Google is talking success all the way and its ‘Click to Call’ program spells success yet again. Google had reported that a year ago it had 500,000 advertisers who were using Click to call. Talking about the last year, former Google Product SVP Jonathan Rosenberg had said “Click-to-Call ads are generating millions of calls every month.”
Even though the noting was quite similar to what it noted recently in a blog post, Google made it clear that the numbers were increasing in case of calls and call metrics. The main reason for the above was that the search engine giant has this service in the form of “offline” conversion tracking, which has been much more than helpful in providing visibility on the true efficacy of keywords and campaigns. The selling calls have been useful for Google to opt for phone-based leads, which are much more qualified and as compared to clicks, they can be rated at a higher value.
The basis of this program has been on AdWords phone extensions to a great extent. This is because, a mobile ad (on smartphone) highlight phone numbers, which users click on and calls are thus initiated. Google tracks those calls.
Talking about the advertisers, small merchants and national advertisers, both make use of such ads. However, national advertisers such as Direct TV and security company ADT, have shown that they can enthusiastically handle clients working via this particular service as they have the potential to deliver “warm leads” to call centers, which can more efficiently close sales.
Google plans to extend its service as its announcement noted that it would be broadening mobile call tracking. This would be available with a new capability reaching beyond phone numbers in AdWords to mobile landing pages. The post even noted that the search engine giant would be “introducing a new conversion tracking metric . . . to report calls placed from mobile pages.” This means that Google would now track calls made after the click-through to a site.
For it charges, the new tracking capability is free, while Google has been charging $1 per completed call on the PC for its call tracking service. One might assume that in the coming future, Google might have some fees set for the service.
For the marketers, they can make use of the existing phone numbers or a “call button” on a mobile site or landing page. There is no specified requirement for them to come up with a specialized call tracking number from Google as Google notes the following:
You can start using this new metric by installing a snippet of code on your landing pages. Upon doing so, you can set ‘calls’ as a conversion metric to track on your landing page. Next, you can pair calls focused campaigns with tools like Conversion Optimizer, then bid by setting a target CPA for calls, and ultimately automate ad serving to optimize for calls.
Google, like its participation in any other field faces stiff competition as call tracking and metrics provider Telmetrics recently came up with a capability which was quite similar to the Google offering. Telmetrics post read as follows:
Telmetrics Introduces Call Tracking Without Tracking Numbers. And Marchex, which also provides call-based advertising, recently released findings of an advertiser and agency survey showing nearly 50% of respondents wanted to generate calls from their digital advertising (PC and mobile).