So many metrics, so little time. Confused about measuring your marketing performance? No worries. This article covers some of the most important areas that require metrics and where to begin. Some of these are more important if you have a wholesale or large volume type business, say a supplement manufacturer. Some of these are more important if you are a retailer and need eyeballs (impressions) and many individual sales, like a tack shop. Some of these are key if you do specialized custom work, like chaps or saddles.
Execs like to toss around alphabet soup letters like KPI, SEO, etc. Don’t get thrown off here. I’m not too fond of business lingo; I feel like it only serves to make others feel like they are somehow not in the club if they don’t know all of the shorthand. But, you should know what it means, even if you aren’t throwing it around like popcorn.
KPI – Key Performance Indicator. Which are just the leading indicators if something is working or not, so they can report to their bosses yes or no. How many times did your “contact us” page get hit, and how many calls/ emails resulted. This is a pipeline indicator, meaning, does your funnel (more on what a funnel is later) select out the interested vs. the tire kicker. Somebody contacted you and proved the marketing funnel worked. You want more of these occurrences.
SEO – Search Engine Optimization. SEO is the most crucial aspect of your website right now. There are books and blogs on this essential stack of data. In a nutshell, it’s how many people searched on Google and selected your site/ page to get what they needed. Ensure that your site is in the top 10 returns when somebody types in “women’s English show shirt,” and then get them to click on your website. How to get them to purchase is another blog topic.
If you want to measure Brand Awareness, you should pay attention to traffic volume (unique users on your site), reach (meaning impressions), exposure, and things like how far your messages are spreading. Do they get shared on social? Do people know what you do and what you sell?
Engagement is another important one. Pay attention to your retweets, comments on posts, replies, and if people are participating. And which people. Are they your target audience, or are you drawing in lots of others but not who you want? Is your community paying attention to what you are saying?
If you need to find brand fans, this is related, and you should dig deeper into contributors and influencers. Are people mentioning your brand as a reference? Who is participating in your online discussions, and what kind of impact do these people have?
Are you trying to position yourself as a thought leader in your industry? This is measured as Share of Voice, and you should track your channel volumes against your competitors. Pick your top three. How are many conversations around similar products centered on your brand? It would help if you also had an idea of SEO comparison for this group against your site. Use SEO tools such as Moz.com to do this effectively.
All of these combine to create a bigger picture of how your brand within your market. I use Google Analytics and Moz to get a picture of web performance and SEO performance for brand sites. There are lots more out there, but I’ve used these for a while, and they offer more data than you can usually use for a first-timer.
Metrics can feel daunting when you set out but think of this as a building block system. Get some data, understand what it means, get some different data, and build a more comprehensive picture of what your company is doing. Once you know what is happening on the interwebs, you can make smarter decisions about what to tackle next to sell more products.
