When I say that we are very serious about hiring only A-players, I mean it.
When I say we are obsessed with numbers, I mean it.
When I say we hire people to tell us what to do and not to tell them what to do, I mean it.
We are constantly on the lookout for people who know what they are doing, love what they are doing and are never satisfied with the status quo.
Below is an example of what an A-Player’s typical output looks like – Lucy’s monthly report (our AdWords campaign manager).
I intentionally said output and not work, because A-Players aren’t about great work, they are all about great output.
Genuine A-Players don’t judge success by the work they do, they judge success by the outcomes they produce.
NB: I have removed some numbers, as our competitors do read our blog. We are happy to share almost anything, but we don’t necessarily want to share all of our confidential data with them.
Hey!
The monthly report is attached. We can run through the report over the phone/conference call if you have questions.
I’ve also saved the monthly reports in the shared folder HERE.
A few things to note:
1. We changed our attribution model in the first half of September from last click to first click (I sent an email about that as well).
So in the past we used to count conversions when a PPC ad was the last point of interaction before a conversion, whereas now we are counting conversions when PPC is the first click in the funnel, even if users eventually convert through another channel, if a PPC ad was how they discovered the site, this conversion is going to be attributed to PPC.
The difference between the previous model and the current model in terms of number of conversions is not massive (e.g. August conversions with the current model are only X conversions less than with the previous model), but it’s worth bearing in mind that in the report we are comparing the current model with the old model.
2. This change in our attribution model also means that conversions keep coming for the previous activity. Our lookback window is 30 days for online conversions and 90 days for offline conversions. That means that I have updated revenue figures for both August and September as customers who discovered the website through PPC in the previous 90 days are still converting. Let me know if you need further info/explanation on this. I will keep on monitoring conv. Data for the past 90 days and updating in our conv. Report.
3. We introduced responsive search ads throughout the account. Responsive search ads is a new format, which allows for significantly more real estate to be taken on the SERP with longer and more prominent ads – sent an email about this as well. Responsive search ads also allow us to compete and win in more auctions, which leads to an increase in impressions and clicks. This is part of the reason why in September we had 31% more impressions and 16% higher traffic.
4. As we changed the enquiry forms multiple times in September in an effort to improve the % of drop-offs, you will see there are new conversion actions for the new forms (so, for example, Offline conv – Enquiry form from other cities was replaced with Offline conv – Talk to Us (Get a Quote) – Other Cities). Please refer to the total number of submitted enquiries.
5. The chat function was introduced to all pages, hence the increase in the number of clicks on the Chat button.
6. We launched the Videography campaign on the 7th of Sep, and we split out the Business – UK campaign into Business – UK and Business – London on the 28th of August in order to drive London traffic to the specific London pages.
7. We paused some campaigns due to poor performance, including Business – AU and SA, and the Family campaign (until we can test landing pages for the latter).
Highlights/lowlights:
- Most likely as a result of new and improved enquiry forms, the launch of the videography campaign and optimisation we saw a 118% increase in the number of submitted enquiries compared to August.
- The number of drop-offs from the users clicking on the Enquire button has reduced by X%, from Y% in August to Z% in September.
- There were X enquiries from cities other than London compared to just Y enquiries in August (X from the UK, Y from New York).
- In terms of enquiries from cities other than London:
- X enquiries from the UK (unfortunately, it’s not possible to see the exact locations)
- X enquiries from Berlin
- X enquiries from New York
- X enquiries from Singapore
- Despite the fact that there were X less online purchases and Y less offline purchases in Sep than in Aug, total revenue went up by almost 67%, which is partly due to driving more relevant traffic, optimisation and probably seasonality.
- Even though our CTR decreased by X%, we are likely driving more qualified traffic with the new ads, which all mention pricing/hour. This allows us to filter out users who aren’t happy with the prices before they click on an ad. Our total conv. Rate for leads and online purchases improved by Y%.
- For General campaign, we saw X more enquiries but Y fewer online purchases, which meant that the revenue for the General campaign went down by Z%. This could be partly due to the fact that in September we started driving General campaign traffic to most specific pages, whereas before we were driving this traffic to the homepage. However, the data is inconclusive at this time, so we need to observe the campaign further. The number of clicks on Chat function increased by X%, which is interesting as we’ve always had a Chat button for the General campaign landing page.
- Ever since we split out our Business campaign into Business – UK and Business – London, we saw a massive increase in the number of conversions in the whole of the UK: so the number of conversions for the main Business – UK campaign stayed the same, while the number of conversions for the London campaign was X, which means that the total conversions for the Business – UK keywords went up by Y. As for enquiries, we had only X enquiries from the Business – UK keywords in August, which grew to Y in August. Plus, we had X purchases for the London – UK campaign in September.
- We tried to reactivate the Family campaign, however, it was paused again until we have new landing pages to test as it was still not generating any leads or purchases.
- Overall, our MoM revenue was £X higher, ROAS was Y% stronger than in August, and the CPA for all conversions was slightly lower than in the previous month. We focused a lot on optimisation in September, improving the relevance of traffic by adding/excluding search queries, changing ads, applying bid adjustments, optimising bids etc.
Recommendations:
- Roll out Business campaigns for other major cities in London that land on the most specific pages based on the success of the B2B London campaign.
- Roll out the General campaign to the whole of the UK (currently only London) to drive more traffic and enquiries – some landing pages might need to be created (will send a list later).
- In terms of international campaigns, XX and YY have the most potential. However, currently we are targeting most of the largest cities in the XX and the drop-off rates are too high, which means that the current CPAs for both of these countries are not good enough to justify further investment. We need to create tailored landing pages for XX and YY in order to improve conversion rates, it is ideal if we had a Book Now option on these pages as well to maximise the chances of success.
Many thanks,
Lucy
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