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How to project how successful (traffic, leads, & sales) my marketing will be?

by bizowner383
9 replies
Hello fellow marketers,

I'm trying to determine if my business will succeed or fail. For me to determine this, first, I need to determine
I'm attempting to project how successful (traffic, leads, & sales) my marketing will be to evaluate if a business opportunity will work or fail BEFORE launching.
Here is the scenario:
This estimate is for pre-startup. Business is not operational. Business is still in the planning phase.
Business is a tour agency
I need 40 customers/month for my business to succeed. How will I be able to project/estimate if my marketing efforts will result in 40 or more customers?
#leads #marketing #project #sales #successful #traffic
  • Profile picture of the author Kay King
    Have you started or operated your own business in the past?

    attempting to project how successful (traffic, leads, & sales)
    What is your experience with generating leads and sales, with generating targeted traffic?

    Business is a tour agency
    Again - what is your experience with a travel company or tour agency? Are you certified - do you have the contacts in the travel/tour industry?

    Whether you can project/estimate or not depends on your level of skills. 40 new customers a month may be a high bar. You do not say what sort of 'tour agency' you are planning. How will the profit be earned? What are the overhead costs? If you are working alone, can you manage 40 new customers a month? Where will they come from?

    It is smart to plan ahead and have projections and goals - just as it's necessary to have a budget and know what your overhead costs will be. Often a business works much better on paper when you are dreaming it up - than it does a few months into actually working on it. Have contingency plans, have a budget that has some flexibility in case it takes longer to get your business 'off the ground'.

    Focus on what YOU need to do to achieve what you want...there will never be guarantees but the more prepared you are, the better your chances of success.
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    • Profile picture of the author bizowner383
      Great! My question was How will I be able to project/estimate if my marketing efforts will result in 40 or more customers, not personal or the other million factors left. Although nobody has truly understood my question, thanks for your replies. Much appreciated.
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      • Profile picture of the author GordonJ
        Originally Posted by bizowner383 View Post

        Great! My question was How will I be able to project/estimate if my marketing efforts will result in 40 or more customers, not personal or the other million factors left. Although nobody has truly understood my question, thanks for your replies. Much appreciated.
        All is based on ROI, it is the essential KPI. 40x $ (per unit) = gross sales - overhead/fixed expenses. Subtract advertising costs. Multiply times ad costs = ROI.

        So you look to cost of promotion. This of course is a where, and when cost. Since there is no history you have to look at costs of either impressions, eyeballs, or time. How long will your ad run? Say you run it one day and you get one customer. Then you test it to see if it holds on.

        The FORMULA in numbers...imaginary. Say your 40 sales are each 1 thousand dollars, or you can share what you think they will be.

        So you take in 40 k per month and have fixed expenses of 4000 (10% on the low side). What is your gross profits from that 36? You will be working mostly on commission from others in the travel business, so it is safe to assume it will be a fluctuating income, and not at all steady.

        Say you get about 25% of the 36k = 9k per month pre tax gross. Out of this you subtract your advertising/customer acquisition costs. Which for your industry is about 7 to 10 dollars.

        So your spend will be between 280 dollars and 400 dollars. If you start with 400 dollars, then you know how much to spend on a given test ad. So you would need to spend 10 dollars a test, until you find one that returns a customer. Now the bad news for you in pre start up, you are totally CLUELESS as to how effective the advertising will be.

        It may take all 400 dollars to get that very first customer, or twice that or more.

        But the formula you seek is fairly simple. Sales (40) (month) @ +$$ - ad costs X ad costs and you get the magic number you seek.

        Just from your post...NO. Just don't. You aren't anywhere near ready for this venture. But feel free to do as you please.

        Did I answer your spurious question? Or maybe I too, didn't understand?

        GordonJ
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  • Profile picture of the author Monetize
    Originally Posted by bizowner383 View Post

    Hello fellow marketers,

    I'm trying to determine if my business will succeed or fail. For me to determine this, first, I need to determine
    I'm attempting to project how successful (traffic, leads, & sales) my marketing will be to evaluate if a business opportunity will work or fail BEFORE launching.
    Here is the scenario:
    This estimate is for pre-startup. Business is not operational. Business is still in the planning phase.
    Business is a tour agency
    I need 40 customers/month for my business to succeed. How will I be able to project/estimate if my marketing efforts will result in 40 or more customers?


    You should call the psychic hotline because
    there is no way to predict any of those things
    unless you already have the clients lined up.

    Businesses such as yours take regular work
    and time to develop, and there will be dozens
    of variables that you haven't even thought of.

    Get busy working on your business, do as
    much as you can to make it successful, and
    once you start getting clients and money,
    you might be able to make projections.
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  • Profile picture of the author SARubin
    Monetize beat me to the punch on this one. So I'll just second her motion...

    Originally Posted by bizowner383 View Post

    I'm trying to determine if my business will succeed or fail.
    Instead of trying to predict if your business will succeed or fail, why don't you physically try it and see what happens?

    Because right now, for you, I suggest a day of movement is worth 10 times more than a month of over-thinking it.

    Originally Posted by bizowner383 View Post

    I'm attempting to project how successful (traffic, leads, & sales) my marketing will be to evaluate if a business opportunity will work or fail BEFORE launching.
    If you really need to quench this desire to see into the future... I suppose you can try a pre-launch marketing campaign. Set up a landing page, engage on social, and see who raises their hand with interest. Try to get some of your ideal clients on a mailing list for when, or if, you do launch.

    At the very least it can give you some experience marketing for traffic and leads because, based on your question, I'm guessing you don't have much experience yet?


    Now before you get too far ahead of yourself, I have to ask you a question...

    How much market research have you done so far?
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    • Profile picture of the author bizowner383
      Great! This is part of market research. Hence, why I stated BEFORE launching. Although nobody has truly understood my question, thanks for your replies. Much appreciated.
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      • Profile picture of the author SARubin
        Originally Posted by bizowner383 View Post

        Great! This is part of market research. Hence, why I stated BEFORE launching. Although nobody has truly understood my question, thanks for your replies. Much appreciated.
        It seems like you didn't get the pre-conceived easy answer that you wanted to hear, and now you think it's everyone else's fault for not understanding.

        I think we understood your question. You want to be able to predict if a marketing campaign, for a startup company that doesn't exist yet, will succeed and bring you 40 new clients a month, BEFORE you try it.

        But that's simply not how reality works. If being able to predict a winner were a real thing, then every start-up would have a 100% success rate, because we would only use marketing that works 100% of the time.

        If that's not the question you're asking then maybe you could ask your question in a different way, so us ignorant people can understand you more clearly.


        As far as market research goes... Simply using the term "BEFORE launching" and asking people to look into a crystal ball for you does not equate to market research.

        I was asking how much you know about the people who buy your type of service (target market)? How much disposable income do they have? How often do they take tours?

        Where can you find them hanging out? And what type of language do they use when they get excited about taking a tour? (this will help you with your sales copy)

        What is your competition doing that's working? Or not working?

        Things like that. You know, market research...


        I'll offer you one last piece of advice, and you can accept it or not (your choice). I encourage you to read the following thread from start to finish. It won't give you a crystal ball to predict the future, but it'll give you an honest insight on what you need to get started...

        https://www.warriorforum.com/main-in...hese-days.html
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  • Profile picture of the author Kay King
    Although nobody has truly understood my question
    Wow - that's the takeaway you got?

    The three people who took the time to answer you have been working online for quite a few years. If a bunch of new marketers told you 'oh yeah - should be easy to get 40 customers a month'....would that mean anything? Nope.

    You answered NONE of the questions asked about your experience/knowledge - which says a lot. How can anyone assess your potential level of success without knowing what your qualifications are?

    That is not 'market research'. You don't say whether you are selling a product you have created or selling tours that are featured by a major player in the travel market. You are asking for answers to a question that doesn't make sense to anyone experienced in online marketing.
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  • Profile picture of the author Jamell
    You cannot measure a return on an investment you haven't made .You should introduce your business model to the market place in phases so that you can get feed back .

    I think it would help if you strated blogging about it as well to drum up interests
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