Telmetrics Sees Big Growth in PPC

Call measurement firm Telmetrics has issued an announcement detailing its predictions for how pay per call will evolve in 2010. We think it’s a pretty good list. Here is our summation of what they say, with some commentary of our own. Here is the original document.

Agencies will embrace PPC. Telmetrics expects advertisers to pressure ad agencies to provide more performance based advertising solutions. Telmetrics expects agencies to buy ads on subscription and resell to accounts on a ppc basis. We would add that a lot of analytics will be needed for agencies to manage this risk effectively.

Online media continues to embrace PPC. Telmetrics points out that digital media have embraced calls as a powerful lead format, and will continue to enhance pay per click programs with pay per call. We would agree, given that many SMBs place a much higher value on calls vs. clicks.

Advertisers scrutinize call quality. More debate will occur on what constitutes a billable call. Our comment here is that this is an area where pay per call faces its greatest challenge — finding an objective criteria for what is a good vs. a bad call. Using call duration, as well as recording calls to monitor the quality of handling are helpful, but this is one area where advertisers are likely to keep moving the goalposts. The greater the transparency, the fewer the arguments.

Pay per conversion is not the next wave. Telmetrics sees many barriers to adopting pay for conversation as a performance based ad model. First it is difficult to track, though easier than it once was. The bigger problem is that the publisher takes a risk, and then relies on the advertiser’s ability to convert to determine which calls it gets paid for. We would agree that at least in Yellow Pages, this is a ways off.