On the Marketing Metrics Scam

Marketing metrics have become hot hot hot of late.  There are many of my marketing brethren who offer for a not insignificant consulting fee to identify for you the absolutely essential metric or metrics that will guarantee marketing success.  Whatever their fee is I will gladly give you advice on metrics for half what they are asking. 

I have been doing a lot of thinking about marketing metrics lately. Those of you who know me will not be surprised at all to learn that I have bought several books on the subject.  Some of these books identify and explain more than 50 separate metrics.  Surely it doesn’t take that many but which ones are the right ones?  My reading and thinking about this question have consumed quite a bit of time. 

My conclusion turns out to be pretty simple.  There isn’t one or a handful of metrics that will solve your business or marketing problems.  Actually, if you are trying to identify the right metric you have more serious problems than you might imagine.  If you have a business or marketing plan then you have defined specific goals.  Once you have defined your goals the appropriate metric is OBVIOUS! 

If your personal goal is to lose weight you would use a scale.

If it is to get into med school or law school you use the MCAT or LSAT.

Likewise you should have goals set for your marketing program: increased profit (ROI), top of mind recall (recall, awareness) you get the idea.

Bottom line:  If you don’t know what metric to use you have not clearly defined your goals.  Don’t hire someone to tell you about metrics.  Hire someone to help you with planning and goal definition.

#justsayin