Acronyms

Most people preach ROI, but there are several factors why you shouldn’t put too much stock in your Return On Investment. I’m not saying disregard it entirely; I’m just saying don’t let it be your main focus when you measure your marketing efforts. Using financial advisor marketing services to help you produce brand-boosting financial seminars might not initially net the ROI you were looking for but it improves your brand visibility, other metrics matter. There are much more effective acronyms (method) for determining how your marketing mix is working, and it’s called ROO, or Return On Objective. ROO isn’t a term you hear very often, and even in my industry – where it’s of the utmost importance – hardly anyone talks about it.

I like a good ROI as much as the next guy, but it’s just not adequate for truly measuring marketing success, and that’s because not everything has an immediate dollar value attached to it. For example, a Facebook post, tweets, and product package design really don’t show you a return in actual dollars.

So, stop measuring your marketing only in terms of ROI. To see a truer value of your marketing efforts, start using ROO. First, start asking yourself what you really want to accomplish with your campaigns. Maybe your goal is a better or new image, larger customer base, fresh design, more social media followers, or a combination. Then collect several pieces of data to determine the effectiveness of your efforts. The measurement data is another acronym I like to call the SCAPES – Sales, Conversions, Awareness, Perception, Engagement, and Satisfaction/Retention – and are explained a little further below.

Sales. Take a look at your sales numbers before, during, and after your campaign. An uptick suggests a positive response to your efforts.

Conversions. Measure how many people are inquiring, visiting, and buying as a direct result of your campaign. Gathering this information is of vital importance because it allows you to interact with (see Engagement) and receive input from clients and prospects directly. Getting it straight from the horse’s mouth is always best.

Awareness. Examine how many people are aware of your product or project before you began a marketing campaign, during your campaign, and after the campaign. An increase in consumer and/or market awareness for you and your business can and should be considered a success.

Perception. There are several factors to the way you and your business are perceived. They include customer experiences, design of your packages, website, materials, appearance of your location and employees, attitudes and moods of employees and patrons, This one can sometimes be a little tricky to measure, as people may not be up front with you to your face, unless you’re one of two things: extremely fantastic, or very terrible. Make sure your people, location, and marketing materials are looking good and that your customers always have a positive experience when they work with you, and chances are you’ll do well with perception.

Engagement. How much time to people spend visiting your location, website, social media sites? Are they retweeting or sharing your information with their social circles? Are they leaving comments or asking questions face-to-face or through your website? If the answers are, a lot, yes, and yes, then your marketing efforts are on the right track.

Satisfaction/Retention. Are those who bought from you happy with what they got? Are they happy with how they were treated? Would they buy from you again, or are you losing customers? Would they refer someone to you? The answers to these questions are very important to your marketing efforts.

The factors that relate to ROO also relate to your ROI. Think of the SCAPES as a series of funnels that feed into a cash reservoir. Consistent positive results will help raise the money level, while negative results will cause it to drain.

The SCAPES are factors that are almost 100% influenced by your marketing efforts. How much money you got back for making your investment won’t tell you what people think of you, how much your sales increased or decreased, what kind of experience your customers had, or how many of them got involved via your website or through social media. The SCAPES will affect your Return On Investment while providing results that truly show the big picture of your marketing efforts.

Start tallying your SCAPES to get an accurate picture of your Return On Objective. Your business and customers will be better off for it, and so will your bottom line.