Marketing KPIs: The Metrics That Actually Matter

The marketing KPIs that actually predict business growth, and how to set up tracking so you always know what's working.

Tony Lael

on Uncategorized •

November 01st, 2021

Using marketing KPIs to measure performance across your marketing efforts and marketing channels can sometimes feel like too much.

It should not require a degree in statistics to measure whether or not your marketing investment is returning solid marketing ROI.

You want to stay busy building organic traffic and getting new, local customers with lead generation marketing tactics.

This post should help you understand the basics for managing with key performance indicators in your next marketing campaign so your team can increase your website traffic, the number of leads, and improve conversion rate.

FREE: Marketing Channel ROI Performance Worksheet

To start, feel free to download our Marketing Channel ROI Performance Worksheet to see how your marketing campaign is working across all channels.

After you’ve entered the basic data, you will be able to answer critical questions for improving your marketing campaigns and marketing KPIs like.

• How do we increase website visitors?
• Does our organic traffic have a better conversion rate vs. social media?
• What changes can we make to increase lead conversion rate?
• How do we increase the number of leads we get?
• How do we lower customer acquisition cost (cac)?
• Which marketing campaign investment is
• How well does a sales qualified lead close to new
• Which channel generates the best marketing qualified leads (mqls)?

Your marketing and sales team should be looking at all your digital marketing together in order to make improvements.

Your sales and marketing team (this may be another agency like FANNIT, internal employees or contractors) should have no problem developing a clear contractor marketing strategy with a tactical plan for your business to grow.

• Resource: https://www.fannit.com/blog/digital-marketing-strategy/

Here Are The Top Marketing KPI Examples You Should Start With.

Using this powerful worksheet will help your sales department and marketing team(s) track the top marketing KPIs and marketing metrics across all the relevant  channels that generate leads to acquire a new customers.

Marketing expenses per channel

Measures what you invest in marketing costs

Website traffic data

Tells you how many people are looking at your website

Conversion rate

How much of this traffic turns into qualified leads. 100 visitors, 10 leads = 10% conversion rate

Leads generated

Qualified leads that you are able to put into your marketing database. Volume is not always the best. Sometimes quality over quantity is what is needed, but you and your team should create a system for evaluating how good (or not good) the new contacts you are generating.

Cost per lead

If you invested $1,000 on digital marketing and generated 100 leads = $10 per lead

Customer acquisition cost (cac)

Not all leads are created equal. So if you have spent $1,000 to generate 100 leads and 30 of those leads turn into new customers (or sales) your cac is $33.33.

New sales revenue

Revenue generated from new customers. If your business can generate new sales and keep customer retention high, you’ll grow your business much faster. BUT, if all your revenue comes from new customer acquisition, you’ll need to always replace that revenue each year.

Average (gross) revenue per sale

This is easier to figure out if you are selling jobs or projects – some service with a start and end that has revenue attached to it. For example, a Moving & Storage company, a Personal Injury Attorney, or a Window Cleaning Company can assign a revenue to a “sale”. To follow our example above, if you averaged $500 of gross revenue per sale x 30 new sales = $15,000.

So in the example marketing KPIs above, would you continue to spend $1,000 if it returned $15,000 in gross revenue?

The easy answer is YES! All day long! BUT, what if those sales are not profitable? You would be spending more to go further behind, faster.

Most Owners and  marketing Managers in charge of the digital marketing strategy  tend to focus on gross sales metrics and basic web analytics – new sales, how much revenue is generated by your sales process, lead conversions, social media efforts, and SEO efforts. They do this because it’s a place to start.

(Bonus) Customer lifetime value

I mention this because as a local service business (like an attorney) you might not care about this KPI. Although you may want to have the same client multiple times, my bet is not really.  Other services businesses like Landscaping, you definitely care about this metric.

What ROI Should You Expect With Campaigns?

This is why you will need to start focusing on gross profits of each sale, not just gross revenue when calculating ROI (return on investment) of your marketing spend.

The best explanation of simple ROI I’ve read is on Investorpedia. Yes, this is a site for financial investment, BUT as a business owner you are financially investing in your business.

Keep in mind, right around $1M in annual revenue and again at $3M in annual revenue, your local service business starts to hit a wall and will need to expand the types of digital marketing you are doing in order to reach sales goals and bust through your barriers.

This is why each key performance indicator you measure performance with needs to be examined individually and collectively (by channel) if you want to make the slight improvements you will need to in order to unlock the next level of sales growth and break through those walls.

Start by looking at how each channel is generating a marketing qualified lead, getting customer conversions, your traffic to lead ratio, and your cost per lead and cost per sale.

That is what our worksheet will help you start to think about.

Each industry and business has their nuances, so we’ve outlined the top sales channels we’ve see work for Local Service Companies.

Local SEO (organic search)

Over time can generate the least expensive leads for your business by far, but there are several factors at play. This is why you need an a professional SEO expert like FANNIT to help you with these campaigns.

• Content on your website
• Technical SEO
• Google reviews
• Local citations
• Google My Business Local Listing posts
• Website visitor engagement
• Backlink signals
• Social media signals

Resource: Google PageSpeed Insights

Paid advertising

This generates leads faster, but can also burn through your investment more quickly if you are not monitoring how your campaigns are set up and bidding is being done. Make sure you outline your process.

Social media marketing

This can be used to build loyalty and increase lifetime value of customers by building community, but who wants be a part of a community built by a Plumbing Company?

TV and Radio advertising

These are expensive, but great brand builders. The only problem is, like other forms of paid advertising – when you stop paying, people forget about you. This is why SEO plays an important role in keeping your brand

Non-digital campaigns

These can work well, but you have to choose wisely. If they are done in combination with digital campaigns the momentum they can help build is typically worth it.

Top Channels for Local Service Businesses to Generate Marketing Qualified Leads

Begin by examining your overall marketing strategy and how each of the lead sources generate sales qualified leads (sqls) for your business.

Then you can start to improve on the various marketing efforts with each channel to eek out more qualified leads, reduce customer acquisition cost, and increase sales growth.

While tracking marketing KPIs your sales team should pitch in to see how your collective marketing efforts produce results across the following channels.

Organic Search

People who use search engines to find information and click on the organic results displayed to them. Not advertisements.

Organic website traffic will end up being the least expensive on a per lead basis, but will be one of the longest for you to develop.

Paid Advertising

There are several ways paid advertising is presented to your potential customers in order to increase website traffic. Below are some examples.

However, if you want to dramatically increase your chances of increasing your traffic to lead ratio, landing pages are the best way to do this.

• Text Ads from Google Adwords
• Google Local Service Ads
• Click to Call Ads from Google
• Paid Social Media Advertising on Social Media Sites
• Display Ads on other websites

Social Media (Platforms) Marketing

Social media is one of those channels that can help you in many ways. Not all leading directly to sales, but providing you with opportunity to get and build.

• Potential Customer Referrals
• Brand Awareness
• Customer Support  Channel

Email Marketing

Unlike social media, emails can typically be targeted for specific segments of your audience who have opted in to receive very specific information from your business.

There are marketing agencies who purchase lists and send unsolicited emails to prospects in a list. This is illegal in the EU due to GDPR.

Here is how the US views email marketing laws at the time of this original post in 2021.

How to Comply with Email Marketing Laws

• Obtain Valid Consent
• Re-permission Contacts With No Record of Consent
• Display Proper Contact Details
• Keep the Communication Honest, Straightforward and Clear
• Opting-out Should be Simple, Easy and Accessible

Local service companies who are trying to increase the lifetime value of their customer relationships will use email lists as reminders.

Like, ‘It’s Time to Fertilize Your Lawn’ or ‘Tips for Repairing Roof Leaks’ that are sent to past customers.

Radio / TV

Get ready to spend a lot of cash, but these campaigns are a great way to remind everyone your brand is thriving. These are great for brands that serve regional markets.

Yard / Truck Signage

This is a low cost way to get eyeballs on your brand and show people you are serving in a local market.

Post Cards & Mailers

The rate of return on this channel has been a steady .5% to 1.5% return and depends on your target market. In some cases, like local healthcare, this can work better than social media.

Local Print Advertising Magazines

One great example of this is Hometown Values which serves small local communities across 5 states in the Northwest who still respond to print advertising.

Or in the Northeast, Uncle Henry’s is a great place to find local vendors.

No matter the marketing channels you choose you will still want to examine each of them for how they can help your team acquire potential customers, what the cost per lead is, how high (or low) the conversion rate is.

TIP: partner with whomever is the best sales copywriter in your company or area that you can find.

Sales Copy in Marketing Campaigns That Increase Sales Qualified Leads

Everyone’s goal with marketing campaigns are to increase sales growth or at least not to damage it.

So how do you make sure your campaigns do what you need them to in order to increase the number of leads, grab new customers and reduce the cost per new customers?

Write top notch sales copy in your campaigns at each step.

Marketing teams can sometimes rely to much on the same old marketing speak and forget they are speaking to humans. Human beings skim content because – THERE IS JUST SO MUCH OF IT COMING AT US?

It’s why we like video so much. We can just turn on the telly and become a sponge.

So, when you are thinking about writing great sales copy in your marketing campaigns I encourage you to think about the following.

• Who is the hero in the story being consumed?
• What challenges do they THINK they have
• Real
• Psychological
• Theoretical
• How can you prove to be the trusted guide they are looking for?
• Do you make it clear to them what your promise or process is?
• What does their life feel like if they follow your advice or adhere to your promise to them?

Analyzing all the marketing metrics in the world won’t help you until you are able to understand that YOU are not the hero in the story … YOUR CUSTOMER IS.

For example, when you write good sale copy for an SEO campaign marketing KPIs like cost per lead will drop because you’ve learned how to  increase search engines’ search rankings which drives more organic traffic visiting your website.

Writing relevant, searchable copy with a strong SEO strategy is something that is engineered, but also takes a knowledge of your customer.

Like, take this post as an example. I’ve been doing this long enough to know that a lot of our clients over the years have asked us the questions this post (hopefully) answers.

Because of my experience and knowledge of my audience I knew, prior to writing this post, that in order to compete with other posts on the Internet discussing similar topics this post needed the following.

• Be at least 3,000 words
• Have 109+ paragraphs
• Have over 9 images
• Make sure to include 78 keywords or phrases
• Have at least 35 headings
• Link to other relevant content on and off our website
• Preferably have a video
• Be original and valuable for a human to read IF they wanted to

How am I doing so far?

This is one example of writing copy for marketing. A few others on our site are.

• The Money Back Guarantee we offer to Plastic Surgeons
• The Local Marketing Strategy Session we provide to local home service companies
• The Sales & Marketing Playbook we offer to anyone who visits our website

Great sales copy can also help build brand awareness on social media channels. For example, one of the posts we wrote about What Color Makes People Want to Buy is the third most visited page on our website.

We recorded a video for that post and offer a FREE Brand Review for you to learn more how your brand is influencing visitors.

If you’re thinking about a simple website design refresh or you want to rebrand your company like we recently did in 2018, you’ll want to check that out.

Or if you are wondering what type of brand equity you have built, you may first want to look into your social media account and the local reviews you’re getting online. Brand equity is a much deeper topic for another time.

The objective of your marketing campaigns is to increase website visitors and increase the number of leads of potential customers.

Getting backlinks for your website is a critical part of SEO. These links placed on other websites (not yours) and are followed mostly by search engines, but sometimes by people who are curious to learn what information is behind the link.

You can read How to Do Digital Marketing: 10 Steps to Create Online Campaigns for Your Business

Backlinks can also come from social media sites.  The point is make sure your sales copy represents your brand, knowledge you can share, and is a source for valid information to your audience.

Ever wonder who should be doing all this digital marketing work?

Roles to Have on a Digital Marketing & Sales Team

A Digital Marketing Team is different depending on what stage your business is in currently. In my 20+ years in operating businesses, I have seen typical small businesses go through the following stages of digital marketing and sales.

Evolution of Marketing Manager

Do it yourself

When you start your business you should do everything you can to generate revenue without overspending.  Become a self-educated expert on everything, including marketing and sales. The goal is to learn enough to be dangerous and not get taken advantage of by other companies.

Hire a marketing agency

This is the fastest way to get a marketing team without having to hire, train, and manage a team of people. The downside is you don’t have as much control and it can be more expensive than hiring an internal team.

Hire a marketing manager

This is a great option when you have the budget and want more control over your marketing. The downside is you have to manage this person and they will need a team to support them.

Hire a marketing team

This is the most expensive option, but gives you the most control. You will need to hire a marketing manager, a content writer, a social media manager, a paid ads manager, and an SEO manager. This is a lot of people to manage and can be very expensive.

Conclusion

Marketing KPIs are a great way to measure the performance of your marketing campaigns. They can help you understand what is working and what is not. They can also help you make decisions about where to invest your marketing budget.

If you are not sure where to start, I recommend you download our Marketing Channel ROI Performance Worksheet. It will help you get started on the right foot.

If you have any questions, feel free to talk to a marketing expert and we’ll be happy to help you out.

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Frequently Asked Questions

Q: How can a roofing company effectively track its lead generation efforts using KPIs? A: A roofing company should track KPIs like "Cost Per Lead" (CPL) for each marketing channel, "Lead-to-Opportunity Conversion Rate," and "Opportunity-to-Customer Conversion Rate." This provides a clear view of which campaigns are most efficient in generating qualified leads and ultimately new roofing projects. Regularly reviewing these metrics helps optimize marketing spend and improve sales pipeline efficiency.

Q: What are the most important KPIs for an HVAC business to measure the success of its local SEO strategy? A: For an HVAC business, key local SEO KPIs include "Local Search Ranking" for relevant keywords (e.g., "HVAC repair near me"), "Google My Business (GMB) Views and Actions" (calls, website visits, direction requests), and "Website Organic Traffic" from local searches. Monitoring these helps assess visibility in local search results and the effectiveness of attracting nearby customers.

Q: As a plumbing contractor, which marketing KPIs should I prioritize to understand my customer retention? A: Plumbing contractors should focus on "Customer Lifetime Value" (CLTV), "Repeat Purchase Rate," and "Customer Churn Rate." These KPIs indicate how successful marketing efforts are in fostering long-term customer relationships and repeat business. Understanding these metrics can guide strategies for loyalty programs and personalized follow-ups.

Q: What marketing KPIs are crucial for an electrician to evaluate the return on investment (ROI) of their online advertising campaigns? A: Electricians should prioritize "Return on Ad Spend" (ROAS), "Conversion Rate" (e.g., form submissions, calls from ads), and "Average Cost Per Click" (CPC) for their online advertising. These KPIs directly measure the profitability and efficiency of paid campaigns, allowing for adjustments to maximize lead generation and minimize wasted ad spend.