In many business niches, the deal is clos not in the same month in which the company receives the lead, but much later: in a month, two, and sometimes in a year.
That is, a lot of time can pass from the moment a potential client leaves a request with their contacts on the company’s website or in social networks until the moment the transaction is complet.
A potential client can discuss purchasing a product or ordering a service with a sales manager, study the product, delve into the topic, warm up on social networks or on the company blog, and possibly become an existing client of the business.
But the marketer nes to quickly assess the real effectiveness of marketing activities and plan future advertising campaigns and promotion budgets. It is important to do this as soon as possible after the end of the reporting period, when the client’s decision on the deal has not yet been made.
How to plan marketing activities in conditions of uncertainty?
It is important to separate two tasks: evaluating specific database by industry the effectiveness of marketing activities and planning advertising and other activities aim at attracting consumers. This article will focus on the second task.
The final sales data will be available only 2-3 months after the end of the analyz period. And only after the majority of leads have been clos in deals will the marketer have the opportunity to objectively retrospectively evaluate the effectiveness of marketing activities bas on the orders attract and revenue.
This delay retrospective version of evaluating the
This information is certainly useful, as it is us for long-term planning in marketing, but it is absolutely not suitable for operational decision-making. Marketers ne results here and now, there is no opportunity to wait 3-6 months until the deals on leads are clos.
The effectiveness of marketing activities of the just complet period can only be assess preliminary and promptly (so that information on the results of the promotion can be us for planning now) using qualifi leads. Lead qualification is perform faster than closing a deal on a lead, usually within two weeks.
As a rule, a marketer does not have enough information
For example, a contractor for setting up contextual advertising can work with such a volume of data (provid that the quality of qualifi leads and their conversion into sales are subsequently track by a marketer on the customer’s side).
To fully calculate the mia plan and the return on investment, we ne data on the conversion from a qualifi lead to a sale, as well as on the average check, costs, and number of orders per client.
In this situation, I propose using a hybrid version of the analyz indicators, which combines data on traffic and qualifi leads for the recently complet reporting period and sales data for those months in which the period for the buyer to make a american samoa business directory decision on the transaction has already end and the bulk of sales have been made.
Thus, when calculating your mia plan, you can now rely on the following indicators:
Expect conversion rate from qualifi leads to deals (calculat bas on data from clos periods, from the end date of which the period of making a decision on a purchase by the client has already pass). You take this data into account, assuming that the conversion will be the same in the plann period. Data on clos deals can be taken from the CRM or sales department reporting.
Conclusion:
Marketing activities for a long transaction level ii: the “should have” cycle can be plann using a hybrid principle (data on conversion from a qualifi lead to a sale is taken for clos periods, and data on conversion from visitors to qualifi applications is taken for the nearest analyz month or week, depending on the planning horizon).