Sometimes users notice that the number of incoming calls in call tracking statistics differs from the real number of inquiries. That truly happens but there’s no blame for call tracking. To identify the reasons for this mismatch, we decided to write two articles. In this first article, we’ll touch common causes leading to differences in statistics. In the second one, we’ll talk about Google Analytics.
Reason #1: Use of guesswork instead of clear data
You can’t manage what you don’t measure, especially when you plan to manage sales with analytics. It may seem to you that you get an enormous number of incoming calls. However, if you don’t have a decent proof about it, how can you make data-based decisions?
Imagine that accounting manager doesn’t keep accounts but says “Maybe our revenues exceed our spending”. It’s the same.
What to do
Rely on call tracking data. Unlike guesswork or suggestions, call tracking is fully automated and provides true information. The call log or dashboard will show you the exact number of incoming calls. You may see it when entering your project in Ringostat.
Reason #2: Human factor
Managers of some companies still manually fill out the spreadsheets (in Excel or CRM systems). It leads to many mistakes and inaccuracies. If your company gets dozens of calls per day, you may forget to record the information due to the lack of time. Moreover, when manually filling out the spreadsheets, you don’t take into the consideration the info about missed calls.
What to do
Excel is good but you can’t optimize business process with it. Minimizing a manual labor lets to avoid mistakes. Therefore, call tracking and CRM integration is a good solution.
That allows to view all the phone calls (including missed ones) within CRM. By the way, if you don’t take into the consideration missed calls, the statistics remain inaccurate.
Reason #3: Use of outside phone service providers
Some phone calls aren’t considered by call tracking service. It happens in the following cases:
- Business activates call tracking not since the earliest days but after using virtual or traditional PBX. After activating of call tracking it continues getting the part of inquiries over this PBX or uses it only for making outgoing calls.
- Company uses call back widget from outside service provider.
- The phone calls come to mobile numbers of call center operators. That usually happens when employees work outside the office.
If clients call the phone number of the company that’s not used for tracking, you may have statistics mismatch. The reason is the phone calls come to you passing over call tracking service. Therefore, call tracking can’t log them. But if you track that marketing channels in another way, a little difference in statistics won’t be significant.
What to do
If you still want the real number of phone calls to be synchronized with the call tracking, you have to activate all the phone numbers of your company in call tracking service. For this, they must be in SIP format. You may ask your service provider to do it but consider that it’s not always possible.
If you’ve already specified your phone number somewhere, you can configure forwarding to it. Clients will think they call your usual number but the call will be logged in call tracking dashboard. And later you may see the data in the call log in Ringostat. However, this process takes a lot of time and energy. So carefully think if you really need it or a little mismatch won’t make a big difference for you.
Reason #4: There’s no number substitution on some pages and resources
Some companies specify the phone numbers not only on their websites. Therefore, clients can see their real phone numbers instead of substituted ones in different places:
- social media;
- landing pages of specific items;
- online bulletin boards and price comparison sites;
- email signatures;
- Google My Business cards;
- flyers, billboards where the company advertised before using a call analytics.
Sometimes it also happens that the old phone number of company stays somewhere on the website. For example, it’s possible if the website has hidden pages and there are no links to them. These pages could be used in the advertising or email campaign. Accordingly, Customer Support can’t guess the availability of such pages if a client didn’t inform them about that.
What to do
Actually, it’s quite difficult to take into consideration absolutely all places where the phone number of the company was specified. So if you forget some of them, there’s no reason to worry. The call tracking is usually configured for the most prioritized call sources. So inquiries from them are logged for sure.
The only thing you need to do is to consider that because of unaccounted sources you may get more phone calls than you view in statistics. Anyway if you configured the number substitution for needed marketing channels, you won’t miss a required information. For instance, the calls from PPC are more important than phone inquiries that came from word-of-mouth.The one phone call from the old flyer won’t spoil your statistics.
By the way, some companies track just a few paid advertising channels and that’s enough for them. Thus our report on calls from PPC comes in handy. It’s available for all our customers by default.
Summarize
The difference between real and analytical data is a common situation. However, there’s no blame for call tracking service. The reason is business can’t take into consideration absolutely all resources with company’s phone number. Or some phone calls can come not to the substituted phone number but to direct one.
Nevertheless, you have to understand that statistics mismatch doesn’t have such negative impact. Even when substituting phone numbers only on your website, you may track the phone calls from PPC because a majority of people come to the site prior to picking up the phone.
Don’t forget to tell Ringostat managers about specifics of your business. We have many clients who place substituted phone numbers not only on their own websites but on the price comparison sites and printed products as well. That helps them effectively track advertising effectiveness. So shape your goals, listen to Customer Support and ask questions 😉
