The Economics of Online Marketing

The “What did I get in return?” side of the equation is more complex. Most marketers seek profit as their ultimate online marketing goal. Yet accurate profit numbers may be too hard to obtain or may be generated too far in the future. When this is the case, employ meaningful proxies such as cost per lead, cost per registration, cost per order, cost per new buyer, advertising-to-sales ratio, and margin-to-cost ratio as surrogates for actual profit.