Hey Frank!

I use Google Ads and get a pretty high “click thru rate” for the ads I’ve come up with.

My only way to track these ads and figure out who’s actually SHOWING UP, not just clicking over to our site, is to personally ask anyone who checks off “Internet” in the “How Do You Hear About Us” section of our guest form, “Do you remember how you found us online?”

The problem is a lot of people can’t remember HOW they came across our church’s site!

They’re like all of us…

We click a link to a page, that leads us to an article and we click on the link to the authors site, we go there and there’s a link there we click on, etc…

Because of the way people surf the internet, I don’t know if they’ll ever be a better, more scientific way to track actual Sunday visitors for pay per click ads.

You can always scientifically track “clicks”, but not “visits”.

Scott:

I was hoping you’d comment!

I’m curious to know what your click through rate is. Can you share?

With regard to tracking response, the one thought I’ve had goes along with some of the strategy I advocate for church websites (including profiles of folks from the church community on the church website).

If:

1) the goal of a church website is to bring people into the community of believers and make the life of the community (rather than the church website) the primary factor in leading a person to Christ (which is what I believe); and,

2) the best online way of drawing an unbeliever into the live of the believing community is to present the life stories of real people within a congregation, both in written and video format (which is also what I believe); then,

What if we used our pay-per-click ads as the beginning of that process?

So, for example, suppose we have a person in our congregation who is a former member of a winning Indianapolis 500 team (as a former client of mine did), and it’s approaching the time of the Indianapolis 500 race.

We decide to create a local pay-per-click campaign on Google and Yahoo so that people in our local geographic area who search on words and phrases related to auto racing will see a text ad which promotes our video account of the life story of our former Indy 500 team member. Our ad sends people to a page on the church website which features his story. The page also invites people to contact that member of our congregation if they want to learn more (obviously, the person who is being profiled needs to be willing to be contacted via email). We set the member up with a specific email address and then track emails to that address.

Now, we have a way of tracking not only click-through rate, but initial response (by counting the number of emails sent to the special email address) and further response (anecdotally, by talking to the Indy 500 team member - how many people did he engage in further conversation beyond the initial response, how many people accepted an invitation from him to meet for coffee, how many people accepted an invitation from him to join the church at a regular gathering, how many people ultimately came to faith in Christ).

A radical approach? Maybe. A risky approach? Perhaps. But does it warrant further consideration? I think so.

What do you think?

I get some pretty decent Click thru rates (CTR).

For a Da Vinci Code Campaign (http://www.experiencepathway.com/DaVinciCodeErrors.htm) I’ve had running since the movie came out my current CTR for one of those Ad groups is 1.67%

For my church ad groups I have one with a 2.42% CTR and another with a 1.72% CTR.

That’s for the whole ad group in each of those categories.

For the Da Vinci Code Campaign I have some keywords pulling 10% and 25% in CTRs!

For one of the church ad groups I have some keywords pulling 8.33%!

Those are pretty high.  1% is considered pretty good!

You’re ideas interesting.  I’d be interested to see how much of a response you’d get.  How many would actually email someone.  If you ever test it let me know.

Speaking of google adwords…

I’m thinking of doing a teleconference with top adwords expert Perry Marshall.

Would you or any of your friends be interested?

See more here:
“ I Have An Internet Expert Ready To Help You...”

Scott:

You’re right - your click through rates are impressive. That’s great!

Regarding my ideas and how much of a response they would solicit, I only need a church to try it out. <grin> It might be that not many people would actually email the profiled person, but in my mind, if personal contact is not made, then any Google ad we run (whether it follows my ideas or not) has not accomplished its purpose. If our efforts do not bring people into the midst of community of believers, then they most likely won’t be saved.

I would definitely be interested in the seminar by Perry Marshall. Let me know when it’s going to happen.

Frank

Here’s an idea…

How about if each ad takes the user to a specific landing page that has some kind of printable coupon on it… “bring this in when you visit and we’ll give you a free book,” or “a giftcard for free coffee,” etc. The page would also, of course, tell a little about your church and link to the homepage. You might not capture every visitor that found you by that ad, but it might help somewhat.

You could tie the ad keywords to the book you’d give away for that particular user: a little devotional for young moms; something X-Gen friendly for that age group; a biker’s bible for the biker crowd… The “free coffee” doesn’t have quite the same “legs,” but the book idea could open lots of possibilities!