At TrackMaven, we prescribe data-driven marketing as the key to a successful digital strategy. Gone are the days of Don Draper, where repeatable success can be found based on a “gut feeling.”
When we speak with new TrackMaven customers, one of the tools we use to get to know their goals is our Data-Driven Marketing Sophistication Model. It’s a useful tool to start a dialog around where our customers feel they currently are, where they aim to be, and what challenges are currently limiting their progress toward becoming more data-driven.
- Gut-Driven: You’re trying to market without quantifying goals or using data to make decisions. You’re producing content wherever, and whenever. Put simply, you’re winging it.
- Data-Aware: You know you need to be data-driven, but you’re focused on high-level vanity metrics without specific goals or a clear path to achieve those goals.
- Data-Informed: You can identify patterns of successful tactics but your reporting is after-the-fact.
- Data-Driven: You iterate regularly based on a systematic approach to goal-setting and benchmarking. Measurement is in your DNA. You test, rinse, and repeat.
For marketing organizations in the first three steps, we often hear, “I know we need to be data driven, but how do we get there? And where should we start?”
Guess what? You’re not alone.
According to Teradata’s 2015 Global Data-Driven Marketing Survey, 87 percent of marketers consider data to be the most underutilized asset in their organizations.
Yikes! Don’t let that data go to waste. Here’s how to get started:
The four essentials for data-driven marketing:
1. Establish an initial set of key metrics, and focus on metrics tied to results.
A word of caution, speaking from (painful, personal) experience: don’t overdo it as you’re getting started. As you’re establishing the key metrics you want to measure and improve, think in terms of results oriented metrics. These are the bottom line numbers that your CEO cares about, or those that are one degree away from them. Until you’ve mastered the bottom line metrics, stay away from metrics that focus on inputs or simply measure things like the volume of content your team is producing.
Why? If your team isn’t focused on the bottom line metrics, you’ll face two big issues:
- They’ll optimize for the wrong things. Tell someone their job is to post to the blog as much as possible, and that’s what they’ll do. Do you have the data to show that more blog posts alone equals more customers?
- Their creativity will be limited. You want them focused on getting across the goal line. Empower them to call the plays that drive the ball down field. Is limited creativity really what you want out of marketers?
Check out our guide to end-of-year content reporting for suggestions for metrics to track.
2. Tie your actions to expected results.
Once you’ve established those key goals, connect the dots. Focus on making sure each member of the team is clear on how their piece is driving part of those bottom line goals. Make sure to articulate the math too though and ensure the team understands the direct quantitative impact their work has on those key metrics.
Then comes the turn. As you work to foster a data-driven culture, it’s important that you are tying your actions to expected results. With each major initiative or project, ask your team how they expect to influence those bottom line numbers. There may be struggles at first, and that’s ok, but ultimately you want to every answer to that question to sound like this:
“We expect that by [doing this project] we will increase [some key metric] by [some value or percentage].”
3. Make marketing data visible and part of your regular conversation.
According to Gartner’s 2015 Data-Driven Marketing Survey, 69 percent of marketers say the majority of their decisions will be quantitatively driven by 2017. If you’re not there yet, part of getting started is creating a routine for your team.
First, make sure the data is visible. It could be as simple as a shared Google document, or as robust as investing in a dashboard displayed on a huge TV on your wall. The key is to put those key metrics in front of your whole team, so everyone has them top of mind, always.
Second, build a routine around reviewing them. Make a discussion about them part of your weekly team meetings, your “one-on-one” meetings, and your leadership team. With every new decision, no matter how clear it may be, ask your team what data they have that backs up the direction they’re headed in. Feels like an unnecessary step? Don’t be fooled. Back to that Teradata study again; 59 percent of marketers cite faster decisions as a benefit of using data.
So stick with it. Create a regular cadence. Exercise those data muscles!
4. Iterate your data measurement methods and data-driven decisions — and quickly!
As you get started, you’ll likely find that despite best intentions, you’ll make mistakes. Maybe you’ve chosen to measure something the wrong way, or in a confusing way, or in a way that isn’t driving the right outcomes. That’s ok, and it’s part of the process.
The key is iteration, both in terms of how you’re measuring, but also in terms of what decisions you’re making with the data. Remember, you’re not choosing to be data-driven just for the sake of the data.
You’re doing it to improve your results, and improve the rate at which you achieve better results. So when you find that something isn’t working, be it your measurement, or the results you’re achieving, make a change. Most importantly, don’t abandon the use of the data just because you don’t immediately strike the nail on the head.
You’ll know you’ve arrived as the conversations change. Your team will begin bringing data to the table, marrying the art with the science, and your results will show. Ultimately, you’ll reach that upper-right nirvana, where you’ll be able to predictably drive the outcomes the business needs.