One of the more difficult aspects of using signs as a piece of your advertising efforts is that it’s difficult to measure traditional advertising. Setting up signs and hoping they do well isn’t an ideal method, so here are a few tactics you can utilize to gauge just how well your sign campaign is doing:
1. Different Phone Numbers
Purchasing a few temporary phone numbers and using them on individual signs is a great way to keep track of which signs people are responding to. Today many companies offer analytics on the numbers you purchase, including call duration and origination. You can use this data to monitor the response to your signs as well as the quality of the calls you’re receiving.
2. Vanity Website Addresses
A unique URL on your sign can allow you to see who is reaching your website through that sign. It’s important to keep the page accessible only through that URL (and not the rest of your site) so you can monitor how the individual sign is performing. The most basic way to do this is to just create a unique page within your existing website, such as example.com/specialpromotion. If you want, you can take this a step further and register an entirely new domain to drive visitors to. This will prevent people from neglecting the path at the end of your vanity URL.
3. Using Google Analytics to Track Tagged Links
Tagging links so you can monitor them in Google Analytics is a more advanced way to keep track of your sign performance. If you are familiar with Analytics and have it installed on your website, it’s not very difficult. Google’s URL Builder can walk you through the process of building a tracking link. After you have this link, it doesn’t make sense to use this long URL on a sign. Instead, use a URL shortener, such as bit.ly or tinyurl.com, to allow people to easily type in the address. You can also input the tagged URL into a QR Code generator (such as http://www.qrstuff.com/) and people can simply scan the code with their phone to be brought through the tagged URL to your site. The tagged links will allow you see how your signs are performing in the Traffic Sources tab under Campaigns in Google Analytics.
You can use these methods individually or in conjunction to monitor your sign campaign’s performance. Now you can measure just how well your campaign is performing, compare sign placements, and compare different campaigns.
Learn more about sign campaigns. Stop by Rich Wiseman’s site where you can find out all about yard signs and what it can do for you.