Do you question what marketing is trying to accomplish? Are you unclear how to delineate marketing vs sales? Do you wonder what percent of the marketing budget is being wasted? Most business owners struggle with the same issues. This is because marketing’s role is often mis-understood, marketing and sales are usually artificially separated and marketing and sales activities, expenses and outcomes are not tracked and measured.
Marketers and business owners alike care about the impact of marketing activities. To fully understand and maximize impact, it is crucial to think about marketing as a system. This includes inputs and outputs – and what happens in between. A well-designed marketing system produces outcomes it is designed to deliver.
HOW DO YOU DESIGN AND CONTINUALLY ENHANCE THIS SYSTEM?
Ensure your Inputs and Desired Outcomes are Clear and Specific
What are your revenue & profit targets?
What do you want MORE of?
- New customers?
- Retain more current customers?
- Higher $ per purchase?
- More purchases?
Are your goals SMART (Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant, Time-bound)?
Integrate Marketing & Sales Within the System
“Sales” is a Channel Within the Marketing System and should be integrated within each conversion step of the funnel.
Only Agree to KPIs that Deliver Business Goals
Why spend time measuring things that don’t lead to you achieving your business goals? When choosing Key Performance Indicators (KPIs), note that actionable and accurate KPIs:
- Tell you if you are likely to achieve the goal
- Track the critical activities that drive, or lead to the business goal
Example of marketing system KPI's include: Impressions, engagement rate, web visitors, referral numbers and qualified leads.
Track Activities, Expenses & Outcomes to Continually Enhance the System
Successful business owners should know the ROI of everything they do. While it is possible to produce a marketing ROI number using the equation below, understanding the IMPACT of marketing activities is far more telling of indicated success.
Measuring the impact by looking at the "System" level effectiveness and tracking activities:
- Create a Marketing Dashboard using consistent data format and time periods (use quarterly, 6-Month or annual time periods)
- Choose Key KPI’s for each Conversion Step
- Look at trends over time instead of points of time
- Look for correlations between activities and results
Continually Enhance the system by:
- Reviewing dashboard together
- Discussing what is driving the results
- Identify what could be tried to enhance results
- Try it, track it and learn from results
- “Rinse & Repeat”
