OMS: You Shape The Direction Of Your Brand

Please send me an e-mail message if you'd like for me to send you a copy of the OMS spreadsheet to follow along with our posts.

Do you ever feel like you don't make a difference?

Maybe you are the humble paid search analyst at your company, and your CEO wonders what you're doing with all of those confusing keywords.

Maybe you just had a breakthrough --- you've found one set of keywords that, coupled with outstanding merchandise, cause a breakthrough in conversion rate.

Can you prove your worth to your CEO?

Go to the OMS spreadsheet. Take a look at cells N15 - N27. These are the annual demand totals for each merchandise division five years from now.

Now try this. Go to cell B39, and instead of the value 3,599 that is in that cell, change the cell to "6,599". In other words, you are adding 3,000 new customers, over each of the next five years, to the business, because you did such a great job of finding a set of keywords that, coupled with outstanding merchandise, cause a breakthrough in conversion rate.

Now look at cells N15 - N27. How did the cells differ?

Well, you've increased the value of your business over time, haven't you? Look at merchandise divisions 14 and 21.

• Division 14 Old Value = $8.9 million. New Value = $9.3 million.
• Division 21 Old Value = $1.17 million. New Value = $1.23 million.

Each division experienced increases of more than 4%, just from a subtle change in keyword strategy across a few merchandise divisions. Also notice that all merchandise divisions generated some benefit, as customers spilled-over, during the course of five years, from divisions 14 and 21 into other divisions. In year five, the business is $800,000 bigger because of the efforts of one individual, making one or two subtle changes today.

Every online marketing professional is making small improvements, improvements that have long-term consequences. As an industry, we do a terrible job of demonstrating our value, on a long-term basis.

The CEO uses the Online Marketing Simulation environment to understand the value all employees bring to the table. Once we get to see that value, illustrated over time, we make different decisions in the short-term to capitalize on it. Online marketing is taken in a new direction, a more productive direction.