I had the honor to be interviewed by Wall Street Journal a few weeks back, thanks to our long time partner Blackfoot Inc (now a MediaBank division). The article and the subject of “going beyond clicks” when measuring marketing effectiveness is definitely close to my heart. I have been a marketer for 19 years now, and have been starving for this. Here is what we as marketer can do now with a multi-channel analytics service/tool:

- Analyze prospect, new and existing customer data

- Analyze marketing data from offline sources (billboard, direct mail, radio, tv, magazine) and online sources (organic search, online advertising, paid search, affiliate, etc.)

- Attribute weight and value for each channels

- Through executive and marketing dashboards, get a 360 view of prospect and customer’s “Total Marketing Consumption” - meaning, we now can see how many direct mail pieces, billboards, magazine ads, organic search visits, click on a banner it took a consumer (or professional for B2B clients) to convert…..Wow, that is something we have been wanting as marketers for a LONG time.

- Take all this data, and add demographic information from Axciom and other databases (also offered by Mediabank) and you have ZIP+4 demographic and psychographic data on your prospects/customers.

This multi-channel analytics opportunity allows for great information but also better marketing decisions. For example, we are now able to:

- See that consumers in Chicago’s Loop are more likely to click on Google ads for “business administration online degrees” than are San Francisco’s richmond district.

- See that consumers in Washington DC are five times more likely to click on a banner ad there when billboard ads, and local magazine ads are also running

- See that direct mail increased conversions from clicks to purchase when it was running with paid search ads and radio ads….

- Need I continue? You understand now the power of multi-channel analytics.

We have had the privilege to test this system by MediaBank for now 2 large clients of ours, and we are able to unearth marketing opportunities, cost savings, and efficiencies that we couldn’t before.

We’d recommend for any marketer to start looking at multi-channel analytics vendors such as MediaBank or TFC, Inc to gain efficiencies, stop counting conversions twice, know how many direct mail, paid search ads, etc you REALLY need to make that sales or generate that lead.

We were very pleased to see that OneUpWeb, an integrated marketing firm, created a report on “Secrets of Social Media Marketing - How 2007 Hot Holiday Products are Marketed Online” which identified our efforts with our partner Crimson Consulting and our client UGOBE for the promotion of Pleo online. We have spent numerous hours strategizing on the best ways to connect with Pleo fans, help them understand how Pleo is being developed and all the challenges that it has brought. We thank Lisa Wehr and her team for writing a great report on social media marketing and comparing the marketing of Pleo to that of iPod Touch, WebKinz and many leading companies.