Ever wonder how those savvy though somewhat annoying know-it-all’s can always quote the latest statistics or tell you exactly which color converts a sale and why your email newsletter template simply won’t do?
Well I won’t tell you to join the ranks of the snobby-but-accurate, but I will share with you some business intelligence tools to get the inside scoop on what works when marketing your services, not to mention a great method for reverse engineering the competition and showing your client how what you do will help them dominate their industry.
Websites for Spying on the Competition
Whether you’re researching what leaders in your (or your client’s) industry are doing to win market share or you’re interested in felling the guards at their gates to gain insider knowledge on their marketing strategy, these business intelligence solutions will help you spy on the competition and gain priceless knowledge on how to do them one better, or at least get a solid foothold in the game.
SpyFu
I love this site for digging into a website’s pay-per-click strategy. Imagine what it would be worth to your client (regardless of the services you’re offering) to know how much money his top competitor spends each day on paid search traffic, or the other top competitors in the space he may not have been aware of that spyfu ingeniously reveals. Find out what top PPC advertisers are bidding on – because those keywords are obviously making them money if they’ve been bidding on them for four months or longer (and top bidders are usually paying close attention and analyzing their campaigns – they don’t just let them run and hope it’s working).
What if you offer graphics design? How would this be useful to you? Well if I were you, I’d use this site to study my prospect’s competition, then see what their PPC landing pages look like, what types of graphics they use, where they’re placed, how they fit in to the overall strategy. If they’re good, you can get some great ideas to present to your prospect. If they’re bad you can now tell your prospect that their formidable opponent has a clear kink in their armor and like Achilles’ heel, you’ll help your prospect laser-focus their own graphics strategy to strike right at the heel and take over.
Quantcast
Though not as useful for researching a website that hasn’t “quantified” their site (meaning they’ve installed Quantcast’s tracking code on their site), Quantcast is highly useful for gaining deep insight into your audience demographics, plus you can now purchase highly targeted traffic for you or your clients. Quantcast is apparently the only website that can track your conversions based on key demographics, identify the avatar of your converting customer, and then drive “look alike” visitors that match those demographics to your site.
Virgin America recently did a case study with Quantcast that showed a 500% increase in conversions just based on household education level. This would be valuable to work into your strategy with your client or into your own marketing strategy.
Other Competitive Analysis Tools
Websites for Spying on Others’ Marketing Experiments and Data
Here’s how you can capitalize on the advanced testing, data mining and marketing experiments that others are doing. Because let’s face it, most freelancers don’t have the time or inclination to put in all that leg work ourselves.
You can easily find out things like:
- What kind of email strategies convert best
- Elements that jack up pay-per-click conversions by 200%
- Specific case studies for 124% increase in conversions for offline-to-online marketing campaigns
- Ways to improve your value proposition (promise or selling proposition) for 204% increase in conversions during a down economy
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