Many people believe that when it comes to marketing, it is hard to measure its effectiveness and impact on the business. There is nothing further from the truth, especially now, in the era of digitalisation. There are a few things that might be harder to measure, e.g. brand awareness, but in general, we can quite easily assess the effectiveness of marketing activities and efforts. 

How to measure marketing

Did you ever hear that saying “50% of marketing works, its only about knowing which 50%”? It might have been true a while back, but today it is much easier to measure almost every marketing undertaking. Let’s have a look at it in more detail, considering various marketing activities.

Advertising

In the past, you placed an ad in a magazine and hoped that it would get somebody’s attention. Exciting design and a catchy image or headline was all that you could rely on. Today, almost every magazine has a digital version, which means each advertisement can have an embedded link directing traffic to your website, or can have a QR code or a link to a landing page with a specific promotion or offer. You can see the performance of the ad by reviewing the impressions, click-throughs and enquiries generated. Having a set of data like that allows you to review the effectiveness of a particular publication. Knowing this, you can decide if your level of investment is returning the results you are expecting. Using the information gathered, you can quickly determine which publications work best for you, what type of advertising brings the required results and what frequency of advertising is at the right level for your company.

Events

As I mentioned in my previous blog “What is the future of exhibitions and events?” events are one of the activities that consume considerable time, effort and investment. You really want to be very strategic in choosing which events you will attend as an exhibitor. When considering exhibition, you need to look at historical data. You need to know if in the past, that event delivered the desired level of leads and opportunities for your company. It would be best if you analysed how many generated prospects were turned into a “won business” and what the level of that business was. Only when all that data is collected, can you decide if it is right to participate in that event again.

Of course, there are various options for participation, which don’t always need to include exhibiting. You can, for example, attend the show as a visitor. You will be able to take advantage of the same networking possibilities but without the high outlay of having an exhibition stand. Also, you might consider being a keynote speaker at one of the event’s forums or conferences. In that way, you not only attend but also establish yourself as an authority on a subject, which in itself, may lead to potential networking and business opportunities.

Next bring us to the newest of the events phenomenon – the digital event participation. In most cases, a fraction of the cost of the traditional exhibition, potentially giving a similar level of exposure and lead generation opportunities.

Marketing resources

There is no secret in saying that people are expensive and there is no difference when it comes to marketing. I think this subject can be considered from two separate angles:

• Companies with a large marketing team,
• Companies with a small marketing presence.

In the first instance, the most effective way to review team performance and its effectiveness is to analyse the marketing skills against the marketing plan. Ask yourself or your marketing manager: 

• Do you have the right people and skills to deliver what is required for your marketing strategy and activity plan? 
• Can you identify “high fliers” who potentially can develop further and take on more responsibilities? 
• Are any team members underperforming, “hiding” in the team and possibly not contributing as much as others?
• Are the tasks within the team distributed evenly or is someone carrying more than a fair share and not getting the recognition they deserve? 
• Do you outsource too much or not enough?
• Do you utilise all available marketing tools efficiently?

Knowing what the team strengths and weaknesses are allows you to make the right decision when considering a reduction in force, outsourcing, using marketing automation solutions or changes to your marketing strategy. All of which might be ways to achieve better efficiency from your marketing operations. 

In the case of companies with a small marketing presence, the approach needs to be slightly different. Here, we need to start from the marketing strategy, activity plan or just a list of things the company wants to accomplish through its marketing activities. Knowing what the company goals are, we can find the most effective way of achieving them. It might be upskilling the existing marketing executive or investing in the most appropriate marketing tool that could improve the performance of marketing. Often, engaging the right marketing agency who can deliver the objectives faster, is a better way to allocate your marketing spend. Also, hiring a part-time marketing professional with extensive experience might prove to be a more efficient solution than having an inexperienced internal resource full time. 

Digital

Of course, the digitalisation of marketing activities provided companies worldwide with a brand new level of data, analytics and statistics to contemplate. But when embarking on that journey, be careful. Nowadays, we often suffer from an overload of data, and many companies will spend a considerable amount of time reviewing data that may actually have no impact on business performance or marketing effectiveness. This can eat a lot of valuable time. I feel this might be a subject for another blog.

In summary

Over the years, I gained much experience in finding marketing efficiencies, and I can honestly say that efficiency can always be found. It is just a matter of gathering the facts and choosing the right solution for a given time, circumstance and the company.