Advertising online is easy, simply place an ad on the “nearest” search engine you can find and you are out there on the net.  However, making money from your spend and having your digital dollars actually generating a return is another story altogether.

Getting the highest return on your spend can only be gained once all the touch points of your digital flow have been optimized. From site design, layout and wording, to market segmentation and marketing to bringing your customers back through retargeting and remarketing.

1. Optimize your site. Many people underestimate how critical it is to have a site and flow that works for the segment they are targeting. Having a beautiful, graphically rich site with mounds of information does not automatically qualify it as a site that will attract the highest amount of purchasing customers. If your site is out there to sell, and that is your KPI for return, then it needs to be optimized to get people through the sales flow.Get them onto the site and buying in the fastest possible way.

2. Consider whether a landing page can do a better job at converting surfers to buyers. Bringing a surfer in could lead to higher return if you can convert better than your current multipage site or flow does. Another way of converting customers in the fastest possibly way is to have a landing page. This is very simply the page where you drive customers to from an advert. It is a one stop sales page and if done correctly can convert many times more than an entire information site can. Think of it like this, if you can convert a buyer in one step as opposed to 2, 3 or 4 you have less chance of them leaving and going else where. Groupon and Living Social do this to great effect. You see the offer, you like the offer, you purchase. Of course if you want to learn more you can click around, but the majority of the required information to make a purchasing decision are on one page.

3. Another secret in the industry is SEO. Although everyone knows about it, not everyone practices what they preach. Spending money up front on getting your site into the Search engines through proper SEO can lead to enormous returns. Organic search is more trusted than sponsored ads and seems to convert better if the site is optimised correctly. Added to that, the popularity of your site in the search engine’s  eyes increases every time someone visits it as a result of a search. This moves you higher up the search results tree and in turn brings you more visits leading to possibly higher sales.

4. Finally, the jewel in the crown at maximizing return rests in remarketing.Once you have a sale, don’t forget about the customer. Contact them, remarket to them and show them why you are superior to your competition. Overall maximizing your return is a simple process of optimizing at each phase. Experiment and you will find what works for your business.

Of course spending money on advertising is a given. Unless you are lucky enough to have organic, viral traffic that brings in a never ending stream of clicks and sales, you need to get “the word out”. Traditional cost per click campaigns on the likes of Google still work although they are very competitive and costly. Placing campaigns on engines where you can carefully segment the viewing audience will definitely help optimize things and Facebook is excellent at that. Still, the best way of getting the highest return on your ad dollars is by advertising on new technology engines where they still remain tightly held valuable gems like Leadbolt. They have a lot of traffic and excellent quality which can be exploited at comparatively low rates meaning your return on revenue again increases. Good luck!