What is Inbound Call Tracking Software?

Inbound call tracking software is a very important tool for businesses of all sizes. Today’s technology has made it easier than ever to find a business’s contact information. This has led to a big increase in consumer phone calls. In fact, studies have shown that 61% of mobile users call a business when making a purchase online. Call tracking helps marketers to decide which marketing activities are driving these calls. As a result, this can solve a lot of problems typically encountered by marketing teams. Ultimately, call tracking can help to fill important gaps in customer data.

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What is Call Tracking?

Call tracking is the process of tracking which marketing strategies have led to inbound calls to a business. This gives marketers the opportunity to trace calls back to digital marketing spend. As a result, they can track their individual digital marketing strategies and decide which ones work the best. These kinds of software provide marketers with a lot of useful metrics and data. There are three main types of call tracking technology. These include:

Campaign-Level Call Tracking

With campaign-level call tracking, a business purchases a pool of phone numbers. They will then assign each phone number to a specific marketing campaign. This strategy can be used for both online and offline campaigns. However, there are a few issues to consider when using this type of call tracking.

First, there is the limited cookie window. With this level of call tracking, your tracing cookie window is likely to be about 30 days long. This means that if your campaigns or sales cycle run any longer, you will miss out on valuable information. The second issue is click attribution. Attribution is an important part of a customer’s path to conversion. With campaign-level tracking, you can only use last-click attribution. When a customer calls your business, the campaign is attributed to the number they called. This method fails to take into account the method they used to get there.

Session-Level Call Tracking

Instead of tracking by campaign, session-level call tracking gives each visitor to your website their own number. This is known as DNI or Dynamic Number Insertion. We will go into more detail about DNI later on. This version of call tracking software is most useful for shorter sales cycles where customers are ready to make a purchase. This is because the phone number will only stay the same for the duration of each session. However, last-click attribution is an issue for this type of tracking as well. If customers leave your website and come back, you will lose that valuable tracking information.

Visitor-Level Call Tracking

With visitor-level call tracking, you can see the entire customer process from consideration to purchase. It is much more precise than the other two methods and solves a lot of their pitfalls. With this level, you are able to see the whole customer journey. This means you can link each phone call back to a specific ad, campaign, or even keyword! Higher attribution models help to gather visitor information, no matter how many times a customer leaves a website.

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Dynamic Number Insertion (DNI)

Dynamic Number Insertion is a call tracking feature that assigns a unique phone number to each advertising source. This helps marketers track offline behavior the same way they track online behavior with tracing cookies. Using DNI, phone numbers can be linked to online consumer actions, like clicks and page views. With this information, marketers can determine which marketing actions are driving traffic to their website. They can also see which keywords led to the most engagement and even which actions led to conversions. Lastly, Dynamic Number Insertion allows for recycling of numbers not in use, which helps to reduce total usage volume.

Tips to Get the Most Out of Your DNI Data

  • Focus a bigger portion of your advertising budget on marketing campaigns that are driving the highest converting phone calls.
  • Optimize products and services that are driving phone calls (according to your website data).
  • Build on published content that is driving phone calls (such as blog posts, videos, or webinars).

Why Use Inbound Call Tracking Software?

For businesses that use phone calls as a conversion point, tracking software is essential. Call tracking enables marketers to analyze their marketing campaigns and report on their success. These analytics are based on the number of calls received and the revenue associated with them. This fills a big gap in customer data. Accuracy is also a very important aspect of call tracking. Many businesses that have invested in phone call tracking software have noted higher accuracy in their customer data reports.

Another added bonus of call tracking is that it can help marketing teams determine their budget. Knowing what is working and what is not is an important part of the budgeting process. More money can be spent on tactics that are successful. In contrast, strategies that aren’t paying off can be scaled back. This is a great way for businesses to make sure they are being smart with their advertising budget.

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Inbound Call Tracking Metrics

Tracking inbound calls is a great way for marketers to track how their marketing strategies are performing. The metrics they track will vary based on the goals and needs of the company. That being said, there are some phone call metrics that are helpful all around. Below is a list of some of the top metrics that can be tracked for inbound calls.

Lead Source

One of the most important metrics when using phone call tracking software is the lead source. Businesses want to know where their inbound leads are coming from. How did the caller find out about them? Where did they find their number? What is their reason for calling? Tracing the lead source can help answer these questions. This, in turn, can really help to improve your marketing strategy.

Landing Page Performance

Each time a user lands on one of your business’s landing pages, they are met with a variety of contact options. These usually include online forms, live chat, and phone numbers. Many marketers track online forms and live chat metrics. However, by not tracking phone calls, they may be missing a key opportunity to improve their campaign ROI. One option for tracking is to have different phone numbers on each landing page. This way, marketers can track which landing pages are the most successful.

Missed Calls

Missed calls should be viewed as a missed opportunity to convert. Another important metric to track is how often this happens when customers call your company. Keep track of how often you miss calls and what happens when you do. Are customers redirected to a voicemail message? What information is included there? Missed call tracking can also alert you to staffing issues or hours that need to be adjusted. You may also want to consider alternate features, like live chat or other website resources.

First-Time Callers

When using inbound phone call tracking software, it is a good idea to keep a record of phone numbers. This way, you can see if this is the first time this customer has called your business. You should also do some research into how they found you. This should include information like what landing page they landed on, what number they called, and their intent. Use this information to create a custom plan for first-time callers.

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Most Popular Call Tracking Tools

CallRail

CallRail is the most popular software for call tracking. It allows users to track phone calls from offline and online marketing, PPC ads, and keywords. Users also have access to specific information about campaigns. In addition, you can see what time of day most calls happen and even which staff member is taking the most successful calls.

Invoca

Invoca is another great tool for gathering phone call information. This software offers real-time analytics that can help marketers take quick actions based on phone call data. As a result, marketers can improve their business’s ROI and increase conversion rates. Invoca also advertises that their service can help to provide a more personalized cross-channel customer experience using automation.

WhatConverts

WhatConverts is another powerful option for call tracking. Many call tracking services offer pretty similar features. However, what sets WhatConverts apart is instant and detailed lead analysis. They provide multiple filters to help users sort through data and get the answers they need fast. These filters include lead type, marketing source, medium, campaign, keyword, and landing page.

Call Center Concept: Portrait of happy smiling female customer support phone operator at workplace

Tracking Phone Calls to Improve Marketing Strategy

Inbound call tracking is a very important tool that many marketers have often overlooked. In fact, many consumers still consider phone calls their preferred contact method. Without call tracking, businesses may miss out on a large section of data that could give them valuable information about their customers. In digital marketing, it’s very important to gather and study as much customer data as possible. If you are looking to round out your marketing strategy, consider using a digital marketing agency. SEO Design Chicago can help you to select the analytics and data reporting tools that are best for you!

FAQs:

  • What is call tracking?
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