By Are you measuring the profitability you're generating through your B2B marketing? If not, you may be missing an opportunity to show the value of your department's work and identify important insights to increase your technology ROI over time. It's not only measurable; it's incredibly useful, also. Here are eight ways that measuring ROI could benefit you right now.
1. Know the Metrics that Contribute to the Success of Your B2B Tech Company
Measuring ROI provides you with insights into how marketing contributes to your company’s success. As you begin consistently measuring marketing efficiency, you'll be able to clearly see which campaigns, initiatives, and strategies increase it over time.
However, word of caution: It's important to measure profitability for a longer period of time (at least six months) before making any decisions — and in some cases, longer.
You can't see ROI (that's the true one!) on a channel or campaign in a month if your sales cycle is six months or more. To learn the true ROI of your marketing campaigns, you have to take a wider view.
2. Directly Impact Short-Term KPIs
Not only does knowing marketing efficiency in your B2B marketing strategy provide you with knowledge but it’s also information you can use immediately. As you determine what's impacting your metrics, you'll make the connections between ROI and your short-term KPIs, and you can confidently make changes to optimize it.
A recent study conducted by the LinkedIn Business Institute, found that B2B tech companies consistently tracking ROI are 50% more likely to meet their short-term KPIs like generating MQLs and converting them to SQLs.
3. Reduce Waste
Measuring your ROI consistently and comparing them with benchmarks in B2B technology and your own past performance provides you with a standard to which you can compare that performance.
This helps you identify when something isn't right or needs improvement. Take clear steps to cut waste while improving efficiency and cost-effectiveness across the board.
For example, are high acquisition costs driving down your strategy? Investing in content strategies like inbound marketing and marketing-sales alignment can bring those costs down.
You'll see reduced waste in the form of:
- Lower customer acquisition costs
- Shorter sales cycles
- Higher conversion rates
- Increased employee productivity (marketing automation and sales-enablement content are huge factors here!)
- Less wasted ad spend
4. Understand Channel Performance
Is LinkedIn worth the investment of time and money your B2B tech company is putting into it? Would a different channel deliver a higher ROI?
The answer varies by company and the audience your B2B marketing seeks to reach. If LinkedIn isn't the right channel for you, measuring channel-specific ROI will tell you.
For each channel, measure B2B technology ROI through:
- Number of leads
- Lead to close conversion rate
- Brand awareness
- Channel reach / impressions
- Length of the sales cycle
5. Evaluate Campaign Performance
By measuring marketing efficiency consistently, you'll know which campaigns are delivering the biggest bang for your buck. This reduces the number of unproductive campaigns you end up pulling because they aren't working. It increases your investment in initiatives that help you meet your KPIs.
When measuring the ROI of marketing campaigns, track:
- Cost per action
- Sales lift
- Average order value
6. Better Business Performance
You'll gain insights you can use to impact the business goals that matter at the end of the day. Be sure to track these to show how measuring B2B ROI affects the bottom line:
- Revenues
- Value for shareholders
- Customer lifetime value
7. Make the Case for Long-term Investments in C-Suite
Sometimes, it's hard to make the case for long-term investments like better analytics and marketing automation. C-suite wants to know how your marketing campaigns impact revenues this quarter.
Getting a handle on how your marketing efforts are impacting the brand and delivering ROI consistently will make it easier to enter the boardroom and make the case for better technologies that help you achieve even higher B2B ROI.
8. Developing a Winning Long-Term Strategy
What you do today to generate leads matters. Without the revenue those future customers generate, a business cannot exist. You should consider generating more leads and higher quality leads, all for less money. Position your business to grow and increase profits.
For example, inbound marketing is a consistent strategy that contributes to significant ROI increases because it focuses on attracting your most ideal buyers through personalized content that aligns with their journey. The consistent profitability that inbound marketing generates isn't as easy or fast to measure as cost-per-click. But all B2B ROI is measurable with the right tools.
If you want to learn how to improve tracking and reporting, then start with an assessment. Relequint’s B2B Balanced KPI Scorecard will help align overall business goals with your preferred strategy to increase your B2B tech company’s ROI. Click here to learn more.
