Data-Driven Marketing: 10 Metrics for Strong Branding

Introduction

Data-driven is that fancy word you always read about as a key to be a successful business. Does being a data-driven business means you would be snowed under metrics all day? While with most things the bigger the better, when it comes to metrics, the less the more.

Defining the metrics that matter the most and keeping an eye on them is the way to go. Branding can have so many metrics; for the financial value, the brand equity and the marketing activity. In this article, we will guide you through the ten metrics that matter the most for strong branding.

 

1. Number of Prospects

Prospects are the visitors to your websites, readers of your blog, viewers of your video, fans of your social media or clickers on your landing page’s link. In other words, it is someone half the way to becoming a paid customer or to taking another action. You need to watch the number of prospects in each channel and understand your customers’ experience on each one of the channels. This leads us to the second metric.

 

2. Macro and Micro Conversion

Conversion is the success of your plan or the final goal you had in mind when you started your marketing campaign. It can be “the Macro conversion”, which normally the business management would care for the most, like buying a product or being a paid customer for a service. While micro conversions can be less cared for but still a win for your brand. Micro conversions are like subscribing to your newsletters, attendants for your webinar, shares for your posts and other steps in the funnel that bring the customer a step closer.

 

3. Lifetime Value

While you might feel happy after the conversion happens as you got yourself a new customer, this is not the end. Since gaining a new customer is way more expensive than keeping the existing one happy, you need to track your customers’ lifetime value. This is the total profit you are getting from one customer. Do they make multiple purchases or renew their subscriptions or even upgrade it or not? A loyal customer is everything!

 

4. Net Promoter Score

Talking of loyalty, a real loyal customer is a customer who is willing to recommend you to family and friends and maybe even leave you a great review. Always ask your customers how likely they would recommend you. In analyzing your score don’t just track promoters put also detractors who won’t recommend you and closer to add a bad review about you. Reach out for those and fix whatever went wrong with them, and make sure also to give “passives” the push they are waiting for before they can recommend you.

 

5. Branding Association

Branding association is the magical point where your vision and slogan come true. Do your customers really associate you with relaxation, happiness, modernity, easiness, reliability and other fancy words you believe your product/service can offer? If so, congratulations! You got your brand into your customers’ hearts and minds. The brand association helps you identify the place your brand takes your customers to when it’s mentioned, and you can always work in improving this place or attributes until you are happy with them.

 

6. Brand Linkage

While it is definitely a great feeling to know that your brand is associated with nice feelings and great attributes, it would be a real slap in the face if brand linkage wasn’t going well. A brand linkage is measuring if your customers can really link your brand when they see your ads “on the web or printed”, when they hear your slogan or mission, or when they see your logo or other brand identity materials.

 

7. Share of Search

You could just track your “reach” but track your share of search instead to see where you are standing among your competitors. If you have done a great job in branding, then the number of people searching for you should go up. Getting yourself the biggest share of search when it comes to the best in your category or when a keyword of your industry is searched is a huge victory for your brand.

 

8. Market Share

Financial sides always matter. In the real word, what your brand conquers in the market share from the targeted group would always matter the most. The brand’s share of the market can be divided into customer segments, product segments, and geographical markets. Market share says a lot about brands ability to retain, and more importantly, to attract new customers.

 

9. Price Premium

Moving from how strong is your ground on the market, is your brand’s ability to command a price premium in the market. Measuring the differential price points between the brand and the competitors indicates the level of value-creation and pricing power. How much more are customers willing to pay only for your brand?

 

10. Revenue

Not including revenue in this list would have been a joke. Definitely, the stronger the brand is the more revenue it is making. Watch your revenue and see how financially your brand is growing. Revenue tells you how well your marketing and sales team are doing. You can also see if your annual revenue per customer is increasing or not.

 

Conclusion

Brands are becoming major assets for companies, that’s why brand measurement and management are a key aspect of successful business strategies on a broader scale and to long-term competitiveness and profitability. The brand financial value is very important but doesn’t also remember to measure the brand equity and customers’ satisfaction and loyalty.