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During the month of June, more than 300,000 phone calls were made to companies directly from the ads they were viewing on elclasificado.com. While this number may seem impressive, at the same time, it does not fully account for all calls that were made as neither users accessing the site from their desktop would not be able to have the calls tracked via analytics nor anyone who did not click to the phone call button from their mobile devices. In either case, both options also provide enough flexibility for us to assume that many calls that may have been placed to the advertisers were not necessarily measured, and, while already impressive, could potentially be even more so as the total calls are most likely already understated.

However, what’s most important, beyond just determining what the elclasificado.com visitors were interested in, is understanding what drove the visitor to actually make a call.

1. PRICE

Hispanic_Family_in_Front_of_Rental_HomeThis should be a no-brainer, but price is effectively one of the easiest ways to drive a greater response to advertisements. Looking back over the month of June, one of the highest performing ads was for a rental property located in Bell Gardens, CA. The ad itself was short and direct, highlighting only price, location, property type, and how many bedrooms there were, which happened to be four. The monthly rent also include a yard and a garage for a total cost of $1,200. In all, the information was merely a list fit into a single sentence. To further put this into context, and how the price could potentially drive a greater response, other ads placed in the same city happened to be a 3 bedroom duplex for $1,600 and $1,200 for a 2 bedroom apartment and neither garnered neadly as much attention. By comparison, the price alone for people looking for rental properties was going to drive a response when compared to the other options, even when the other options had more of a description. However, in the case where the price may be high and negotiable…

2. HOW NOT INCLUDING THE PRICE CAN DRIVE PHONE CALLS AS WELL

Hispanic_Family_Showing_Off_Keys_to_New_CarSeemingly contradictory to the first point, towards the end of the month, two of strongest performing automotive ads on elclasificado.comactually did not include the price. However, what they did include was the make/model, images, and some basic information that a car buyer would be interested in knowing, albeit small lists of information such as “new tires,” “in excellent condition,” “cruise control,” or “All inspections passed” that could at times be relatively vague. This being said, what each of the ads did have was a message that was welcoming for inquiries. In one case, the message stated call without any commitment, while in the other all reasonable offers would be considered. In this case, it would stand to reason that ads with prices that are negotiable can often see greater results from actually not listing the price and leaving the cost open to offers.

3. APPEALING TO THE BUYERS SENSE OF IMMEDIACY

Hispanic_Woman_Calling_in_Response_to_Online_AdExamining our buy-and-sell categories, ads that included a sense of immediacy tended to perform best. In the case of one advertiser selling a fridge, the advertiser mentioned that she was moving to a new location where a refrigerator was not necessary. While the low price included for the refrigerator undoubtedly helped drive a response, her immediacy seemed to further help matters as she encouraged people to call immediately as if she was going to be moving in the near future and the fridge needed to be sold prior to that time. To further endorse this point, another advertiser selling furniture was asking callers to quickly call in order to take advantage of the deals he was offering in order to be able to buy a new sofa. While again, the price may seem to have some influence in regards to the total response generated, it’s also interesting to note that others advertising similar products without a sense of urgency did not see the same amount of calls, even when advertised in the same areas.

 

Of course, all these results are also relative in the context that a phone number is included in the ad, which is strongly encouraged to drive greater results. Looking at the different actions/indicators of interest that can be tracked by our analytics platform, phone calls accounted for nearly 70% of all actions taken in response to ads placed, and again, this also does not take into account calls that are not made from mobile devices. As a result, it is also entirely feasible that for the previously mentioned ads, more phone calls in response to their inquiries would have seen an even greater response.

Hispanic Content Marketing

*Google Analytics: June 2014