If you don’t measure it, you can’t improve it.
Failing to measure your marketing performance is one of the biggest mistakes you can make. There are many reasons why marketers avoid building reports; it may take too long, there are more pressing priorities, it’s not a lead generation tactic, etc. All these “excuses” are likely true, however, if you don’t measure you can’t improve. Your campaigns will become stale, your leads will be flat, and your budget will not be efficient.
Measuring marketing performance can be simple and take less than five minutes a week. The first step is determining your top five KPIs based on your business objectives. Here are some examples of the KPIs you could consider:
- Total Number of Leads
- Total Number of Sales
- Total Revenue
- Total Marketing Spend
- Cost-per-Lead
- Cost-per-Sale
There are countless other metrics you can include in your reporting. However, if you try to include too many (more than five) KPIs, then the report will lose its value. While measuring impressions, clicks, etc. are important, they don’t need to be measured each week. Those metrics should be reviewed on a quarterly basis when you are able to observe long-term trends and make recommendations based on performance.
Once you select your top five KPIs, you should track these metrics week-over-week in a simple spreadsheet that takes your marketing team five minutes to build. Be sure to review these KPIs during your weekly marketing meetings and make recommendations for improvement. These reports are a great way to show the marketing team’s value, rally around campaign wins, and keep up the momentum for continuous improvement.
