Marketing Metrics that Will Help You Keep Your Job

As a senior marketing manager, the metrics that you choose to measure, analyze and report to your CEO and CFO will have a big impact the size of your marketing budget, the stability of your job and the influence your team will have on the strategy of your organization. As a graduate marketing student in the Northwestern University Medill Integrated Marketing Communications program, I have sought to identify some of the key metrics that you should be tracking and utilizing to improve the performance of your marketing organization.
 

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In his article “The Most Important Marketing Metrics” on B2B Marketing Insider, Michael Brenner outlines several key marketing metrics that every senior marketing manager should be using to run their business. He argues that if you get just one metric to present to your CEO and CFO, it should be Return on Marketing Investment, also known as ROMI. This metric calculates your company’s financial return on marketing investments, and it’s often helpful to break down your marketing by activities or channels and identify what brings the most return for your investment. In a future post we’ll delve into a few more key metrics to consider for your organization.

If you want to understand the math behind the metrics, or need to educate members of your staff who will be responsible for collecting and analyzing these metrics for you, then I recommend you check out “A Simple Explanation of the Math Behind 7 Common Marketing Metrics”, written by Ryan Ghods and published on the Hubspot website. He argues that whatever role you play in the marketing world, it’s becoming increasingly important that you have an understanding of—and level of comfort with—the math behind the metrics you cite every month.

Based on my experience and research, there are three actions that I recommend you take as you incorporate marketing metrics into your organization:

1.     Identify metrics for survival—Identify the key marketing metrics to track and report to the C-suite so that you can improve your marketing results and keep your job.

2.     Understand the numbers behind the numbers—Understand the math behind the metrics so that you can calculate them with confidence and ease.

3.     Make the numbers count—Confidently interpret the meaning and relevance of the metrics and be able to discuss the strategic implications with C-suite executives.

Today more than ever, it’s critical that you understand the impact of each marketing investment on your organization. If you can’t confidently identify and measure which aspects of your marketing deliver financial returns for your company, then your credibility and influence will suffer. Not to mention your career. 

What metrics do you track to improve the performance of your marketing efforts? Which metrics have been the most helpful in improving your business?

 

About Scott Knudsen 

Scott Knudsen is Director of Brand Strategy & Project Management for Murray Brand Communications, a San Francisco-based marketing services firm. He is also a graduate student in the Integrated Marketing Communications program at Northwestern University’s Medill School. He focuses on a customer-centric, data-driven integrated approach to marketing communications that combines marketing analytics with strategy. You can reach him with questions or comments on Twitter @ScottKnudsen

Brazil: Surfing the real-estate wave

Favelas, the longtime feared Brazilian slums that were traditionally known as some of the most dangerous neighborhoods on the planet, have transformed into the diamond in the raw for real-estate. Today, there are many American companies who are finding it harder and harder to compete in local markets, but have not realized there are interesting opportunities in emerging markets that are yet to be discovered. As a graduate student at Northwestern University's IMC program, I have developed a special interest in Brazil and the emerging markets of Latin America. My international background, and experience launching products and brands in these areas, have given me a unique perspective on the broad range of opportunities that lies ahead for those wanting to explore new territories.

A good way to start is by taking a look at companies like GTIS, who have figured out a way to profit from Brazilian growth. By gathering investment from the outside, GTIS is funding growth and profiting from it as well. Today, they have offices in New York as well as Sao Paulo. As seen in an article by the New York Times, there are many opportunities to be taken advantage of by those who see them.

Metropolis like Rio de Janeiro, São Paulo, and northeastern cities like Recife are experiencing unprecedented growth. The slums of these cities, which are scattered close to proliferous neighbourhoods like Rio’s Leblon and Ipanema, have begun acquiring new value as land becomes scarce. Finding these types of opportunities may be more than half the battle when it comes to investments. Today, with foreign money being injected into the country, not only have inhabitants of the favelas increased their purchasing power, but the land around them is increasing in value. Favelas are often located close to some of the most sought after neighborhoods, creating a great opportunity to become a part of the imminent real-estate wave.

However, it is not all reais and dollar bills. For those willing to take the plunge and put in the effort, it is important to understand that the Brazilian real-estate market operates very differently than its American counterpart. Making assumptions can be the death of any well-intentioned business venture, in a market as different and fast paced as this one. I recommend you surround yourself with experienced people, and stay up-to-date with the news. Understanding the Brazilian culture and market dynamic can be a difficult task for foreigners, but learning how to do it is well worth the effort. The United States Department of Commerce, for instance, is a good place to get started. Finally, going to local experts such as Connection Consulting, and finding the right alliance to help you in your efforts to penetrate the Brazilian market.

Background: Laura Lozano is a student of Integrated Marketing Communications at Medill, in Northwestern University. She has experience working with international brands from a broad range of industries, ranging from fast-food to real-estate.

Skype: laura_loz
Twitter: laura_lzo

 

Social Media recipes to measure your brand's success

As a brand manager, your brand's presence in social media is critical but difficult to measure. In my selection of coursework at Northwestern University, I have been studying the issue of measurement of social media activities (and activities on other new media platforms). Customers today constantly hop back and forth between offline and online media. Although many organizations have activated social media programs, majority struggle to measure its impact on revenue. In this post, I will highlight some important findings on this burning topic of how to measure social success for your brand.

To tell this cryptic correlation, Altimeter Group, a research and advisory firm based in San Mateo, California, conducted a study to understand challenges, as well as strategies for understanding the financial impact of social media. In her report titled “The Social Media ROI Cookbook”, analyst Susan Etlinger, lays out the best practices and “recipes” that organizations are using to understand its impact.

While the report sites multiple challenges, the prime challenge that organizations struggle with is actually tying social media to business objectives. But, while revenue is important, it isn’t everything. Eighty-four percent of survey respondents reported that the primary business impact of social media was not revenue generation, but “insight that helped us meet customer experience goals.”

Based on this research, the Altimeter team identified six primary guidelines that brands are using to measure the revenue impact of social media.

What is important to remember is that while top-down approaches provide business context and bottom-up approaches provide granularity, they are most valuable when viewed in context of each other to evaluate the complete picture.

Based on the Integrated Marketing Communication (IMC) model, the lesson for a brand manager is that the criteria for choosing the right measurement mix are:

· Identify your business type: the way your company goes to market (exclusively online or multi-channel) largely drives what is possible when it comes to revenue measurement.

· Assess your service or product type: sales cycle is key criteria in determining revenue measurement strategy, sales cycle vary considerably for low consideration and high consideration purchases

· Factor in your media mix: the type of medium (Paid, Earned and/or Owned) also influences your measurement method, as you can only measure online properties that you control.

· Consider your customer profile: possibly the most important factor, the type of customer (business, consumer and/or highly social) will determine what measurement is possible

To conclude, it’s important to remember that in real terms we are still at the very beginning of social business and no one set of measures can tell you everything. But looking at the granular data in context of broader trends will deliver a more representative view of the revenue impact of social media.

By Nikhil Kaul


ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Nikhil Kaul is a technophile, shutterbug, avid traveler, and foodie. When not indulging, he seeks problems in the ever-evolving marketplace to rattle his brain for solutions. A masters' student of Integrated Marketing Communications at Northwestern University, he enjoys wrestling with the challenges that businesses face due to the increasing influence of new media and changing customer behavior.