How to Find True ROI In Your Marketing Efforts

Caid Christiansen• May, 03 2015

Despite what you may have been told, ROI in marketing is not a unicorn.

It’s possible to find true ROI in your marketing efforts—you just have to know where to look.

Step 1: Start with Strategy

Strategy always—always—comes first. It will tell you who you’re trying to get in front of, what they’re interested in, what your value propositions are, what your messaging in your marketing will be, and most importantly, what your goals are.

Your strategy and goals will drive every decision you make. Strategy is a foundation that everyone must have.

Step 2: Pick Your Tactics

With your strategy in place, it’s time to pick tactics. A new website may be what you need to reach your goals. Maybe you need a radio ad. Maybe you need an email campaign. Or, possibly you’ll need some combination thereof.

Your goals will help you decide the tactics you’ll need to execute.

Step 3: Pick Your Metrics

From the very beginning, you should also set out to uncover which metrics you’ll measure, both on an ongoing basis and after you’ve reached the end of your ‘trial’ period or first rev. It does you no good to reach the end of a test and realize you never figured out what you were going to measure.

What you’ll need to measure will depend on your goals and the tactics you have in place, but the important thing is that you know what you’re going to measure and have a decent idea of your expected result.

Step 4: Measure and Repeat

After you execute—no small task in and of itself—it’s time to measure and repeat.

Did the tactics you executed help you reach your goals? What does the data tell you? Most importantly, how does that data translate into business? This will mean tracking your tactics’ effectiveness, and also keeping a close eye on how new business comes in. All the social media metrics in the world won’t mean anything if you don’t have the systems in place to see if new sales are coming through Facebook or Twitter.

With this knowledge, you can measure and repeat. Measuring tells you whether your approach is working. Tweaking and repeating will help you continue to find success.

We’ll be the first to admit that it’s generally not this easy. These are four basic steps for finding ROI in your marketing efforts, but actually executing them and finding that ROI takes experience, expertise, and rigor—which is where a marketing expert comes in.

Expertise aside, don’t believe anyone who tells you it’s impossible to tie marketing to tangible ROI. It may be difficult, but impossible it ain’t.