketing. We also send out leaflet drops (junk mail – sorry), advertise in the Yellow Pages, sponsor the local kids football team and all the other stuff. Basically, we’re trying to get as many people to ring us up, or visit one of our two showrooms in Leeds or Wakefield.
All the data is available on our Adminbase programme, the very excellent sotware for double glazing companies, but the key to analysing the data is dependent upon how good those inputting leads are. We continuously insist that anyone who inputs a lead on Adminbase MUST put an accurate lead source down, but its not easy.
For example, if you receive a web lead where the contact form states the customer contacted the company after seeing a TV ad. Did they really watch an ad and go straight to the website, or did they surf the internet find our website and then remember they have seen the TV ad before? We also get many customers who either can’t really remember why they chose to contact us, or simply state ‘We’ve just heard of you before!’
Anyway, assuming the data on Adminbase is something like accurate, we have decided that radio advertising is simply not working. West Yorkshire Windows has advertised on Real Radio for many years almost continuously, and more recently on Radio Aire and Ridings FM. The average cost per sale we generate from each radio station is over £1000.
The advertising we do on TV is very expensive – I mean VERY expensive, but the average cost per sale is far less. I used to think TV advertising was more for brand awareness, but this year I have realised it is a great medium for generating leads – and lots of them.
Crucially, the message we have on radio is virtually the same as the message we have on TV. Currently, West Yorkshire Windows are pushing that we’ll pay £30 for old uPVC windows we replace, and provide free fitting on the energy efficient windows we put back in. Also we offer Buy Now Pay Later and are pushing a Free LCD TV on all conservatory orders. As the messages are the same, it’s clear that TV works far better.
The best lead source is consistently the website advertising we do. The cost per lead and cost per sale blows the socks off all other paid for advertising.
So, we’ve decided to divert our budget away from radio and spend more on TV and the internet in the future, especially Adwords and SEO.
I think radio advertising is great for building brand awareness – everyone knows West Yorkshire Windows who listens to Real Radio. But having a well known brand is absolutely no use if when a customer decides to get quotes for a conservatory or double glazing they forget all about you, search on Google and find your competitors!
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So glad to hear you knock radio, especially as your finance director got me and one other Outlet (the usual suspects) to support him and spend MORE money on it in September !!!! You could say the left hand doesn’t know what the right is doing ?????
Jonathan
You know myself and my finance director do not always see eye to eye.
RCG
I’ve had some good responses off radio but only if I do a specific event and push it as a live link weekend and blast a massive amount of spots into one week.
I found that spending 4k over a month doesn’t work were as spending 3k in a week seems to work better, I suppose it’s because you dominate the radio for that week, and it really is about whether the offer is good enough to get people in.
But if you can afford tv I would think that’s great, just don’t use a little local channel, we’ve got S4C down here in sheep land and I can only say what a waste of money.
Also do you think that the Radio may push leads to your website? So they don’t seem to come up asa radio leads? Andrew said that he feels when the radio goes off line the other lead sources suffer?
We have, in the past, been of that opinion that although radio does not seem to have loads of leads attributed to it, it is an important part of the mix hence why we have continued with it.
When you are faced with reports though suggesting a cost per sale of over £1000 then you have to question its worth as a branding exercise; especially when you have been on air for such a long time and have such an established name on a particular station.
The plan is to cut the radio for the remainder of the year and I don’t feel we will suffer too much from that although I do feel that in a few months the impact will hit us if we don’t replace this with something else (e.g. more spend on web, continued TV spend etc.) especially in regards to getting the WYW name out there as the TV is under the CO umberalla brand.
We all know advertising is not as easy as black and white and it’s about getting the right combination yet on the other hand why bother tracking your leads if your not going to look at the information that is recorded and act on it.
Valid point Heidi, I too have a figure of 1200 pound as a cost per sale.
The unfortunate thing in my case is that I can’t afford to get on TV, I’ve got a leaflet drop rolling all the time, but how do you get your name out there in a better way if you can’t afford the big hit? It’s the old drip feed again I suppose.
Thanks
Andrew
We’re not saying TV is the only answer here, it’s about looking at what you can afford, what’s working with what you are doing, and what’s not at any particular time.
But this is not easy, as we all know and as Matthew has covered in this post. Do we conclude that if the Radio is costing over a £1000 a sale then it’s not working or, like you suggest and we have in the past concluded, it is helping all other lead sources so battle on with it regardless?
Well I guess the only way to be sure is to test it like we are. I know we have done this in the past, but as you know I keep disappearing on maternity leave so I’ve never been 100% sure of the outcome myself.
This doesn’t necessarily mean switching it off altogether (as we are) but you could reduce spend; for instance go heavy wed – sun when you’re driving traffic to your showroom or week on week off.
You could then put additional spend into another source such as ad words and see if the overall number of leads are affected. You may already have a successful mix Andrew but by altering the balance within the mix slightly may have a significant effect on the number of leads you actually generate.
Obviously making changes like these wont have an instant impact on leads, especially if we are discussing radio as a branding exercise as brands take time to establish but equally they are not forgotten overnight. If we’re assuming this though (radio is more of a branding exercise) then a couple of months off wont necessarily harm business but could enable you to afford to try new mediums whatever they may be.
In short, I don’t know the answer (I don’t even think there is one as more people would be rich within our industry!) but what I have concluded recently is that the more analysis you do, the better position you are to make informed decisions.
You can swallow a cost per sale of £1000 if you KNOW that lead source is significantly helping all others but if you do not know this for sure and all other advertising platforms are costing around £270 (ish) per sale then alarm bells must start ringing???
We have always collected ‘how did you hear about us’ information but is that enough? I know I have looked at this information on many occasions but have I really used it to full effect? Not really if I’m honest.
Over the next few months I am going to spend considerable effort in this area finding out as much information as I can. Hopefully then Andrew I will be able to provide you with a more certain answer instead of talking in circles!
As a first step I have put together an advertising survey that our sales staff will fill in, I can e mail it to you to look at if you wish?
One other rather important point which we haven’t even touched on is the importance of the message within the advertising we are doing. Research may conclude one form of advertising is not working but how do we know we haven’t just got the message wrong???
I could waffle on all night but I really have to go.
Heidi
p.s. if you find out the winning formula first please will you share it with me ;0)
By the way… when i say ‘what i have concluded recently’ in regards to analysis this doesnt mean that we have been making rash decisons over recent years. We have always looked at how our advertising has been performing but over the next few months i intend to look at this in much greater depth.
just wanted to make that clear!!!
HiHeidi,
I’d love to get hold of that info if you don’t mind e-mailing it to me. It is tricky I stress about spending 2k on a campaign as my advertising budget at the mo is only 5k a month and by the time you take out Yell.com / price engines / best quotes/ a little bit of news paper ads and the money is pretty much gone.
I love everything to do with this business even the stats which drive me mad on occasions, I’d love to have the gonads to put all the money I’ve made this year into one big TV ad but I know I’d never talk Luci into it.
I’m really focusing on the internet at the mo to try and get that sorted and get my ranking better. So it’s all about SEO but even this I’ve got to do on my own (get the violins out).
The stats are the main reason really I’ve dropped alot of spend out of newspapers and into buying in leads as at least they are a lead and for one ad I can get 10 leads.
We have been leaflet dropping now for the last two month and are starting to see the results coming through. But it’s still trying to find that magic mix that works, I booked a radio ad after talking to Andrew, but like I say I’ll just blast a week on and then that should sort it for a while, well I booked two months actually but I look at the results from this month and if it don’t work I’ll cancel the next months..
Speak to you soon
Andrew
Aww Andrew,
No need for violins, you’re not on your own. You’ve always got the Conservatory Outlet group to turn to!
We’ve got lots of fantastic new literature out, a new retail DVD and much more to help you turn all those leads you work so hard to get into sales!
Just give me a shout if you need anything.
Let me know how things go over the next couple of months and i’ll keep you up to date with anything interesting i find.
I’ll e mail that survey to you today.
Take care,
Heidi
You should be in sales not marketing!