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In a previous post, we talked about the importance of data-driven marketing for financial services companies. But how can you actually measure the success of these data-driven marketing campaigns to make sure that you’re on the right track?
That’s where digital marketing analytics comes in. According to a survey by Deloitte, organizations plan to increase their spending on marketing analytics by 200 percent in the next three years. Below, we’ll go over what digital marketing analytics is, the advantages of using it, and some pointers on how financial services companies can adopt digital marketing analytics.
What is Digital Marketing Analytics, and Why is It Important?
Digital marketing analytics is the use of data and analytics to evaluate the effectiveness and impact of your marketing campaigns. By turning customer actions into cold, hard facts and figures, digital marketing analytics offers a comprehensive view of the performance of your marketing efforts—from your website and lead generation campaigns to your email marketing, social media, and e-commerce.
The goal of digital marketing analytics is to understand customers’ behaviors, goals, and motivations so that you can create better marketing campaigns and make smarter business decisions.
What Are the Benefits of Digital Marketing Analytics?
Digital marketing analytics is ultimately a customer-first approach. Rather than examining bottom-line financial KPIs such as costs and revenues, the metrics in digital marketing analytics focus on how your prospects and customers behave (see the next section). Aiming to improve these metrics will help boost customer loyalty, which is crucial for long-term profitability.
In addition, using digital marketing analytics takes a great deal of the guesswork and supposition out of your marketing efforts. Did your recent email campaign fail because the subject line wasn’t compelling enough, or because the graphics inside the email turned customers away? Digital marketing analytics gives you exactly the information you need to answer these questions and more.
What Are the Most Important Digital Marketing Analytics Metrics?
There are a wide variety of possible digital marketing analytics metrics that you can use, but some of the most common include:
Websites
Traffic: The total number of page visits during a specified period. Traffic can be segmented by the source (e.g. email or social media) or by the device (e.g. desktop or smartphone).
Time on page: The average amount of time that a visitor spends on your website.
Bounce rate: The percentage of visitors who left your website without taking action or visiting other pages.
Lead generation
Click-through rate: The percentage of people who clicked on a call to action (CTA).
Free trial conversion rate: The percentage of users who became paying customers after a free trial.
Leads to close ratio: The percentage of leads who are converted to paying customers.
Email marketing
Open rate: The percentage of recipients who open a sent email.
Click-through rate: The percentage of recipients who click on a link in the email.
Unsubscribe rate: The percentage of recipients who unsubscribe from your email list during a specific period.
Social media
Engagement rate: The ratio of engagements with a social media post (e.g. comments and likes) versus the total number of views or impressions.Audience growth rate: The rate of growth of your social media audience over time.
How to Use Digital Marketing Analytics Effectively
Getting all of these metrics for digital marketing analytics in hand is important—but it’s only one piece of the puzzle. How can you actually use this information effectively to enjoy the benefits of digital marketing analytics?
There are two major steps here: first, collecting all your digital marketing analytics data in a centralized location; second, using the data and insights to set goals and milestones for your marketing team.
In order to get a holistic view of your digital marketing efforts, you may need to use multiple tools: one for your web analytics, another for email marketing, still another for social media, etc. To effectively analyze all this data, you need to collect it in a single repository where you can efficiently run marketing analytics queries and generate reports for key decision-makers.Using the results of these analyses, your marketing team should be able to understand where it is succeeding and where it has room for improvement. Once you’ve identified the areas that need additional focus, come up with SMART goals (i.e. goals that are specific, measurable, achievable, realistic, and timely) so that you can assess the marketing team’s progress.
Conclusion
By adopting digital marketing analytics, financial services companies can become better informed about their audience and enjoy the benefits of a customer-centric approach. To learn more about financial marketing and sales strategies, check out the latest articles on our blog. You can also get in touch with our team today for a consultation about how we can help with your business needs and objectives.
