The concept of measurable analytics for marketing has a tendency to divide small businesses into two camps: Those who don’t even think about measuring their marketing and those who firmly ask exactly what the ROI will be as a means of deciding what marketing to do. Neither of these camps is the perfect place to be when you factor in brand awareness. So, today we’re addressing a big question. Is brand awareness measurable?
I want to start by telling you that I am a big believer in tracking results wherever you can. (Read here for a whole ode from me to newsletter analytics, for example). Business owners can’t afford to sit back and be satisfied just for having done a random marketing task. A marketing strategy that boils down to ticking tasks off the list without ever checking to see how or where they are landing is bound to start missing the mark eventually.
Having said that, not every single thing you do for marketing is perfectly measurable. And that doesn’t mean it isn’t worth doing.
Not every single thing you do for marketing is perfectly measurable. And that doesn't mean it isn't worth doing. #marketing #business #smallbusiness #biztips #entrepreneur
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If you compare this to sports, many sports recognize “the assist.” Someone may score a goal, but the assist is noteworthy because it was the set-up required for the goal to happen. In many sports, the assist is something that is recorded and tracked. This is possible because all of the action was visible. The assist happened right there on the field of play, where everyone could see it.
In marketing, however, the assist is not always out in the open for us to see and record. It could have been a private conversation between two people that brought a new lead to your door. Or maybe someone calls you because your business name came up several times in the last few weeks – they can’t even remember where, but it started to feel really familiar so they became primed to notice it more. Perhaps someone saw a post from you on Facebook for the 200th time, and this was the time that they finally clicked through. It’s not always possible for us to attribute lead generation to one specific call to action or moment without acknowledging that there could have been an assist at play.
In marketing, brand awareness fills the same type of role that the “assist” does in sports. When you invest in brand awareness, you are creating more opportunities for the assist out there in the world.
In marketing, brand awareness fills the same type of role that the 'assist' does in sports. #business #smallbusiness #smallbiz #entrepreneur #marketing #biztips
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Brand awareness isn’t about hitting your audience with a hard core sales message. It’s about making sure they know you exist. It’s just giving them a reason to think about you. The more moments they spend thinking about you, the more likely they will be to remember you when they need your services or products.
The length of time your audience sits with your message impacts whether that message gets into their long-term memory. (Read here for more on this). Brand awareness simply leverages the idea that repeated exposure adds up. It becomes a factor in the decision making process.
The bottom line is that brand awareness is not perfectly measurable. That said, is there ANY way you can start to get a sense of its impact?
For one thing, you can ask people how they heard about you at any point of sale or any sales conversation. However, instead of forcing them to choose one option, have them choose everywhere they heard about you. They may not even remember where they first heard about you if it was a while back, and in that case it is especially important to know what their journey involved.
Sometimes when prospective clients contact me, they will tell me “I was just exploring your website!” And I’ll ask them specifically what they checked out. A basic open-ended question from me will help them recount the journey they just went on, and I’ll begin to understand how many blogs they read, which social media channels they surfed, who recommended me to them to begin with, etc.
I acknowledge in my own marketing process that there are some things I do that need to be carefully monitored and measured. There are other things that I carve out time for because I know it will be seen at some point in a client’s decision making process. Those activities are brand awareness, and I make the call on how much of that to build into my plan.
As a business owner, you make choices about where you put your time, money, and other resources. Don’t count out brand awareness just because you aren’t sure exactly how to measure it!
Don’t count out brand awareness just because you aren’t sure exactly how to measure it! #business #biztips #smallbusiness #smallbiz #entrepreneur
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The truth is that brand awareness isn’t always measurable, but it could lead to the things that are. Most goals have an assist. The same can likely be said about your sales!
Want more insight on ROI? Read here for this tip on How to Measure Marketing ROI!
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