by Queensland Government
You should measure and analyse the results of your advertising. This will help you assess whether you are receiving a return on investment, and achieving your advertising goals. Knowing what types of advertising work best will allow you to improve your approach for future advertising campaigns.
Monitor your business
To understand the results of your advertising, you must first monitor your business before a campaign begins.
If you know roughly how many customers visit your store each day, you can compare the numbers once your advertising begins. If you see a significant increase in customer enquiries, it is likely your sales will increase as well.
Monitoring how many enquiries you receive by email, website or phone can also tell you how your customers prefer to contact you. As an example, you may discover that customers prefer to visit your website first and print out an advertisement with a discount coupon, before coming into your store. This is invaluable information to use in your next advertising campaign, as you can make sure you heavily promote your specials on your website.
Remember, advertising may take time to generate results. If you advertise in a magazine it may be kept around the house for a couple of months before a customer visits your store to act on the advertisement.
Assess the results
There are many simple ways that you can assess which types of advertising generate the best results for your business. You can:
ask your customers how they found out about your business
motivate customers to mention/bring in an advertisement for a discount
use a separate phone number or email address for specific advertisements to track the response
monitor the enquiries from customers just after a new advertisement is published - for example, you might advertise a new product on the radio on Friday and find that you have an increase in customers the next day
capture customer postcode information to determine the best locations for advertising.
Review your goals
Comparing the results of your advertising with your initial goals will tell you whether your advertising has reached or exceeded your expectations. For example, you might research whether:
enquiries and sales have increased
your business image has improved
your marketing goals have been met
feedback from customers has been positive.
After reviewing your goals and results you are in a strong position to set new goals and strategies for your next advertising campaign.