I?ve written a new case study to go into the second edition of my book, Magnetic Marketing, and thought you might like to read how measuring your marketing can save you money. The first edition of my book has sold out, so the second edition is about to go to print and you can order your copy here.

Mike Chester is a handyman who operates within a 5 mile radius of his home. This area includes a number of good sized towns and many residential areas.

When I started working with Mike, he had done a lot of planning to work out the best marketing for his business. He knew where he wanted to take his business, he had a clear picture of his ideal clients and he was using a number of different marketing tools to generate enquiries. Most importantly he was measuring all his marketing efforts, keeping track of what he was spending and how many enquiries each activity brought in.

Mike uses a spreadsheet to help him measure his marketing. Each activity is listed, along with its cost, the number of enquiries it generates and the average spend per client for the different activities. We worked through each activity in turn, looking at how effective they were. Mike was advertising in a number of local magazines and we could see that some where bringing him a steady flow of the right sort of clients. While others were generating a high number of enquiries, the conversion rate into actual projects was low and the average spend was even lower. Further investigation showed that one of the magazines was not being distributed properly ? Mike was paying for an advert in a certain number of copies, but far fewer copies were actually being distributed. The end result ? the adverts were pulled from this publication. In another, Mike was paying for a half page advert; the number of enquiries being generated by it was good, so we decided to test a quarter page advert, for less cost. The end result ? the smaller advert generates the same number of enquiries as the larger one.

Another thing we noticed from comparing the numbers was that the average spend of clients who contacted Mike via his website, was much higher than for any other marketing activity. Many of the magazines that Mike advertises in are free, so clients who see his adverts are not necessarily looking for a handyman. However, people who search online for a handyman in his geographic area are actually looking for someone who can help them and are prepared to pay for the work. The end result ? the money that Mike is saving on the printed publications is being diverted in improving his website, so that it generates more enquiries and so that the conversion rate is improved.

How much time, money and effort could you save, by measuring your marketing?