Topic: How to assess your marketing campaign and determine if it is succeeding.

Freelance Project, May 2009

The popular cliché says, “The definition of insanity is to continue to do the same thing, but expect different results.” Unfortunately businesses can get caught up a similar vicious cycle. Reusing the same marketing message via the same platforms, yet failing to timely notice the diminishing returns. Companies asleep at the wheel were really caught napping as the fallout from the current economic downturn kicked in.

It is reported that nearly 70% of marketers do not even know how to measure the return on investment for the campaigns. This amounts to a throw it on the wall and see what sticks type of approach, wasting valuable resources on poster printing, print ads, etc.

Factors to consider when developing your marketing plan include how does your audience want to communicate with you? Many may assume it is email, but experts say texting is rapidly rising as a preferred option. Headlines are filled with the news regarding the meteoric growth of Twitter, a micro-blogging service.

While it may be tempting to create an account, following a lot of users, because many may reciprocate because of your brand name or the fact you are a local company. Gain a certain number of followers, and some might believe this is a measurement of success for the marketing campaign. However, when you begin to flood them with sales messages only, they will just as quickly unfollow resulting in no or very little response to your promotions.

On the surface it may appear to be a minimal outlay of resources because no money was spent on poster printing or website ads. However, how many hours of staff resources were used to produce the one measly sale? Yet by spending more time identifying Twitters who love a good bargain, and their primary focus is sharing that type of news with fellow Twitters and via their shopping related blog, can be a gold mine for increasing traffic and sales.

Recently a popular food and household product company offered up to $50 in printable coupons for a limited time. They shared the information via their website, bought ads on popular websites and blogs their research showed their shopper visited often. They also sent the word out to popular bloggers. Then they just sat back and watched the message get shared and reshared via blogs, twitter and other social media mediums.

How can they measure the results: how many new visitors registered with their site, which was required before you could select the desired coupons. They already know what coupon redemption rates to expect they might see a slight bump in the usual rates. More importantly now they can reach consumers with an email newsletter highlighting recipes featuring their product. Following this up with posters printed in a variety of sizes and shapes and strategically placing in the store can result in more sales and focus group results showing your company foremost in the customer's mind.

When developing a marketing campaign it is important for the team to not only come up with a great new branding message but identify measurements by which the outcome will be evaluated. It is very important that buy-in is received on these measurements at the executive level to ensure everyone is on the same page and committed.