Measure

The search marketing campaign is underway, so it's now time to keep a close eye on the scoreboard. We need to know what is working well, what is not producing the results we expected, and where are the areas not yet addressed that could use some attention. We'll need to rely on a few key elements so that we can cycle back into Promotion with the hot items for next month's agenda:

Analytics.  If you could only do one thing in this process it would to ensure you have analytics set-up so that you can report on traffic to the site. Analytics will tell you everything you need to know about the traffic to the site. How many users, what environment, bounce rate on pages, how they found you, how long they stayed, and most importantly how many conversions were made. Data collected here will give the team direction when creating an agenda for next month's Internet marketing initiatives.

Conversion Tracking.  What are the objectives or primary goals for the website? Whether it's a successful checkout on an eCommerce website or the completion of a contact form, we want to track conversions so that we can measure the return on investment. Conversion will mean something different for everyone, and we want to identify what they are and how we can measure success.

Areas to Improve.  No matter how successful we've been to date with your Internet marketing initiatives, we can always strive to get better. Evaluating our analytics, reviewing our content strategy, monitoring social channels, etc. will all help to identify areas that we can improve. We are trying to get to the top or stay on the top, either way identifying opportunity for improvement will help us in this effort.

Areas doing Well.  Let's celebrate success and evaluate how we can extend what we did here to other initiatives. We can utilize tools such as Google Analytics, heat mapping, conversion reports, etc. to track down wins, and leverage this success in other areas of the site. Confirmation that things are headed in the right direction is always a critical piece of the puzzle.

Summary Reporting.  Analytics will provide as many micro reports as needed, but we find it important to summarize the big picture. At the end of each month, quarter, year, or whatever time table you wish to evaluate, a report of where we are today in comparison to the same period 1 year ago can provide great insight. This can include traffic, conversions, rankings, or other important metrics that might help us make intelligent business decisions moving forward.

Integrating the review and revise initiatives into the process will ensure the agenda is always in line with priorities. With an ultimate goal being a return on investment (ROI), use this process to measure success as well as failure.