July 15, 2025 • 23 mins
In this transformative episode, Philippa Gamse, Owner of Websites That Win International, shares strategies to optimize your website’s performance through analytics. If you struggle with unclear website goals or wasted marketing spend, you won’t want to miss it.
You will discover:
- Why benchmarking against competitors can mislead your website strategy.
- How to set clear, actionable goals for your website’s customer journey.
- What notional values reveal about your marketing tactics’ true impact.
This episode is ideal for Founders, Owners, and CEOs in stage 5 of The Founder's Evolution. Not sure which stage you're in? Find out for free in less than 10 minutes at https://www.scalearchitects.com/founders/quiz
Philippa Gamse has clocked over 25 years in digital marketing strategy and analytics, consulted with nearly 500 clients, and worked with websites that have generated hundreds of millions of dollars. Owners and marketing executives hire Philippa to find hidden insights in their web analytics that will grow their business and cut wasted spending because many are missing those “hidden gems.” Philippa is the author of “42 Rules for a Website That Wins”, endorsed by Guy Kawasaki, and has taught at three international business schools.
Want to learn more about Philippa Gamse's work at Websites That Win International? Check out her website at https://www.websitesthatwin.com/ or connect with her on LinkedIn https://www.linkedin.com/in/philippagamse/
To learn more about Scott, visit https://www.scattritzheimer.com.
To get help scaling your own business or nonprofit, visit https://www.scalearchitects.com
Mentioned in this episode:
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:01):
All right, here we go.
Hello, hello and welcome.
Welcome once again to the Start, Scale and Succeed podcast, the only podcast that growswith you through all seven stages of your journey as a founder.
And today's guest is Philippa Games.
And she's here to talk to us about three, what I found are very clever rules that you'veprobably never heard of.
(00:25):
And they're quite important because these three rules, along with a couple others, willdetermine whether your website is a winner or not.
Philippa has clocked over 25 years in digital marketing strategy and analytics andconsulted with nearly 500 clients during that time span and worked with websites that have
cumulatively generated hundreds of millions of dollars.
(00:49):
Owners and marketing executives hire her to find hidden insights in their web analyticsthat will grow their business and cut wasted spending because many are missing those
hidden gems.
She's helped clients in North America, in Europe, in the Middle East to translate thenumbers into transformational ideas that move the business forward, reveal opportunities
(01:12):
for new markets, products, and services, and maximize the return on their investment.
Philippa is also the author of 42 Rules for a website that wins, which was endorsed bynone other than Guy Kawasaki and has taught at three international business schools.
She's here with us today
Philippa, I'm so excited to have you on the show.
(01:34):
It's been a minute in coming, but we finally got you here.
And you've got these 42 rules for websites that win.
And as I was reading through the book, there were three that really jumped out as likeinstantly true, but wildly underappreciated.
And so I wanna dive into a couple of these.
There are 42 of them, we're not gonna hit all 42, but there's a few here that I think arereally powerful.
(01:57):
So the first one.
is something that I think is the opposite of what most people have heard, is rule numberfour for your book is beware of benchmarking and best practices.
So why do we need to beware of benchmarking and best practices?
Hi, good morning, Scott.
It's great to be on the show.
Yeah, it's interesting.
(02:17):
A lot of people say, well, how do people in my industry typically, you know, succeed orwhat's the average number of visitors, open rate, conversion rate, whatever.
And I'm always a bit wary of comparing your business online with others in the space.
(02:39):
Not to say it's never worth it.
But the thing is, let's say that you're doing much better than other competitors.
I mean, you the problem is you don't know what the other competitors are doing, or youdon't necessarily know how good their marketing is, how their efforts compare to yours,
how much resources they're spending.
(03:00):
So if you're doing particularly well, that's great.
But what you don't want to do is say, we're doing great.
So we don't have to worry so much.
And equally, if you're not doing so well against them, you don't want sort of panic.
I mean, yes, you want to do better.
But the question is, how are you doing against your own goals, your own targets?
(03:21):
And I mean, I think the industry benchmarks, okay, you can take a look at them.
I mean, another question is how good the data is.
Because of course, a lot of the information that goes into things like conversion ratesand revenue and so on, directly attributable to the website.
is pretty confidential.
So, you know, yes, always take a look at them.
(03:43):
But what I'm usually much more interested in is let's set our goals and our targets, andthen benchmark ourselves against you know, our original measurements and where we are a
month from now, three months from now, and so on.
Yeah.
Yeah.
I love that because I, like, I just find, like you're saying, I've worked with so manycompanies and their data on their conversion rates, number one, are all measured slightly
(04:08):
differently, right?
So like, what is the numerator?
What's the denominator?
Like, is it when they sign up for a free trial?
Is it when they actually pay something?
Is it when they buy millions of dollars of stuff or make a $1 transaction?
So...
Even inside of an industry is very, very big differences.
And a lot of them don't measure it very well, even if it is defined the same.
(04:29):
Right.
And so it's like how that data validity points a really big one.
And and and I love that it's not just don't do this, right.
But it is do do this and using the website and saying,
What are our goals?
What do we need it to do is so important because who cares what your conversion rate is ifit doesn't actually move you to your goal as a company.
(04:54):
So, so much wisdom in that.
It begs the question, yes.
sorry, I was just gonna say, I'm honestly amazed at the number of business owners ordecision makers that I meet who can't articulate those goals to me when we first start
talking.
And I just wanted to throw that in.
that was exactly where I was gonna go next because there's this like part of our brain,right?
(05:17):
That is the part, this is not scientifically accurate.
There's a part of our brain that is responsible for setting website goals, right?
And for a lot of CEOs and business owners, they use all kinds of other parts, but theconnections are just missing.
And so...
You talk to them about your goal for this, your goal for that, and they're on it andthey've got metrics and they understand it and they're driving it it's awesome.
(05:38):
And then you say, well, what role does your website play in that?
And then it's like crickets.
It's just, it's no idea.
So thinking through, and I've just bumped into this a lot recently, so there's no reasonto pick this specific criteria other than I've just bumped into it a lot.
But there are lots of folks who create successful businesses, millions, hundreds ofmillions of dollars a year.
(06:01):
but they largely do it offline.
Sure, they have a website, and maybe people look at that website, but they don't producethrough that website, right?
Or at least not intentionally.
And they realize, hey, at this stage, we want to have a better online presence.
People are making decisions that way.
And we want to be able to take advantage of a website.
(06:23):
We want our website to actually help us win as opposed to just being there.
So...
How do you help them figure out what those appropriate goals should be?
So the thing is, I mean, maybe even if you don't start out with specific targets, but whatyou need to do with your site is to be aware of all the things that you want it to do.
(06:46):
And everybody focuses on the obvious one, which is sales and revenue, direct revenuecoming in.
Okay, but very few people buy from a website on their first visit, you know.
And so,
It's interesting that when we look at website performance, a lot of people will focus alot on acquisition costs.
(07:11):
You know, how much does it cost me to get traffic to the site?
And then they'll look at the end results, you know, how many people actually spend somemoney, but they miss the whole big space in the middle.
You know, we talk about the customer journey, right?
Which is kind of the behavior engagement piece where people have said, okay, I found youand I'm thinking about.
(07:33):
doing business with you, but I haven't decided yet.
And now I'm looking at your website to find out more about what you do.
And to make important decisions like do I trust this business that I have just found?
How do you create that that online trust with them?
And so really being aware of especially that big piece in the middle that most so manybusinesses ignore.
(07:56):
So for example, I've got video on my website.
which is really important because video is a really good way of marketing and it reallygives people a feel for your business or who they might meet in your business.
mean, it's still a people selling is still a people thing, A relationship thing.
And so how many people watch those videos?
(08:18):
How many people watch those videos beyond the first five, 10 seconds, because you'd beamazed how many people fall off watching a video, right?
So looking at all the elements on your site,
and how they work together and how they work individually and how they relate not only toyour major goals, which are obviously to sell something usually or to get a lead, but how
(08:39):
do they relate to the goals that you have that take them along that process, like maybesigning up for a newsletter or a free trial or after sales.
Let's not forget the after sales, right?
Joining your frequent buyer club if you have one, something like that, right?
So being aware of all the points on your site where you want something to happen andfiguring out if it is happening.
(09:02):
And if it is, then you can say, is it happening at a rate that feels reasonable to us?
And obviously smaller goals will have a higher conversion rate than larger ones.
even that piece, we just said, it's amazing how many people can't articulate this, buteven that piece like.
Where are all the calls to action on your website?
Do you know exactly what you want people to do on every page of the site?
(09:27):
And the answer is often no.
It's so true.
It's so true.
I love that.
And, you know, for some folks listening, like, we don't even know what should feel good ornot feel good.
I, okay, right?
If you're not sure, then pick one and try to improve it.
And if you move the needle on it, great.
If you don't move the needle on it, then you can sit down and say, hey, do we still reallywant to try this or do we want to move on to something and see if there's some low-hanging
(09:53):
fruit there?
So I think we were so used to
operating or trying to get to clarity that we've lost our tolerance for mystery to someextent.
And I think it hurts us in a place like this.
I want to jump to rule number nine.
So do the math before you do the deal.
(10:15):
And this just ties into a lot of what we've talked about so far, but
When we're doing the math, one of the challenges are you sit down with a marketing agencyand they just start rattling off like this and likes and that and the other and the other.
And it's like, I don't even know what math to do.
So what's the math that we wanna do and why is it important that we do it ahead of thedeal?
(10:40):
Right.
And, well, and of course, some of that like likes and so on, you you want to reallydistinguish between the things that are actually moving your business forward, as you just
said, and, you know, likes are lovely, but that doesn't mean people are buying anything.
It's the same as a marketing agency that will tell you, look, we're doing our job becauseyou've got more visitors this week than you did last week.
(11:00):
And the question is, so what did those visitors actually do anything?
Did therefore my actual goals, goal conversions increase?
Or were they the wrong kind of visitor because there's a huge difference there, right?
so one of the things that We teach analytic students But also obviously I try to practicemyself is If you if you've to decide what you want to test and what you want to change and
(11:29):
what you want to focus on I mean one thing you can't do
is look at every single metric you could possibly think of the whole time, because you'lljust get completely overwhelmed and there's no point.
There's actually no point measuring anything unless you're gonna do something about it,unless you've got a reason for measuring it that you can act on.
And so suppose you've got something that you want to play with where you're looking to geta conversion, you're not getting a conversion.
(11:53):
One of the things that it's well worth doing is to say, can we put a value on thisconversion?
And if we can put a value on it, then we can say, right, well, if we increase this, if wecan increase the rate, we're going to increase the outcome, the value of the outcome,
(12:13):
right?
And what might that increase be?
And it's often difficult to say what increase we expect, but you can do a notional one.
can say, look, if we improve conversion rates by 1%, which unfortunately in today's webworld is still an improvement, right?
know, for a lot of businesses that will make an actual tangible difference in revenue.
(12:37):
So it's important to think that way.
And you can do that.
I mean, putting some sort of value on every single point where you're measuring whethervisitors do something can be really helpful.
So for example, I worked with a company that B2B company, but they had a sales process.
And one of the first things that you could do was download, you know, a list of
(12:59):
parts, specifications and so on, right, that detailed out what you might want to buy.
And then you could download another list of shipping rates for different types of assemblyor whatever it was they were doing.
And then obviously you could track your orders.
And so obviously orders, you know how much you're making because there's a certain amountof money people are buying, right.
(13:24):
But what's the value of downloading a list of a spec list?
Hmm.
actually they did, they just put a notional like, for example, say your sale was $10.
I mean, this obviously silly example, just proportionally, they would say, right, if youdownload the specs, that's maybe $1.
If you download the shipping rates, that tells us that you're further down that line ofmaking a decision because you're interested enough to know, okay, what's it going to cost
(13:51):
me to buy this, in addition to the actual price, right.
And so maybe that's $3.
in relation to your 10, right?
And it's all notional, but it doesn't really matter because what that allows you to dothat they did really well is that when you're looking at your analytics, if you add
notional values to your micro goals, your steps along the way, then you can start lookingat more interesting things like which of our marketing tactics lead to the most value in
(14:22):
terms of those micro conversions.
which is really interesting.
And then you get to see how valuable things like email are, even though everybody likes tostill say that email is dead, but it's really not.
You know, but you can then you can see things.
Another thing that I is really a bugbear of mine, you know, that a lot of people do socialmedia advertising, right, because they think that it's all the buzz.
(14:48):
But if in my experience, often, if you look at social media,
from that perspective of how much actual value does it add to the business, it's it's youreally start wondering why you're bothering.
And not because there's anything wrong in that sense of social media, but people are noton social media doing business most of the time.
Right, right, unless you're selling t-shirts or something.
(15:11):
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
you know, one of the other rules in the book that I don't have picked up is is one sizedoes not fit all.
So you know, my whatever we say, you've really got to look at and say, does this apply tomy business?
100%, 100%.
One more rule, and then I've got another question for you that I'm interested to see yourresponse.
(15:34):
Rule number two, so we're actually going back to the beginning here.
Rule number two, appoint your web ambassador.
Emphasizes that you have a dedicated website overseer.
So what is a web ambassador, and who in an organization usually fills that role?
So, you know, this is really interesting because the truth is, I wrote this book a whileago.
(15:55):
And, you know, I think, I mean, hopefully it's still relevant, because we're still talkingabout it.
And I hope by the time this podcast comes out that I will have another book on the market,which will be much more up to date.
But a little while after I wrote this book, a position emerged, which was called ChiefDigital Officer.
And I actually think that to some extent, my my perspective of this web ambassador conceptwas
(16:20):
in fact, the Chief Digital Officer in some ways.
But what I was really trying to get at was the amount of times where I would see in a in acompany or a business, different departments not talking to each other in any way that
would allow for really good leverage between them and what they were selling.
(16:40):
And, know, because on the web, it's a web, right, we can go from here to here to here.
And sometimes visitors will do that in a way that we just don't expect.
There was synergy between different departments that didn't didn't show up.
And so they were missing out on being able to say, hey, you just bought this.
(17:01):
And we've also got this service or this product that you know.
And additionally, when you're trying to be really effective, the silos, the politicalsilos that exist, that says this department can't have this data because it doesn't belong
to them.
where if they had some of that data, and they knew what was going on, they could say,right, this helps us to do our bit.
(17:24):
And I, and you still see all that.
And what I was trying to do with the web ambassador thing was to get beyond that and tohave somebody who had the authority to put all of this together, and not only authority,
but also the the insight, the vision, the access to put all of this together and say,right, this is how we do this holistically across the whole organization.
Yeah.
(17:45):
I love that because, you know, if you're a teeny little company, it's to some extent adistinction without a difference.
But you're right, as you get bigger, as these different divisions and departments start tobecome more solidified and complex and dare we say it, more siloed, then yeah, it starts
to actually split the side apart and just becomes really problematic.
(18:06):
And I love this idea of having someone
who doesn't get their way on everything but is responsible for coordinating all these waysinto one cohesive experience for users.
And I think some of it is just literally communication, just communication not happening.
And in larger companies, you know, I've seen it where you've got a multinational company,where the big decisions are made somewhere else, and the local market is saying, hey, we
(18:32):
really need to do this.
And the big decision makers are saying no, potentially, maybe just because they can't seethe benefit because they're not there and they're not getting enough data.
But I but I do still see that.
Yeah, so true.
Philippa, there's a question that I have I ask everyone.
I'm interested to see what you have to say.
what would you say is the biggest secret that you wish wasn't a secret at all?
(18:56):
What's that one thing you wish everybody watching and listening today knew?
Honestly, I think if you're not really making the most use potentially of your web.
So we've been talking about websites, but the key for me to that is your analytics andwhat they can tell you.
Because just looking at the site doesn't tell you anything, right.
(19:16):
And to find a company or a business that's really making really, really full in depth useof what that information can tell them.
A lot of the times people don't and they do
kind of stick with good, comfortable, familiar stuff like vanity stuff of, know, we'regetting more this week, this this week than we did last week, but there's no so what to
(19:39):
it.
So, you know, don't measure for the sake of it.
Measure what you're going to do something about.
But measure, you know.
Yeah, so true, so true.
Phillipa, there's some folks listening would just love to have some help and clarity ontheir website.
Interested in this new book that you have coming out, where can they find more out aboutyou and the work that you do?
(20:01):
Sure.
So first of all, I'm on LinkedIn.
And I think honestly, I think I am the only person in the entire world with my name.
So I don't have any Google gangers.
So you can easily find me on LinkedIn.
And I am very happy to connect with people.
And also, my website is websites that win.com.
(20:21):
And on the site, there is an ebook that has some stories of things that we found inanalytics.
that we couldn't have otherwise known that have allowed us to make actual specific andtangible changes to a site or even to the business that made significant difference that
we couldn't have known without analytics.
And it's not a techie book.
(20:43):
It's all in English.
There are no charts in it.
But you know, it's designed to give people some inspiration and some ideas.
That's awesome.
Excellent.
Well, head on over to websites.win.com.
Check out the eBooks.
Fantastic.
Short and sweet.
Very, very powerful and ensure to inspire you and your website development.
Philippa, thanks for being on the show.
It's just a privilege and honor having you here today.
(21:05):
And for those of you watching and listening, you know your time and attention mean theworld to us.
I hope you got as much out of this conversation as I know I did and I cannot wait to seeyou next time.
Take care.
Excellent, well done.
Well, well done.
Let me hit stop here.
All right, here we go.
Hello, hello and welcome.
Welcome once again to the Start, Scale and Succeed podcast, the only podcast that growswith you through all seven stages of your journey as a founder.
And today's guest is Philippa Games.
And she's here to talk to us about three, what I found are very clever rules that you'veprobably never heard of.
(00:25):
And they're quite important because these three rules, along with a couple others, willdetermine whether your website is a winner or not.
Philippa has clocked over 25 years in digital marketing strategy and analytics andconsulted with nearly 500 clients during that time span and worked with websites that have
cumulatively generated hundreds of millions of dollars.
(00:49):
Owners and marketing executives hire her to find hidden insights in their web analyticsthat will grow their business and cut wasted spending because many are missing those
hidden gems.
She's helped clients in North America, in Europe, in the Middle East to translate thenumbers into transformational ideas that move the business forward, reveal opportunities
(01:12):
for new markets, products, and services, and maximize the return on their investment.
Philippa is also the author of 42 Rules for a website that wins, which was endorsed bynone other than Guy Kawasaki and has taught at three international business schools.
She's here with us today
Philippa, I'm so excited to have you on the show.
(01:34):
It's been a minute in coming, but we finally got you here.
And you've got these 42 rules for websites that win.
And as I was reading through the book, there were three that really jumped out as likeinstantly true, but wildly underappreciated.
And so I wanna dive into a couple of these.
There are 42 of them, we're not gonna hit all 42, but there's a few here that I think arereally powerful.
(01:57):
So the first one.
is something that I think is the opposite of what most people have heard, is rule numberfour for your book is beware of benchmarking and best practices.
So why do we need to beware of benchmarking and best practices?
Hi, good morning, Scott.
It's great to be on the show.
Yeah, it's interesting.
(02:17):
A lot of people say, well, how do people in my industry typically, you know, succeed orwhat's the average number of visitors, open rate, conversion rate, whatever.
And I'm always a bit wary of comparing your business online with others in the space.
(02:39):
Not to say it's never worth it.
But the thing is, let's say that you're doing much better than other competitors.
I mean, you the problem is you don't know what the other competitors are doing, or youdon't necessarily know how good their marketing is, how their efforts compare to yours,
how much resources they're spending.
(03:00):
So if you're doing particularly well, that's great.
But what you don't want to do is say, we're doing great.
So we don't have to worry so much.
And equally, if you're not doing so well against them, you don't want sort of panic.
I mean, yes, you want to do better.
But the question is, how are you doing against your own goals, your own targets?
(03:21):
And I mean, I think the industry benchmarks, okay, you can take a look at them.
I mean, another question is how good the data is.
Because of course, a lot of the information that goes into things like conversion ratesand revenue and so on, directly attributable to the website.
is pretty confidential.
So, you know, yes, always take a look at them.
(03:43):
But what I'm usually much more interested in is let's set our goals and our targets, andthen benchmark ourselves against you know, our original measurements and where we are a
month from now, three months from now, and so on.
Yeah.
Yeah.
I love that because I, like, I just find, like you're saying, I've worked with so manycompanies and their data on their conversion rates, number one, are all measured slightly
(04:08):
differently, right?
So like, what is the numerator?
What's the denominator?
Like, is it when they sign up for a free trial?
Is it when they actually pay something?
Is it when they buy millions of dollars of stuff or make a $1 transaction?
So...
Even inside of an industry is very, very big differences.
And a lot of them don't measure it very well, even if it is defined the same.
(04:29):
Right.
And so it's like how that data validity points a really big one.
And and and I love that it's not just don't do this, right.
But it is do do this and using the website and saying,
What are our goals?
What do we need it to do is so important because who cares what your conversion rate is ifit doesn't actually move you to your goal as a company.
(04:54):
So, so much wisdom in that.
It begs the question, yes.
sorry, I was just gonna say, I'm honestly amazed at the number of business owners ordecision makers that I meet who can't articulate those goals to me when we first start
talking.
And I just wanted to throw that in.
that was exactly where I was gonna go next because there's this like part of our brain,right?
(05:17):
That is the part, this is not scientifically accurate.
There's a part of our brain that is responsible for setting website goals, right?
And for a lot of CEOs and business owners, they use all kinds of other parts, but theconnections are just missing.
And so...
You talk to them about your goal for this, your goal for that, and they're on it andthey've got metrics and they understand it and they're driving it it's awesome.
(05:38):
And then you say, well, what role does your website play in that?
And then it's like crickets.
It's just, it's no idea.
So thinking through, and I've just bumped into this a lot recently, so there's no reasonto pick this specific criteria other than I've just bumped into it a lot.
But there are lots of folks who create successful businesses, millions, hundreds ofmillions of dollars a year.
(06:01):
but they largely do it offline.
Sure, they have a website, and maybe people look at that website, but they don't producethrough that website, right?
Or at least not intentionally.
And they realize, hey, at this stage, we want to have a better online presence.
People are making decisions that way.
And we want to be able to take advantage of a website.
(06:23):
We want our website to actually help us win as opposed to just being there.
So...
How do you help them figure out what those appropriate goals should be?
So the thing is, I mean, maybe even if you don't start out with specific targets, but whatyou need to do with your site is to be aware of all the things that you want it to do.
(06:46):
And everybody focuses on the obvious one, which is sales and revenue, direct revenuecoming in.
Okay, but very few people buy from a website on their first visit, you know.
And so,
It's interesting that when we look at website performance, a lot of people will focus alot on acquisition costs.
(07:11):
You know, how much does it cost me to get traffic to the site?
And then they'll look at the end results, you know, how many people actually spend somemoney, but they miss the whole big space in the middle.
You know, we talk about the customer journey, right?
Which is kind of the behavior engagement piece where people have said, okay, I found youand I'm thinking about.
(07:33):
doing business with you, but I haven't decided yet.
And now I'm looking at your website to find out more about what you do.
And to make important decisions like do I trust this business that I have just found?
How do you create that that online trust with them?
And so really being aware of especially that big piece in the middle that most so manybusinesses ignore.
(07:56):
So for example, I've got video on my website.
which is really important because video is a really good way of marketing and it reallygives people a feel for your business or who they might meet in your business.
mean, it's still a people selling is still a people thing, A relationship thing.
And so how many people watch those videos?
(08:18):
How many people watch those videos beyond the first five, 10 seconds, because you'd beamazed how many people fall off watching a video, right?
So looking at all the elements on your site,
and how they work together and how they work individually and how they relate not only toyour major goals, which are obviously to sell something usually or to get a lead, but how
(08:39):
do they relate to the goals that you have that take them along that process, like maybesigning up for a newsletter or a free trial or after sales.
Let's not forget the after sales, right?
Joining your frequent buyer club if you have one, something like that, right?
So being aware of all the points on your site where you want something to happen andfiguring out if it is happening.
(09:02):
And if it is, then you can say, is it happening at a rate that feels reasonable to us?
And obviously smaller goals will have a higher conversion rate than larger ones.
even that piece, we just said, it's amazing how many people can't articulate this, buteven that piece like.
Where are all the calls to action on your website?
Do you know exactly what you want people to do on every page of the site?
(09:27):
And the answer is often no.
It's so true.
It's so true.
I love that.
And, you know, for some folks listening, like, we don't even know what should feel good ornot feel good.
I, okay, right?
If you're not sure, then pick one and try to improve it.
And if you move the needle on it, great.
If you don't move the needle on it, then you can sit down and say, hey, do we still reallywant to try this or do we want to move on to something and see if there's some low-hanging
(09:53):
fruit there?
So I think we were so used to
operating or trying to get to clarity that we've lost our tolerance for mystery to someextent.
And I think it hurts us in a place like this.
I want to jump to rule number nine.
So do the math before you do the deal.
(10:15):
And this just ties into a lot of what we've talked about so far, but
When we're doing the math, one of the challenges are you sit down with a marketing agencyand they just start rattling off like this and likes and that and the other and the other.
And it's like, I don't even know what math to do.
So what's the math that we wanna do and why is it important that we do it ahead of thedeal?
(10:40):
Right.
And, well, and of course, some of that like likes and so on, you you want to reallydistinguish between the things that are actually moving your business forward, as you just
said, and, you know, likes are lovely, but that doesn't mean people are buying anything.
It's the same as a marketing agency that will tell you, look, we're doing our job becauseyou've got more visitors this week than you did last week.
(11:00):
And the question is, so what did those visitors actually do anything?
Did therefore my actual goals, goal conversions increase?
Or were they the wrong kind of visitor because there's a huge difference there, right?
so one of the things that We teach analytic students But also obviously I try to practicemyself is If you if you've to decide what you want to test and what you want to change and
(11:29):
what you want to focus on I mean one thing you can't do
is look at every single metric you could possibly think of the whole time, because you'lljust get completely overwhelmed and there's no point.
There's actually no point measuring anything unless you're gonna do something about it,unless you've got a reason for measuring it that you can act on.
And so suppose you've got something that you want to play with where you're looking to geta conversion, you're not getting a conversion.
(11:53):
One of the things that it's well worth doing is to say, can we put a value on thisconversion?
And if we can put a value on it, then we can say, right, well, if we increase this, if wecan increase the rate, we're going to increase the outcome, the value of the outcome,
(12:13):
right?
And what might that increase be?
And it's often difficult to say what increase we expect, but you can do a notional one.
can say, look, if we improve conversion rates by 1%, which unfortunately in today's webworld is still an improvement, right?
know, for a lot of businesses that will make an actual tangible difference in revenue.
(12:37):
So it's important to think that way.
And you can do that.
I mean, putting some sort of value on every single point where you're measuring whethervisitors do something can be really helpful.
So for example, I worked with a company that B2B company, but they had a sales process.
And one of the first things that you could do was download, you know, a list of
(12:59):
parts, specifications and so on, right, that detailed out what you might want to buy.
And then you could download another list of shipping rates for different types of assemblyor whatever it was they were doing.
And then obviously you could track your orders.
And so obviously orders, you know how much you're making because there's a certain amountof money people are buying, right.
(13:24):
But what's the value of downloading a list of a spec list?
Hmm.
actually they did, they just put a notional like, for example, say your sale was $10.
I mean, this obviously silly example, just proportionally, they would say, right, if youdownload the specs, that's maybe $1.
If you download the shipping rates, that tells us that you're further down that line ofmaking a decision because you're interested enough to know, okay, what's it going to cost
(13:51):
me to buy this, in addition to the actual price, right.
And so maybe that's $3.
in relation to your 10, right?
And it's all notional, but it doesn't really matter because what that allows you to dothat they did really well is that when you're looking at your analytics, if you add
notional values to your micro goals, your steps along the way, then you can start lookingat more interesting things like which of our marketing tactics lead to the most value in
(14:22):
terms of those micro conversions.
which is really interesting.
And then you get to see how valuable things like email are, even though everybody likes tostill say that email is dead, but it's really not.
You know, but you can then you can see things.
Another thing that I is really a bugbear of mine, you know, that a lot of people do socialmedia advertising, right, because they think that it's all the buzz.
(14:48):
But if in my experience, often, if you look at social media,
from that perspective of how much actual value does it add to the business, it's it's youreally start wondering why you're bothering.
And not because there's anything wrong in that sense of social media, but people are noton social media doing business most of the time.
Right, right, unless you're selling t-shirts or something.
(15:11):
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
you know, one of the other rules in the book that I don't have picked up is is one sizedoes not fit all.
So you know, my whatever we say, you've really got to look at and say, does this apply tomy business?
100%, 100%.
One more rule, and then I've got another question for you that I'm interested to see yourresponse.
(15:34):
Rule number two, so we're actually going back to the beginning here.
Rule number two, appoint your web ambassador.
Emphasizes that you have a dedicated website overseer.
So what is a web ambassador, and who in an organization usually fills that role?
So, you know, this is really interesting because the truth is, I wrote this book a whileago.
(15:55):
And, you know, I think, I mean, hopefully it's still relevant, because we're still talkingabout it.
And I hope by the time this podcast comes out that I will have another book on the market,which will be much more up to date.
But a little while after I wrote this book, a position emerged, which was called ChiefDigital Officer.
And I actually think that to some extent, my my perspective of this web ambassador conceptwas
(16:20):
in fact, the Chief Digital Officer in some ways.
But what I was really trying to get at was the amount of times where I would see in a in acompany or a business, different departments not talking to each other in any way that
would allow for really good leverage between them and what they were selling.
(16:40):
And, know, because on the web, it's a web, right, we can go from here to here to here.
And sometimes visitors will do that in a way that we just don't expect.
There was synergy between different departments that didn't didn't show up.
And so they were missing out on being able to say, hey, you just bought this.
(17:01):
And we've also got this service or this product that you know.
And additionally, when you're trying to be really effective, the silos, the politicalsilos that exist, that says this department can't have this data because it doesn't belong
to them.
where if they had some of that data, and they knew what was going on, they could say,right, this helps us to do our bit.
(17:24):
And I, and you still see all that.
And what I was trying to do with the web ambassador thing was to get beyond that and tohave somebody who had the authority to put all of this together, and not only authority,
but also the the insight, the vision, the access to put all of this together and say,right, this is how we do this holistically across the whole organization.
Yeah.
(17:45):
I love that because, you know, if you're a teeny little company, it's to some extent adistinction without a difference.
But you're right, as you get bigger, as these different divisions and departments start tobecome more solidified and complex and dare we say it, more siloed, then yeah, it starts
to actually split the side apart and just becomes really problematic.
(18:06):
And I love this idea of having someone
who doesn't get their way on everything but is responsible for coordinating all these waysinto one cohesive experience for users.
And I think some of it is just literally communication, just communication not happening.
And in larger companies, you know, I've seen it where you've got a multinational company,where the big decisions are made somewhere else, and the local market is saying, hey, we
(18:32):
really need to do this.
And the big decision makers are saying no, potentially, maybe just because they can't seethe benefit because they're not there and they're not getting enough data.
But I but I do still see that.
Yeah, so true.
Philippa, there's a question that I have I ask everyone.
I'm interested to see what you have to say.
what would you say is the biggest secret that you wish wasn't a secret at all?
(18:56):
What's that one thing you wish everybody watching and listening today knew?
Honestly, I think if you're not really making the most use potentially of your web.
So we've been talking about websites, but the key for me to that is your analytics andwhat they can tell you.
Because just looking at the site doesn't tell you anything, right.
(19:16):
And to find a company or a business that's really making really, really full in depth useof what that information can tell them.
A lot of the times people don't and they do
kind of stick with good, comfortable, familiar stuff like vanity stuff of, know, we'regetting more this week, this this week than we did last week, but there's no so what to
(19:39):
it.
So, you know, don't measure for the sake of it.
Measure what you're going to do something about.
But measure, you know.
Yeah, so true, so true.
Phillipa, there's some folks listening would just love to have some help and clarity ontheir website.
Interested in this new book that you have coming out, where can they find more out aboutyou and the work that you do?
(20:01):
Sure.
So first of all, I'm on LinkedIn.
And I think honestly, I think I am the only person in the entire world with my name.
So I don't have any Google gangers.
So you can easily find me on LinkedIn.
And I am very happy to connect with people.
And also, my website is websites that win.com.
(20:21):
And on the site, there is an ebook that has some stories of things that we found inanalytics.
that we couldn't have otherwise known that have allowed us to make actual specific andtangible changes to a site or even to the business that made significant difference that
we couldn't have known without analytics.
And it's not a techie book.
(20:43):
It's all in English.
There are no charts in it.
But you know, it's designed to give people some inspiration and some ideas.
That's awesome.
Excellent.
Well, head on over to websites.win.com.
Check out the eBooks.
Fantastic.
Short and sweet.
Very, very powerful and ensure to inspire you and your website development.
Philippa, thanks for being on the show.
It's just a privilege and honor having you here today.
(21:05):
And for those of you watching and listening, you know your time and attention mean theworld to us.
I hope you got as much out of this conversation as I know I did and I cannot wait to seeyou next time.
Take care.
Excellent, well done.
Well, well done.
Let me hit stop here.
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