Jan 24, 2014 By Jeff Ogden

5 Smart Ways to Measure Your Marketing in 2014

in Marketing

measure marketing Marketers are under pressure every day to prove the value of the work they are doing on behalf of their employers. If they can convince their bosses they’re delivering good, measurable business results, they have good job security. But if they fail to convince their superiors, there’s a good chance they’ll be shown the door.

Here's a framework to measure the results of your marketing, in order to prove to your boss that you are doing a great job.

1. Map your customer’s buying process

The five common stages of the customer buying process are:

Untroubled/Unaware
Have Problem
Need Solution
Considering Who is Best
Decision

I like those buying steps, because unlike other approaches, they get inside the mind of the buyer. After all, who has not encountered a prospect that has a problem, but does not know it or does not care about it? Lots of marketing gurus share their buying process, but I like to use the one found in this white paper, How to Find New Customers.

2. Think through what drives movement through the buying process

Now that we have buying stages, we can look to how prospective buyers move through the process. For instance, what has to happen to move from Untroubled/Unaware to Have Problem? Can we measure that movement? And when buyers make the jump from Need Solution to Consider the Best, they’re becoming a Marketing Qualified Lead (MQL) and can be passed to Sales. How can we measure our effectiveness in creating MQLs. (It’s important to note that by giving sales fewer, but better quality leads, then revenue goes up.)

3. Review ways to measure that movement

Now you are ready to put measurements in place. How effective are you at creating MQLs? What percentage of MQLs are accepted by Sales? Those are but two of the more effective measures you can use. For a detailed look at marketing metrics, check out the Definitive Guide to Marketing Metrics.

4. Balance the nice-to-have and must-have

Twitter followers, blog readers and website visits are so-called “vanity metrics" that matter. They’re more about growth of your brand than revenue generation. Strive for a balance between vanity metrics and hard metrics.

5. Always look to improve

Your first try will not be perfect. Don’t worry about that. Just keep working on it and tweaking it every week to make it better. Read a lot. Keep working and improving.

Two dear friends and marketing experts, Jim Lenskold of The Lenskold Group and Laura Patterson of VisionEdge Marketing provided invaluable insight for this post.

I hope these five tips help you improve your job security in 2014. Let me know how it goes.

Learn more marketing tips with the free Salesforce e-book below.