Measuring online advertising has typically revolved around online impacts. Click through rates, impressions, sales, repeat visitors were all accounted for. But now Google attempts to dive into the perviously inexplicable offline impacts. That’s right, Google is proving there is a direct correlation between someone seeing a search ad and then visiting a brick and mortar store.
The “store visits” tool hopes to shed light into measuring store visits. Online Brands explained it saying, “This tool allows marketers to see which type of search ads – including local inventory and product listing ads, motivate people to sign off and visit a physical store.
The tool uses an algorithm to estimate the number of people who went to a store as a result of seeing an ad within 30 days. Advertisers are given anonymous data collected from smartphone users who have turned on their location history.”
Google hopes this tool can be used to improve Estimated Total Conversions. Considering that a rough 95% of retail sales occur in physical stores, it makes perfect sense to try and measure them!
Googles believes gaining insights into these new, complex purchase paths will bring three results:
- Optimise online marketing programs
- Design better experiences for customers
- Allocate marketing budgets more effectively
Do you believe this store visits tool really is the most effective way to meet these results?
