Not getting ROI you desire from your marketing? Learn the secret to productivity

Wondering why you’re not getting the return on interest you wish for with your marketing campaigns? You may be missing the one key factor that leads to real marketing productivity, writes Annette Densham, PR specialist and co-owner at The Audacious Agency.

The ultimate key to productivity lies in one simple word: ACCOUNTABILITY.

Productivity doesn’t come from effort and time, it is the result of a carefully aimed effort that is goal-driven.

Accountability is a four-part process that Miriam van Heusden, analytics expert, is sharing with us today. Miriam’s experience in this field comes from her work in creating one of the most innovative software platforms (Maraytics) that enables entrepreneurs and marketers to ascertain the exact ROI of each marketing campaign, regardless of what it is and where it is hosted.

To say the least – accountability is her ‘thing’. Here is her 4-step process.

4 steps to accountability in your marketing campaigns

1. Ownership of your progress

Let’s talk about this from a marketing aspect. Marketing is the action-based aspect of acquiring the leads that will convert into business to keep your company afloat.

Having an action-based plan is important, but even more than that, you must have insights into the effectiveness of your marketing efforts. What works for one business may not work for another. There is no single one-size-fits-all ‘plan’ that will guarantee results.

Every business must measure the successes of each individual campaign, calculate their losses and ROI on each campaign, and from there, decide which campaigns to cull, pause, or put more investment into.

2. Acknowledging your weak points

A man with a bow and arrow can only hit his target with practice. Practising only leads to improvement if you also practise accountability – go and look at each ‘hit’ and ascertain what went wrong so that you can improve your next attempt.

Results don’t come from stringing arrows one after the other and simply ‘doing your best’, if you’re not unpacking the factors that are preventing you from hitting your target. Ever thought about marketing in that light?  You can’t keep blindly posting on social media, sending out newsletters, directing money into social media and other paid ad campaigns if you don’t know exactly how much revenue is generated from each outreach method.

Some of them are working for you better than others – do you know exactly how much better? You need to. This will determine how much energy and money you should be diverting into each one.

With the right tools, you might discover you’ve been diverting time and energy into avenues that don’t generate a profit for your business.

3. Fortifying your marketing strategy with new tools and approaches

They say that the biggest predictor of a business’s future success is its ability to adapt. The markets constantly change, consumer demands swing unpredictably, economies take unexpected turns …

The only way to stay on top of an ever-changing marketplace is to stay abreast of the latest tools out there. Not only can it simplify a number of your in-house functions and procedures (saving you time and money), but you might discover something that genuinely boosts your business’s ability to reach its consumers and sell with greater ease.

4. Measuring, measuring, measuring

Don’t shoot in the dark when you have a finite number of bullets – bullets being your proverbial budget. Make sure you know your books, you know the financial health of your business, you know how much profit you’re generating and what your expenses are in order to gain the leads that are keeping your business afloat.

You must have analytics for every aspect of the business and this means quantifying the time your staff spend on each task – knowing what your cost per hour is to run your business versus what you’re generating.

One of the best investments for your business is a tool that will help you to see your spending, see your income, and maximise the avenues that are really working for you.

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