With all the work that goes into a marketing campaign, you want to be sure you're measuring results properly and basing your future campaign decisions on solid and reliable information. It's simply too easy to base your advertising strategy on the wrong data and much more challenging to sort out the relevant and valuable data. 
Most businesses follow a 'one-and-done approach' that often neglects the opportunity to learn from past campaigns and expand and improve upon that success — thus, limiting the potential brands have in both reaching and resonating with their target audience.  

Ditch the one-and-done approach that isn't working and start measuring your campaign results right away. The following will highlight our most helpful tips on measuring success to improve your future campaigns. 

1. Set goals and timeframes  

It can't be overstated just how important it is to have set goals and timeframes laid out for everyone to see and follow. Measuring and tracking campaign success cannot be done accurately if there aren't clear and concise goals and a deadline to reach them by. For this reason and more, the very first thing you need to do is set your goals and timeframes. 

The best way to do it? Create SMART goals — goals that are Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Relevant, and Timely. This means the goals are detailed to avoid misunderstandings, measurable to allow improvements, attainable to limit risk, relevant to your business goals as a whole, and dated with a timeframe to keep everyone on track. 

2. Establish reporting benchmarks  

There's no doubt about it — benchmark reporting requires effort, but it's well worth it when done right.  

Benchmarking provides valuable context, helping you to set meaningful targets, gain insight into trends occurring across your industry, and informs you how you are doing compared to your competition. 

To maximize the benefits, the benchmark report consists of three basic components — the metric, the benchmark value, and the comparison group. The following are typically included and segmented across multiple levels (i.e., region, industry, organizational size, revenue): 

• Process maps 
• Infographics 
• Case studies, and more.  

3. Identify your KPIs 

Key Performance Indicators are essential to tracking and measuring the success of your campaigns. KPIs gauge how well your business is doing at reaching a set goal. While there are KPIs for nearly every business component, they're particularly important for marketing success since they allow you to take prior results and learn from your mistakes while building upon your successes.  

The key is to identify your KPIs as they relate to your business goals — choosing ones that directly influence business outcomes. Ninety-five percent of leading marketers agree that to truly matter, marketing analytics KPIs must be tied to broader business goals. 

With that being said, some of the best KPIs include Customer Lifetime Value, Sales Revenue, Conversion Rates, Social Media Reach, Mobile Traffic, Organic Search, and more. 

4. Test your tools  

The marketing tools you use to measure the success of your campaigns depend solely on the goal you intend to achieve. However, that doesn't mean every tool that claims to help you reach that goal will do exactly that for your brand or business. 

One of the most important things you can do when measuring success is to test your tools and evaluate whether they're the right ones for your business in particular. After all, not all brands and people are the same, so not all tools will work for everyone. 

5. Turn data into valuable insights  

There's no use putting in all the hard work, time, and money to measuring and improving your marketing campaigns if you can't efficiently turn it all into valuable insights. Sure, access to the largest data piles in the world would be great, but if you can't accurately interpret it, it can’t do anything for your business.  

In 1910, Scottish writer and poet Andrew Lang said, 'He uses statistics as a drunken man uses lampposts—for support rather than illumination.' Decades later, many modern businesses still mistakenly use data to support rather than drive their decision-making. 

Partner with experts to benefit from their experience 

Working with a media partner can help you see ROI from your marketing campaigns much sooner than the average newcomer looking to scale their business and improve their advertising efforts. Perfecting your marketing campaigns is beyond challenging, but working with a team of experts who have been specializing in this field for countless years will take that stress off your shoulders. Every campaign counts towards your ultimate goal of increasing sales and growing your business, so why not use every campaign to improve on the next one?