By Anwen Cooper, Get Fruitful Marketing
If you want to take your business and marketing to the next level this year, you need to begin with a review of your efforts from last year. So many people just carry on with a ‘business-as-usual’ approach, without ever taking this critical time to analyse and reflect. But remember – knowledge is power. The more you know about your business and customers – the stronger your position. The chances are that you have most of this information at your fingertips… you just need to dig it out. Here are 15 points to consider when undertaking an annual marketing review and plan:
1. Resource allocation
How did you spend your marketing budget and allocate your time to generating new business in 2015? What was a good investment of resources? If you have a CRM (Customer Relationship Management) system then this may be easier for you to track. If you don’t have an automated system yet then make this your number one priority for the year ahead.
2. Sales analysis
Again, if you have a CRM system, this may be easier to run reports on. Otherwise, look back over your accounts to see:
- Where did most of your business come from?
- Who were your most profitable and least profitable customers?
- Who were your most loyal repeat customers?
- What proportion of business came from new v repeat customers?
- What were your best-selling (and worst-selling) products or services?
- Were there particular market segments that were easier to reach?
3. Website analysis
Next, take some time to review your website visitor statistics. If you’re using Google Analytics, or you have a custom analytics package – login and pull the reports to see:- Where did most of your traffic come from?
- How many and which pages do visitors look at?
- How long do people spend on your site?
- What search terms people are using to find you?
- What were your most popular blog posts and pages?
If you don’t have access to this information, ask your website provider, or get some help with installing Google Analytics as a priority for the year ahead.
4. Email marketing analysis
Look back over any email campaigns you sent out and find out:- Which got best the response?
- What times of day and days of the week got the best response?
- Which links got the most clicks?
- Was your open rate, click-through rate and unsubscribe rate consistent?
5. Social media marketing analysis
Look back at your social media analytics and review:
- Which of your posts received the most engagement and views?
- Who were your top followers?
- What content generated the most click-throughs to your website?
- Did any of your convert to any actions such as e-list sign-ups, content downloads, direct sales?
6. Direct mail and paid-for advertising
If you ran any direct mail campaigns or paid-for advertising, review which had the best response rate and return on investment.7. Events, exhibitions, networking
Consider any events, exhibitions and networking you attended and work out the return on investment in terms of lead generation, sales closed, professional development and market research you benefited from as a result.8. PR
Review any free media coverage you generated, and consider what this would have cost if you had paid for the same amount of advertising space. The value of editorial is often calculated as being around three to six times the equivalent cost of paying for the same space in advertising – though there are many who question the validity of this method – it might give you a guideline to assess its contribution to your bottom line.9. Campaign comparison
Compare different campaigns you ran throughout the year, and assess which yielded the best responses and ROI. Were there particular channels or messages that worked better than others? Were there promotions at particular times that proved more effective?
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