Measuring Advertising ROI – Call Tracking

One of the focuses at Spork Marketing is return on investment (ROI). When it comes to calculating ROI, one of our ROI tools is call tracking. The basic premise is simple: We publish a unique phone number (either local or toll-free) on the client website, ad, etc.

When this unique tracking phone number is called, the caller is automatically forwarded to the client’s current phone number. This process takes less than a second, so the caller has no idea that their call has been forwarded. At the same time that the call is forwarded, Spork Marketing receives an electronic notice that a call has been made. Using our internal systems, we can then associate the call with a specific advertisement and track results in real time. Simply put, we can track a specific phone call to the ad that triggered the call. You no longer have to guess as to which advertisements are working. Imagine the possibilities:

• You could place a different tracking number in your phone book listing, on your website, and in your print flyers to see which one works best.
• You could place a tracking number in TV commercial and figure out exactly how many calls you received as a result – and you could do it by time of day.
• You could even hand out business cards with a special tracking number at your next conference or event and find out if the event is worthwhile.
• Of course, you could also use the tracking number to figure out which one of your search engine ads is generating phone calls.

When you can track every dollar of your advertising budget, you will quickly maximize your advertising. You can cut advertising that doesn’t work and spend more on ads that get results. Put another way, with call tracking, you can cut costs and increase revenue.