Marketing Strategy Metrics: Supermodels vs. The Band Geeks

Subtitle: The science behind why you suck… and finding a happy medium.

Over the last few days I have been talking to an old partner who is now a fancy pants director at a big consulting firm in charge of growing a new division.

As we discussed how his marketing funnel is tiered and contact points of different classes of prospects, I immediately noticed that my discussion went straight towards the metrics of each group.

 

• How many are there in each prospect group
• What is the frequency of contact
• What is the close rate at each stage
• And about 9 million other questions

Now, to any direct-response marketer, it’s all about the numbers.  Both online and off, if your marketing model is based on direct-response (direct mail, email marketing, squeeze page sales, CPC, etc) then you usually know a LOT about metrics and have very exacting and scientific models for optimizing results. I’ll call these folks the “Band Geeks” for the remainder of this article.

However, if you are in a more squishy marketing field like advertising, promotions, creative, or marketing strategy, you usually tend to focus a lot less on the science of metrics, and put your attention on the art of the sale or emotional triggers.  These peeps, I’ll refer to as the “Supermodels.”

What I think a lot of Supermodels miss is the crucial data that metrics provide in both determining your ultimate strategy, and further refining your strategy to optimize the desired results.

The reason I bring this up is because most of us “Gisele Bundchen’s” don’t really use metrics that much; And we should.  The primary reason that we don’t bother is that collecting useful metrics sucks.  It’s a pain to find the right ones, it’s a pain to track and collect the data, and it’s a pain to interpret it – But it’s worth it.  We all know math is anything but sexy, and us supermodels are all about the sexy, but in this case it is worth taking the bullet and packing the bassoon.

 

Back to the Case Study…

In my buddies plan, we reviewed the different classes of prospects, where each one came from, where they are in the decision making process, and then the tactical marketing method we would use to move them along the curve until the prospect either said “not interested” or the deal was closed.

Depending on who the prospect was and where they fit into the mix, they might receive one of several emails, a call from a field sales agent, a push from another consultant, a FedEx package, or in some cases a call from a partner themselves.

Dozens of variations and iterations on the actual conversation or content received by the prospect made the model pretty complex, but ultimately it was both strong and manageable.  What was missing however; was a system to collect and analyze the metrics of each one.

And that’s a critical flaw.

A Band Geek would have had these systems in place from the very beginning, all scientific-like.  And they would be right.  We supermodels think that we are the experts on reading people.  We know the right triggers, we know how to write and design to solicit an emotional response, and believe we know just what strings to pull to get people to do what we want.   But we really don’t. And any marketer who tells you they know exactly how a person or group of prospects will respond to something is just full of shit.  They may have had similar experience, or marketed to a group like this before, but so many factors beyond anyone’s control make every case an independent scenario.

But if you have your metrics in place from the beginning, tracking the right figures, you can see exactly how people are responding and where in the funnel needs improvement.

In real life, when you have a pretty complex marketing model with lots of prospects in different stages, and lots of messages for different groups, it gets REALLY HARD to figure out what to do when things are not working as expected.

Sales point a finger at marketing, marketing points the finger at sales, creative points the finger at strategy, strategy points a finger at the customers, customers give you the finger and go away.  Blech.

But when you have a strong system of metrics in place from the very beginning, you can actually see where things are falling through the cracks.  For example, say that you see that the telemarketing group has a 5% close rate on getting an initial contract, but a recommendation from an in-field rep has a 25% close.  That gives you at least a basis for examining your strategy and at a minimum you know to test different options and to look into what the field reps are doing differently.  Suppose that your email to medical prospects has a 50% higher open rate than the same email to legal prospects, that again gives you a basis for examining your strategy and making modifications.

But none of this is possible to do without a system of metrics in place BEFORE you start rolling it out.  I have been in a situation where I have tried to roll out reporting systems after a program has started, but by that point, you are usually doing it because you have a problem, and the infighting, as well as your assumptions on what might be working is already in place, and that guarantees your objectivity is tainted.

 

The moral of the story…

So, my recommendation to you fledgling supermodels is this.  Make friends with the Band Geeks, learn how to do what they do.  Yes, you may look a little funny in a tweed sportcoat, but you have to admit, the naughty librarian look is HOT!

Be cool.  Your nerdy Adriana Lima,

 

JJ