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Marketing success: how to identify your core KPIs

The Good Marketer

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November 5, 2021 | 6 min read

You have probably heard the saying, "you can't manage what you don't measure

" This applies to marketing performance, too.

Because if you don't measure (and track) your KPIs, you won't know where to divert your attention and resources - which is the perfect way to lose money. As part of their job, it's essential for the leading marketing agencies in London to understand these metrics and how they can make or break a business. Working with an established marketing agency in London allows you to use this expertise and experience to generate campaigns and marketing efforts that drive the best results.

However, if you're after a little more information before you decide to work with an established marketing agency, here are some insights into how to identify your core KPIs.

What are marketing KPIs? Why is measuring them essential?

KPIs or key performance indicators are the golden metrics that you use to evaluate your success in your business. They are a measurable way to determine how well your marketing is progressing and generating the desired results for your business.

A set of well-defined KPIs can guarantee that your marketing activities align with your business's end goals.

And the best part about marketing KPIs is that you can go by a set of standard marketing KPIs or define your unique ones based on your business - making them incredibly flexible to work with.

When you measure your KPIs, your revenue is fixed. Your marketing has a direction; it has velocity. It drives results. And you can influence your data to use it for improving a range of areas within an organisation, including marketing, sales, customer service, operations, finance, strategy and product development.

SMART key performance indicators

Specific - Performance indicators should be clearly defined. The definition should be detailed so that there is no ambiguity.

Measurable - The indicators should be measurable. It should have a value that can be measured and recorded.

Achievable - The indicators shouldn't be unrealistic or impossible to achieve. They should set you up for success by being realistic in scope and attainable in nature.

Relevant - Performance indicators should be relevant to the overall goal or mission of your marketing effort. They should help contribute to achieving the result as intended.

Time-bound - The goal should be achieved in a set timeframe to be labelled as effective. If the results are delayed, your marketing efforts won't be counted as successful.

Expert marketers use these KPIs to track a business' health and marketing effectiveness. By identifying performance gaps, your marketing team can develop the most relevant metrics for your campaigns.

You must note that marketing KPIs vary from business to business based on their unique products or services and customer demographics. So, every company has to decide which metrics are essential before setting a budget.

Depending on your business goals, you must evaluate your traffic sources, campaign messages, online and offline user experience, sales funnels, among more, to get your SMART key performance indicators.

How to choose your KPIs

Every business has five stages; existence, survival, success, take-off, resource maturity. So, if you are a startup in the bicycle industry, you can't compare yourself with the leading name in this industry, because you’ll be in a different stage of growth.

The first stage is about proving that there is a market for your product or service. At this stage, your objectives and key performance indicators (KPIs) may not revolve around making sales.

Instead, they would be all about increasing brand awareness and getting validation from your target market for the pain points that your product or service has identified and addressed. And this is where the bicycle startup would be.

On the other hand, the final stage would occur when your company would have stability in the market. This is when you would think about expanding your product line or introducing sub-brands. Thus, your KPIs would be focused more on customer retention than increasing your organic traffic. And this is where Brompton would be.

Run competitor analysis

There are two reasons why you should run a competitor analysis.

1. When you are new to an industry and have no clue what data to measure, you can take inspiration from the competition.

2. To know where your competitors are failing, so you can build on their strategy and create a better one.

Competitor analysis is a valuable exercise to find out what your competitors are doing well and what they are doing badly to identify opportunities for your business.

Remember that the key is to reflect on your company's actual goals, then use competitor analysis to understand what others in your industry are doing. Simply copying a strategy without tailoring it to suit your business's needs won't prove to be useful for you.

Avoid vanity metrics

Vanity metrics are numbers that don't add anything to your business's bottom line but make you feel good about receiving some online engagement. They don't contribute to your business decisions and are simply 'nice to have.'

Your KPIs should focus on generating revenue. If they aren't doing that, you must reconsider them.

That's why businesses need to replace incomplete and partial key performance indicators (vanity metrics), such as page views, likes, and comments, with complete and specific data points (actionable metrics), such as logins, purchases, and signups to generate better marketing ROI.

Effective marketing is key to any business's success. But it is common for companies to get overwhelmed by the process. An expert digital marketing agency can help advise you on and identify your most important KPIs. Meaning you stay focused, save time, and keep you from making expensive marketing mistakes.

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