Marketing Metrics

A Puzzle Called Marketing Metrics...!

Marketing metrics, the puzzle...

World over Marketers are trying to crack this. It sounds simple but eludes all the minds. Simple as in, any marketing investments need to result in some brand and some demand. While brand can be tracked with expensive research, demand is straightforward revenue. Many simple measures such as website hits, downloads, call centre spurts, telephone rings can also add to this. To keep it short, it is not a measurement puzzle...!

Any puzzle is a mind game. This too is similar.

Businessmen know how to invest. They are smart people. There are many management theories that explain how to measure return on investments. Unfortunately these investments are tangible. The money gets converted into plant, machinery, land kind of fixed assets (and gets depreciated year on year, saving on tax)...or money gets converted into resources viz., man, machine and measured in terms of operational productivity...or money gets converted into power and control, as in equity ownership rights...or money gets converted into future money of higher value, as in debt markets.

The puzzle grows multitude when the same Businessman sees money converted into an advertisement in the leading news daily...most importantly in the next day. How much is it worth? This is the question that starts the riddle. It does not have, 'depreciation'. It does not have 'operational productivity' day in, day out. It does not have 'ownership rights'. It is just a piece of paper. Worse if it is a TVC, which vanishes in air in seconds.

Do you think any number of marketing metrics will help?

Even if it results in demand, it has a diminishing effect (unless the product satisfies a basic need or a perpetually growing fashion!) and hence needs continuous investments. Puzzle takes a different turn as there is no 'straight line' equation as in 'input-process-output'.

This puzzle has a solution:

a) Businessmen need to own...