If you can’t measure it, it doesn’t count.

I’m going to let you in on a pet peeve of mine. I have a great network of people, many in business, some in technical, a few in engineering, some in their own work…you get the mix. For the past 15 years, I’ve taken a lot of ribbing about being in marketing-related roles. My non-business network tease me about not “really doing anything that you can count.”  They profess that it’s more about “fluff” and “art”, and there isn’t a lot of science to it.

WRONG! WRONG! WRONG! 

The marketing world has a lot of science to it. The easiest rebuttal is all the demographic data; but, they counter that the technical side of the business does that.

Still wrong.

Marketers are constantly wondering what metrics they should track to measure their success and progress.  Others question the value of spending time measuring success. Based on speaking with a number of peers and customers, my experience in marketing for… well, for at least the 15 years I’ve referenced, and also after talking with the gurus, here are some ideas for the metrics you should track when launching a product or managing existing products. To help you explain to your non-marketing network that there IS science behind the art.

1. Traction: Is the rate of new customers trying the product increasing?
2. Forecast accuracy: How are we doing compared to the sales forecast? Are their bottlenecks, backorders or inventory constraints?
3. Return rates: It is hard to please 100% of your customers, but I try!
4. Lead conversion rates: Are the leads of good quality? Is sales closing the deal?
5. Profitability: Are we hitting margin targets?

Of course there are many more things you could track, this list is really the very tip of the iceberg, but the goal of this list is to point out that there should be 5 things that you should measure on a monthly basis to see a high level or executive view of your business.  If these 5 aren’t the right items, choose the 5 for you. But, do them regularly.
One final note, make sure to measure these metrics as a trend, keeping track of how they change over time.  The real value is not just in knowing where you stand, but also knowing if you are moving forward or backward.

There are several ways to accomplish these measurements ranging to the good old pencil and paper, to using a spreadsheet or software that is designed for the task.

What do you measure for your business?  Are there any particular detailed metrics you would like to see discussed?  Looking from the outside in, if you can’t measure it, it doesn’t count. And, how would you even know if you are successful. In the end, numbers don’t lie.