Digital media is no different to Traditional media:
forget about the metrics, just focus on the leads.
Digital Marketing is often viewed with a level of suspicion by businesses. I know because I used to feel the same way as a client. And that suspicion is nothing to do with the individuals involved, the companies themselves or the results it produces. There are loads of great people and great businesses around that produce great results. No question.
It’s because as a client, there’s just too much to learn. And it keeps on going. Just when you think you know all of the channels, along comes another. Just when you think you know how Google works, it changes. Just when you’ve remembered what an acronym meant, a new one arrives. And so it goes.
The idea that overly complicated metrics is exclusive to new media is a slightly skewed version of history of course. I’ve sat in many a meeting where good marketing executives have glazed over when the media company drops by to talk about eyeballs, universe, ratings, and costs-per-thousand.
But there was always one way to unpick the effectiveness of it all – a way that applies just as equally to old media as it does new media. Just as much to yesterday as today.
What did you spend and what did you get?
It all comes down to leads.
And in that sense, new media is no different to old media. Now, of course, there are many other factors that can be thrown in the ring – brand profile, audience engagement, media massaging etc. But you don’t do those things for fun either. There’s no point in raising the profile of your brand unless it ultimately results in more revenue further down the line.
At DigitalKOG we measure everything, literally everything – and that information is always available of course – it has to be as it’s what we use to maximise results, and for reasons just as important – transparency and trust. But we don’t kid ourselves that any of the metrics matter to our clients apart from what they spent and what they got for it.
It maybe new media, but the accountability is as old as the hills. This year’s new thing and next year’s new thing won’t change that.
Count the leads, count what you paid for them and count what happened to them. And feel free to glaze over at the other stuff if you want. I probably would.
