Be Careful What You Measure ...

From Steve Berkowitz's Sharing the Consulting I'm Paying For series

It's hard to attend a jewelry conference lately without hearing from gurus and digital marketing companies who promise they are the key to audiences, clicks, and likes. But if you're like me, you wonder: What do those likes actually get me in terms of revenue? 

I don't want to be a digital marketing expert. I want to run my jewelry company. But, like you, I have to mind my marketing if I want to stay in business. So I've been paying for some expert advice, and I wanted to share it with you. After all, a rising tide lifts all boats, right?

Here's what I've learned about metrics recently.

1. Metrics like impressions, likes, shares, and social media engagement are "vanity metrics." Yes, they are easy to understand, and they give us that satisfying sense that something is happening, but they don't translate into revenue, nor do they qualify as real leads that we can turn into a sale.

2. Metrics like CPC (cost per click), Reach, Cost, CPM (cost per thousand impressions), and Clicks are more valuable than "vanity" metrics, because they tell you how well your advertising is performing per advertising dollar. However, they don't actually tell you how much revenue you gained or how many prospects you recruited per advertising dollar. 

So what, I asked, am I supposed to do? I suppose you're wondering that too. Well, we have to make sure that our digital campaigns are attached to meaningful campaign metrics in Google Analytics.

I definitely wasn't going to try to set it up myself. And I'm sure Erica, in our office, could have figured it out, but that would take time away from the valuable time she spends make sure we taking great care of our customers. We were able to count on our digital marketing partner to do this for us, and you should be able to too. Here's what you should ask for:

• Set up Google Analytics Campaign Tracking for each paid advertising effort. This will connect your website with your advertising, allowing you to see where visitors came from and what they did once they got to the website.

Yes, this even matters if you're trying to drive your customers to the retail store and not buy online.

How will you know if they've done it? Because when you go into your Google Analytics (http://analytics.google.com) you'll see that there are campaigns set up and tracking. Just click on ACQUISITION on the left panel. Then click on CAMPAIGNS, then ALL CAMPAIGNS. You should see campaign information appear that relates to the ads and promotions you are currently running. If you don't - or if your marketing partner is using names for campaigns that don't make sense - sit down with your marketing partner and review what you need. 

• Make sure your digital marketing and social media partner(s) and put a unique UTM Paramter in every single ad! UTM stands for "unique tracking module," and it lets you see where every single website lead came from. If you're running one ad with two different images (to test the relative effectiveness of the images), then your digital partner should use two UTMs. How will you know if they've done it? Because instead of having a link that looks like this:

http://yourwebsite.com/page

You'll see a link that looks like this:

http://yourwebsite.com/?utm_source=somesource.com&utm_medium=referral&utm_campaign=mycampaign

• Finally, always set goals for your digital marketing efforts. You wouldn't buy inventory or run a sale without setting goals. Your advertising is no different. Have your marketing partner(s) work with you to set goals that are meaningful to your bottom line. Then, have them set up your Goals in Google Analytics. You can see the goals that are set — and how you're doing on achieving them — by clicking on CONVERSIONS in the left panel of your Google Analytics, then GOALS.

This information won't make you an instant digital marketing expert, but it will make you more effective. Sometimes, the most important thing we can learn is what to ask of our marketing partners. I hope this information was helpful to you! Let's all get out there and build some retail traffic.

Best regards, 

Steve