I was at the golf course on Saturday with my son Taylor, my Brother in-law Mike and his son Marc. We were all having a great day hitting the ball.
We started talking about aspects of modern day marketing and discussing the importance of putting the emphasis in the right place. I asked Mike, what do you think is more important, traffic to your website or the conversion rate?
With a furrowed brow, Mike offered his opinion (which I value since he is focused on these things all the time in his career and the company he works for did over $500 million in sales last year)
“Traffic is vitally important, without traffic you have no chance of conversion, however if all you are doing is attracting traffic, that can be a great way to deplete your marketing budget because you have no return on investment”
“So conversion is really the key” he continued, “take what traffic you do have and focus on improvements like working smarter and attracting the right traffic, the people most likely to do business with you”
So I pondered on this a while as I hit golf balls. Some of my shots took off straight, rose high and landed near the pin. Some took a wild curve in the wrong direction and were lost.
When I took my time and planned my moves, doing what I knew to be correct and things felt right, I got the results that I sought. When I was hurried, unfocused and just got up and whacked at the ball, well, you know...another lost stroke and missed opportunity.
Near the end of our day we caught up with Deron Williams, superstar point guard for the Utah Jazz and Gold Medalist for Team USA Basketball 2008....My 12 year old son was in awe! (See picture above) We watched Deron tee off and hit the ball straight down the fairway 280 yards landing in a perfect spot for his second shot. Obviously his talents extend beyond the hardwood floor and it was truly fun to watch.
We all know it's a different market out there than we are used to, but we are seeing some bright spots all over the Western US with production builders pulling permits for new subdivisions not just in ones and twos but twenty or thirty at a time. The large custom homes and owner builder projects also continue to show up, in fact, the majority of the new custom homes we see are at values far exceeding half a million$ each with a dozen or more multi-multi million$ homes in our reports every week.
Instead of focusing on what's wrong or difficult about your market, try looking at the traffic you do have. Concentrate on the opportunities that are there and sharpen your organization's skills so that when the moment comes to land that next important project, everybody has their eye on the ball and is ready to hit one down the fairway right at the target.
Make it a great day!
Justin Harris - Business Development Director - Construction Monitor
