Google says “Calls to a business are worth at least 3x more than clicks to a website.”

When you think about what you’ve been told regarding online advertising, it’s pretty hard to know what to trust. Pay Per Click (PPC) advertising was supposed to the a great value and drive traffic to your site and make you tons of money. Well, if you did it then you know it works sometimes and sometimes it does not work at all. You also know that it brings in some business, but not so much that you can stop doing all other kinds of advertising. Google is now focusing on “Call Only Campaigns,” that are designed to have people click to call your business from their search.

Google is focusing on Call Only Campaigns because they found that phone calls are worth at least 3x more than clicks to a website. We’ve known this for a long time and agree with this statement, except that our data shows a call is worth 14x more than a click. Here’s why: Besides the most obvious reason of being able to speak with someone and answer their objections on the spot, your likelihood for making the sale or booking an appointment increases as well.

There are a variety of other factors that show the phone is the best way to generate more sales. For example when somebody clicks on your site and fills out an online form, you are then either responding back to them by email, waiting for them to respond in an instant chat, or you’re following up with them by phone based on the information they provided to you in the form. Now if that person doesn’t answer their phone, you leave a voicemail and then they call back. Maybe you miss the call or its after hours. Now you’re not stuck in phone tag mode and you have to allocate your resources to reaching out to this lead. All this effort and money could have been saved by just directing them to the phone, answering the call when it came in and talking to the client at that moment. Not only would you not have to put the resources into trying to contact them, but you would have already made a sale if you would have just spoke to them. A person who calls into a business is three times more likely to make purchase or book an appointment vs an online lead. Another way to say that is “people who call a business buy faster.”

So now Google wants to push their call only campaigns like it’s a new idea, but we’ve been saying this for a long time. Customers should be able to click on the ad and call you, and they should be able to see your number in your ad. That number should be a vanity number.  The reason it should be a vanity number is that a person clicking your ad may not remember how to find you a 2nd time around. Just clicking and calling doesn’t guarantee they’ll remember how to reach you. If they have to search for you and click your ad again then maybe you’re paying for the click to call twice .

If they just remembered your number you would not have to pay for that second click . You want to drive people to the phone, you want them to refer you, and you need something that’s as simple as pie in order to accomplish this. That’s why a vanity number is so effective. If you need a drywall contractor and you ask your friend and they simply tell you to call 1-800 Drywall, what could be easier? Nothing .

On a final note, if the customer clicks your ad and calls your business, then uses their call log to call you back at a later time Google does not track that second call, only the initial one. With Ignition and our vanity numbers, every call is tracked and recorded.