You’ve done it! You created and survived your holiday marketing campaign! While it would be nice to revel in the feeling of accomplishment, you’re not done yet.
“But the campaign was a success!” You say, “we earned so much money! What’s left to do?”
Nothing much . . . only determining if your campaign was actually worth the time, money, and energy you spent on it.
I hear this sentiment all the time from business owners. After they’ve dipped their toes in the marketing world for the holiday season, they decide to leave the pool until the next fall.
“Why would I ever need to know all those marketing stats?” They ask.
This attitude will doom your chances of long-term success. These metrics affect your business, your brand, and your bottom line.
Those “marketing stats” will help you in a myriad of ways. They
- are necessary for calculating your return on investment (ROI);
- give you valuable demographic information;
- help you determine your upcoming budget; and
- give you insight into and ideas for your future marketing initiatives.
Here are a few metrics you should consider measuring at the end of your holiday marketing campaign.
Impressions are the number of times an individual person sees a piece of content (ads, tweets, updates, blogs, etc.). This is an awareness metric. Although impressions are important, it can be a vanity metric. Focus on the quality or the effect of the impressions. How many times did a person see your ad before taking an action?
Reach refers to the number of people who saw your ad. I’ve already discussed how important it is to target the right audience, and this metric lets you see if you hit your target! Did the social media network, website, and/or publication you chose for ads live up to your hopes? Did you get the customers you expected, or did you see a boost in traffic from an unexpected demographic? For instance, video games are marketed to teenagers, but parents are usually the people who actually buy them.
Engagement is, essentially, interaction. It shows that your audience actively participated in your content. Likes, clicks, shares, comments–all of these are ways your audience engages with your brand. Think of engagement as the active result of reach and impressions!
Click Through Rate (also known as CTR) is found by dividing the number of individuals who clicked a link or ad on your webpage by the total number of users who viewed the page. If your page was viewed by 380 people, and 7 of those people clicked the link to your storefront, then the click through rate would be 1.84 percent. That CTR isn’t horribly low, by the way. According to Hubspot, search ads average a CTR of 1.91 percent and display ads have around .35 percent.
Conversions are actions taken by visitors. These actions can include completing a purchase, filling out a survey, or subscribing to an email newsletter. Tracking conversions enables you to retarget consumers. In retargeting, you present ads to consumers who visited your page but did not complete an action (e.g., added items to the digital shopping cart, but never paid).
All of these metrics will vary according to your goals. Too many novice marketers make the mistake of only analyzing these metrics after the holidays or another big campaign, but that is asking for trouble. You need to do this throughout the year! Take stock of where you are so that you can get to where you want to go!
Voilà! I’ve told you everything you need to know about running your holiday marketing campaign! If you have additional tips (or cautionary tales), share with us in the comments below. Don’t hesitate to reach out to me if you have any questions about digital marketing, seasonal campaigns, or one of my many Christmas cookie recipes!
Do you need more help with your holiday marketing campaign? Don’t wait for a Festivus miracle! Contact The Go! Agency today for your free consultation!
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