According to Penquin, when it comes to reporting on marketing, there are key metrics (highlighted below) that really matter and then there are those that are just there for show.
Customer Long Term Value (LTV)
A customer’s long term value is a very critical metric to monitor, evaluate, optimise and help drive essential business decisions. It is the total revenue a business can on average expect from a single customer.
Mailchimp, a marketing automation platform stated that, ‘You can estimate your Customer Lifetime Value with the following steps:
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- Forecast a customer’s lifecycle with your business.
- Estimate future products purchased to forecast future revenues.
- Estimate the costs associated with producing and delivering future products.
- Calculate the current value of those revenue amounts.’
Cost Per Lead (CPL)
Lead Quizzes, an online quiz platform stated, ‘In the simplest of terms, CPL is the amount of money you spend in order to generate a single new lead for your business. It is used to measure and monitor the effectiveness of marketing campaigns. If you are spending more money on acquiring a new lead than you are earning from having that particular lead become a paying customer, you must be doing something wrong, right?’
Qualified leads are those that maintain interest and keep coming back for more. These are the ultimate leads that will or should be converted to closed deals. Mapping their journey from lead to customer also helps you measure what actions they took to convert and then apply those learnings to other customers. Every lead has a cost associated with it, but it is up to each marketer and business to determine this particular value.
Marketing attributed value
This is the actual rand value that it costs to market to the lead, and this is an extremely important metric. Here you have to honestly look at the channels you are using, the audience you have selected and the amount of money you are spending on them. Constantly evaluate whether you are using the right channels, or if you could be spending less money marketing to where your audience ‘hang-out’ more frequently.
Spending a fortune on Twitter lead generation cards may not be the right platform for your brand. Consider whether your market spends more time on Instagram for example and whether your content will be better received there. Rather be in the right places – even if it’s less places – than trying to be everywhere all at once.
Conversion rates
How good is your content at attracting users? You have to look at the content you’re sending out, and then how many of the people you’re marketing to are actually interested enough to click through, complete a form or engage with you. Really think about what will convert a lead into a customer before launching any campaign.
Your average monthly database growth
Database management and growth is the process of keeping your contact database as clean as possible, keeping the data up to date and growing your database by attracting more leads and customers.
Analyse your database all the time to determine whether the data you are collecting is clean. And if your database is filled with hard bounces and unsubscribes, make sure a massive scrub is done so you don’t waste efforts and money on uninterested prospects. It is also extremely important to know what you want to do with the data you are collecting, and that it is the correct data.
HubSpot mentioned that: ‘You want to create an engaging, personalised experience for leads and customers. Unreliable data undermines those efforts, so having a resource that provides solid visibility into your contact records and the means to consistently maintain them is central to successful contact management.’
Average time spent on your website (dwell time)
If you are directing people to a website, this is a key stat to look at. This will determine whether your initial interaction (like your ad or PPC advertising) has had the right impact and if people are interested in your product. So consider what keywords are driving visitors to your site and focus on those users. If your keywords are not transparent and direct enough, you may need to consider dropping them. Remember, the aim of this is to get users to read your content and consider taking an action such as: signing up, buying, reading more and sharing.
Metric measurements are crucial to determine whether you are spending your money and efforts in the right place. Learn from your audiences, from your successes and your flops. Metrics are the only way to get honest answers. As our sister company, Spitfire Inbound stated, ‘Always measure what matters.’ Now, go and improve your ROI – you have the metrics to guide you.
