Monthly? Quarterly? Annually. In order to fully understand the performance of your marketing program, you need enough data to make an educated decision. Here are some major factors that affect your annual marketing performance.
Seasonality
This is a trend that you can count on every year. Seasonality plays a huge role in every industry, and truly portrays how demand fluctuates throughout the year. People need different things during different times of the year, resulting in changes in search and purchase behavior. For example, during the winter your auto shops will likely see an increase of searches for “tire repairs” or “break repairs” due to the perils winter brings. On the other hand, you will see a different demand during the summer, like searches for “AC repairs” or “engine coolant.” Each of these seasonal demands will result in different levels of revenue based on the ad spend and product values. Seasonality should be approached strategically, tailoring messaging and spend levels to the trends associated with each season.
Non-proportional Data
Different marketing channels don’t accrue value in the same ways. You might be running search and banner ads year round, giving you 365 sets of data but you may only send out a monthly email newsletter, meaning only 12 data sets a year. With only a month’s worth of data, for example, you won’t be able to fully compare the two or see exactly what each channel drove. In addition to this, if you run any print collateral you could have 50 people see your billboard one month, and 1,000 the next month. Waiting until the end of each channel’s campaign will allow you to see the overall performance rather than getting an unproportional view of just that month.
Samples Are Inaccurate
Don’t make big decisions off of a sample size. It’s critical to get a statistically significant amount of data before you can truly evaluate the success of your marketing efforts. Through all of the different things that occur in a year from seasonality and holidays, to A/B ad tests you run and fluctuating spend allocations, there is a lot to account for before making future decisions. Not to mention unforeseen obstacles, like market fluctuations or even reputation management issues. It’s important to get the full picture, visit https://conceptualminds.com/services for expertise and guidance in evaluating the performance of your marketing program.
