Comments on: Five Meaningless Marketing Metrics

By: fmdays

fmdays — Wed, 01 Apr 2009 18:23:12 +0000

Thanks for the compliment but I can’t take credit for the line. That goes to a former boss who had a great sense of humor and infectious laugh.

You are right in that they are incomplete measures. Sadly many inexperienced marketers, however, will often present them as results rather than raw data. It is the challenge of the CMO or Director of Marketing to educate people how to “connect the dots”. I agree that it is easier said than done. The difficult thing is that many of the conversations about results don’t happen until after the campaigns are over and it is to late to do anything meaningful.

By: Mike O'Toole

Mike O'Toole — Wed, 01 Apr 2009 14:24:35 +0000

Very thoughtful post, and I love the “anxious parade of activity” comment. I would characterize your five measures as incomplete rather than meaningless. Campaigns produce data, and data must be measured. The real challenge is connecting upstream activity data to downstream results. Easier said than done, I know.

By: Metrics that Matter

Metrics that Matter — Wed, 29 Oct 2008 14:16:07 +0000

[...] Marketing A couple of weeks ago I poked fun at the array of numbers that frequently masquerade as metrics. As a follow-up to that post, here are some additional thoughts about the attributes of [...]

By: limeduck

limeduck — Fri, 26 Sep 2008 17:52:46 +0000

These metrics are indeed out-and-out junk, to which I might add column inches of press coverage, but don’t forget about the potentially fatal condition of Dashboard Bloat. That’s when your allegedly at-a-glance dashboard metastasizes into a dumping ground for every number that can possibly be generated, as a figure, a percent and a rolling average for good measure. Be sure to include several metrics that are tightly correlated, too. When you have dozens of KPIs, you have to wonder exactly which are truly “Key” anymore.

By: Geoff McGehee

Geoff McGehee — Fri, 26 Sep 2008 14:49:01 +0000

The all time worst metric is measuring the “value” of multi-channel shoppers as opposed to single channel. You always hear that multi channel shoppers are 2-3X more valuable than there single channel counterparts, but it is almost the equivalent of saying that multi-buyers are more valuable than an average buyer.

This major problem ends up being an irrational desire to coerce customers into another channel thinking that they will magically become better buyers upon doing so!

By: Gregory Ng

Gregory Ng — Fri, 26 Sep 2008 13:54:55 +0000

Great list! I would say though that for #5 I agree only to a point.

The problem is most email marketers aren’t even at the point where they can think about optimizing for better click throughs. Some have no idea about optimizing against image blocking and spam filters. So I would say open rate is the first metric they should concern themselves with. Once they nail that, then worry about click through.