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Key indicators of marketing activity. Marketing Metrics: From the Marketer to the Owner

Yasheva Galina Artemovna k. e. in Economics, Associate Professor of the Department of Commercial Activities, Vitebsk State Technological University, Doctoral Candidate of the Belarusian State Economic University.
Email: [email protected]

In order to improve marketing activities and improve competitiveness, businesses need to regularly assess the effectiveness of marketing.

As the analysis showed, marketers do not have unity on this issue. So, a number of scientists - V.V. Zhivetin, V.L. Samokhvalov, N.P. Chernov, I.A. Feraponova - believe that the effectiveness of marketing policy in relation to a particular enterprise (industry, group of industries) is made up of the results of improving production and marketing activities in the following main areas: optimal use of the market potential, including for a new product; increasing the reliability of predictive estimates; finding a market segment for this product; improving the accuracy of market balance analysis, etc. . It seems to us that to give a comprehensive quantification difficult in these areas.

M. Tugan-Baranovsky, L.V. Balabanov suggest evaluating the effectiveness of marketing in the following areas: buyers, marketing integrations, adequacy of information, strategic orientation, operational efficiency. At the same time, they do not define a system of indicators for evaluating these areas and an algorithm for calculating efficiency.

N.K. Moiseeva, M.V. Konysheva provide indicators of marketing activity by functions (market research, assortment policy, sales activities, communication activities) and general indicators (profitability, strategy activity). These scientists are closer to the development of an algorithm for calculating the estimated marketing effectiveness, however, they did not bring it to practical application(no scales have been developed for qualitative assessment marketing and the model for calculating the summary performance indicator).

Most practitioners, as shown by a survey of American firms, argue that the effect of marketing activities is to increase sales and profits. In our opinion, on final results In addition to marketing, other components of the enterprise's potential also influence - management, personnel, production capabilities (equipment, technology), finance, so this assessment is too simplified.

G. Assel proposes to evaluate the effectiveness of marketing activities as the effectiveness of marketing costs. At the same time, with the help of economic and statistical methods, the relationship between marketing costs and the result - sales volume or profit is investigated. It seems to us that such an assessment method is an assessment of the effectiveness of costs, and not the marketing activity itself.

M. McDonald argues that an empirical approach is preferable to a quantitative one based on statistical testing of narrow deductive hypotheses. He cites the results of a study in the early 90s, conducted in England, some European countries and the United States. Analysis of marketing effectiveness was carried out in the following areas: the internal attitude of company management to marketing (its definition, role and functions); organization of this activity (involvement in the strategic planning process, the level of coordination and information exchange between marketing functions); practical implementation of marketing functions (use of marketing research, planning, participation in the development of new products, etc.). McDonald, in the study mentioned above, notes that it only takes three things to achieve perfect marketing in the UK: information system; measuring and monitoring the effectiveness of marketing activities; investments in personnel training and development .

Many foreign researchers showed interest in and in relation to marketing changes (Doyle, 1992; Liu et al, 1990; Shaw & Doyl, 1991; Wong et al, 1989; Avlonitis et al, 1992; Jaworski & Kohli, 1993; Mueller -Heumann, 1993; Narver & Slater, 1990; Wink, 1992). However, for interested parties (the top management of companies) and the general public, only the results of the studies were communicated, and not the methodology for conducting them (since it is a trade secret).

An independent examination of the quality of marketing is carried out by international organization Marketing Quality Assurance Ltd (MQA), which was established in 1990. Its activities and structure are maintained in accordance with the European Standard EN 45012. MQA provides services for the certification of marketing companies for compliance with systems international standards ISO 9000 series. The approaches implemented in the BS 5750, ISO 9000, ES 29000 standards have been criticized for the fact that despite their positive impact on the quality of goods, they achieved little in relation to the consumer. For example, McDonald argues that none of the existing standards affect the needs of the consumer.

MQA marketing quality assessment is carried out according to 35 standards, which are divided into three areas: consumer orientation; business, marketing and sales plans; management responsibility. It seems that the system for evaluating the effectiveness of marketing, enshrined in these standards, certainly allows you to give an accurate, objective, versatile assessment of the marketing of enterprises, but this methodology is also not disclosed due to trade secret, since such a certification service is paid. In addition, it is very time-consuming and cannot be used in the practice of domestic enterprises independently.

Thus, the study showed that science has not developed the methodological foundations for a comprehensive assessment of marketing effectiveness, available for practical use V analytical work enterprises and consulting services. The basis of the methodological approach to evaluating the effectiveness of marketing, in our opinion, should be the answer to 3 questions: for what purposes the methodology is being developed, how the results can be used and for whom it is necessary. The assessment methodology proposed in this article meets the following conditions:

Purpose of the evaluation- for operational audit of marketing, monitoring of marketing effectiveness, comparative analysis marketing by enterprises, as well as for assessing the competitiveness of enterprises ( comprehensive assessment marketing as a factor of competitive advantage).
Purpose of results. The results of the assessment can be used by employees of enterprises for planning marketing and competitiveness, improving the organization of marketing at the enterprise, making decisions to improve the skills of marketing service specialists.
For whom is it intended. This technique is intended for independent experts - specialists of consulting services, marketing centers, researchers in the field of marketing and competitiveness.

The author's logic on the issue of evaluating the effectiveness of marketing is as follows. Marketing activities are implemented in practice by performing marketing functions - market research, market segmentation and selection of target market segments, product positioning, development of an effective product range, introduction of new products to the market, implementation of a flexible pricing policy, selection of effective distribution channels and organization of marketing activities, implementation effective communication activities. The main functions of management are planning and organization, therefore, the success of all marketing activities depends on how high-quality and objective the marketing plans are and on the effective construction of the marketing service.

To assess the performance of these marketing functions and marketing management functions can, in our opinion, only with the help of peer review. The experts of the marketing service of the enterprise should act as experts.

In order to assess the effectiveness of marketing management, a questionnaire has been developed (Appendix 1) containing 15 questions that evaluate the performance of marketing functions in the following areas: marketing research, market segmentation and product positioning, analysis of marketing organization, marketing planning, development of a marketing mix. Each question has 3 possible answers, which are scored from 0 to 2. The maximum number of points for each question is 2. The number of points for each question of the questionnaire is determined according to the following table (Table 1).

Table 1
Marketing effectiveness evaluation system

The maximum score for marketing effectiveness is 30 points. To assess the level of efficiency, an assessment scale was developed based on the principle of a progressive step (Table 2). The step value is 4 points, and for the values "very good" and "effective" - 5 points (because the highest marks are more difficult to achieve).

table 2
Marketing Effectiveness Scale

The developed approach was used to analyze the effectiveness of marketing at light industry enterprises of the Republic of Belarus. The enterprises associated with the concern "Bellegprom" were subjected to the survey. The group includes 94 manufacturing enterprises. The selection of enterprises for the study was carried out on the basis of the reference book of the Bellegprom concern. Questionnaires (Appendix 1) were sent to 65 enterprises. 48 replies received.

The experts were employees of marketing services, sales departments, commercial departments performing marketing functions, with whom an agreement was previously obtained to conduct an expert study. The results of evaluating the effectiveness of marketing activities are presented in Table 3.

Table 3
Evaluation of the effectiveness of marketing activities of light industry enterprises of the Republic of Belarus

As can be seen from the table, almost 80% of the studied enterprises do not carry out marketing effectively or satisfactorily. Not a single enterprise received the maximum efficiency rating. The highest rating was "very good". It was received by 3 enterprises that are also known to consumers of light industry goods in Russia. This sewing enterprises- JV CJSC "Milavitsa", OJSC "Elema", footwear company LLC "Marko".

The weakest directions are “Market segmentation”, “Marketing planning”. So, none of the analyzed enterprises develops a marketing plan, does not determine the overall strategy of the enterprise and marketing strategy. As a result, the marketing mix is not perfect, marketing functions are not carried out in full. Most enterprises do not segment the market and do not develop products for target segments. They sell their products to anyone who buys, that is, they use an undifferentiated marketing strategy, which is extremely dangerous in a highly competitive environment. The consequence of this is that manufacturers do not position their product on the market. Of the 30 specialists of the marketing and sales services of these enterprises surveyed, 15 specialists could not determine the essence of the concepts of "market segmentation", "product positioning". Due to the low level of professional training of personnel, an inefficient marketing policy is being pursued. Marketing employees do not understand the benefits of choosing promising segments (segment) of the market and the correct positioning of the product, while this allows the company to find market "niches" and successfully promote their products on the market.

Other marketing functions in the analyzed enterprises are also not effective. Pricing strategies are not defined, the main pricing method is costly, most enterprises do not apply flexible system discounts. The advertising campaign is carried out irregularly, the schedule is not developed, the effectiveness is not evaluated advertising campaign. Sales promotion measures have not been widely used in Belarusian enterprises for the production of clothing and footwear, although, as the study showed, the demand for many types of goods (for example, shoes, hosiery) is elastic, and the use of promotional measures such as coupons, gifts , cumulative bonuses, holiday discounts, discount cards would significantly increase sales.

Commodity policy does not correspond to the principle of marketing: "to produce what can be sold, and not to sell what can be produced." Many businesses are planning production program based on available production capacity and purchased raw materials. The needs of buyers are studied superficially, irregularly. The human resources of marketing services do not allow conducting regular sociological research, and it is expensive for enterprises to order such research from third-party organizations, since they are expensive, and the costs included in the cost price are limited to 1.5% of the sales volume, including VAT. As a result, products are produced that do not quite satisfy the needs of customers, which are difficult to sell.

As the analysis showed, the possibilities of the Internet are not used to promote goods on the markets (market research, advertising, selling on the Internet). Only 25% of the enterprises of the Bellegprom concern have their own websites, which are regularly updated.

To test the fairness of the assessment of marketing effectiveness, the results obtained by enterprises (assessment in points) were compared with the indicator "reserve finished products in stock." It was found that companies with low score marketing efficiency, stocks of finished products in the warehouse exceeded the standards by 1.5-2 times.

General conclusions from the analysis of the effectiveness of marketing enterprises can be formulated as follows.

Low professional level of managers and marketers.
Absence or weak consideration of the interests of consumers.
Low marketing costs.
Lack of a motivation system for marketing personnel.
Inefficient information system.
Lack of marketing planning and control.

Thus, the marketing activity of light industry enterprises of the Republic of Belarus can be characterized as inefficient. It seems that such an assessment of the effectiveness of marketing should be carried out at enterprises annually in order to improve the marketing activities of enterprises, as well as to certify specialists in the marketing service and, accordingly, to make decisions on improving their qualifications.

ANNEX 1

QUESTIONNAIRE
"THE EFFICIENCY OF YOUR MARKETING"

The Your Marketing Effectiveness Questionnaire is designed to help you assess how customer-focused your business is. It will tell you what you need to do to improve your marketing and increase the efficiency of your business.

Base your answers on your own assessment of the effectiveness of your marketing, not on the assessment you hope your customer would give. Please tick the answer that best fits your business.

MARKETING RESEARCH

Question 1. When was the last time you conducted market research, customers, their purchasing activity, your competitors?

Question 2. How well do you know the sales and profit potential of various market segments, customers, distribution channels, products, etc.?

Question 3: How effective is your marketing information system in providing high quality data to help you make quick marketing decisions?

MARKET SEGMENTATION AND PRODUCT POSITIONING

Question 4. Do you develop different products and marketing plans for different market segments?

Question 5. Do you define a strategy for positioning your products on the market?

ORGANIZATION OF MARKETING

Question 6. How effective is your marketing compared to your competitors' marketing?

Question 7. How is marketing activity organized at your enterprise?

structural units

Question 8. To what extent is Internet marketing used in your company?

MARKETING PLANNING

Question 9. How widely is strategic planning used in your enterprise?

Question 10. What is the quality of your marketing strategy?

Question 11. What are the main goals of marketing?

COMPLEX MARKETING

Question 12. What is your price policy and how effective is it?

Question 14. How experienced and efficient are your salespeople?

existing clients

Question 15. What is your commodity policy and how effective is it?

THANKS FOR PARTICIPATION!

Source. Own development.

Literature

Assel Henry. Marketing: principles and strategy: A textbook for universities. - M.: INFRA-M, 1999. - 804 p.
McDonald M. Strategic marketing planning - St. Petersburg: Peter, 2000. - 320 p.
Marketing management. Scientific publication/ Ed. Tugan-Baranovsky M., Balabanova L.V. - Donetsk: DonGUET, 2001. - 594 p.
Markushina E. Marketing for teapots with a whistle / http://www. management.com.ua/marketing/mark037.html.
Moiseeva N.K., Konysheva M.V. Marketing management: theory, practice, information technology: Proc. allowance / Ed. N.K. Moiseeva. - M.: Finance and statistics, 2002. - 304 p.
General issues of light industry / Survey information. Issue. 12. - Experience in the use of textile and light industry in the new economic conditions. M.: Ministry of light industry of the USSR, TsNIIiTEIlegprom, 1989. - 38 p.
Decree of the Council of Ministers of the Republic of Belarus No. 831 dated June 1, 2001 “On making additions and changes to the Decree of the Council of Ministers of the Republic of Belarus dated June 10, 1994 No. 429 // Regulations in finance and accounting. - 2001.- No. 25, S. 75-77.
Randall Richard C. The Quality Yearbook. Published by McGraw-Hill, Inc.

In practice, the evaluation of the effectiveness of the marketing activities of an enterprise comes down to the fact that already calculated and proven postulates are applied.

Firstly, this is the isolation of the developed methods from reality. Trying to lump together everything that a marketing department should be doing leads to an overly abstract methodology.

Secondly, the complexity of implementing methodological developments in practice: we need human resources, time and money. The costs of conducting all the necessary research to evaluate marketing activities often become comparable to the size of the marketing budget.

Third, many methodologies operate with information that is not needed in everyday professional activity. Then the assessment becomes an end in itself, for the sake of which it makes no sense to conduct research.

The role of marketing and its contribution to the achievement of the main goal of any commercial firm to increase profits is limited. Traditionally, marketing is a subsystem commercial service, and its task is to sell goods in a given volume, at a given price, in a certain geographical region in the allotted time. Three evaluation parameters that can adequately reflect the effectiveness of marketing activities are:

market share;
reputation and brand image;
consumer loyalty.

An analysis of these parameters, a comparison of their actual and planned values can show how the marketing service coped with the task, in which area to look for the cause of failures, where there is room for growth. The data obtained is key to formulating a strategy further development. Let's take a closer look at each parameter.

The level of fame and, as a result, the image of the brand reflects the contribution of marketing to the communication activities of the company. If market share is the money that the company already has at the moment, then fame (reputation, image) is what provides today's share and determines its positive change in the future. The fame of a trademark, unlike the market share, is an abstract concept, it cannot be "felt", it is difficult to correctly assess and, moreover, convert it into banknotes. If it is not evaluated, then brand management, in particular brand awareness management, will be ignored, which is in fact a rejection of the strategic vision of marketing. That is why brand awareness is proposed to be taken as one of the key parameters for evaluating marketing activities.

At all fame for its "immateriality" trading stamps closely tied With indicators commercial activities companies: revenue, turnover, market shares. For a specialist does not represent special work derive the dependence of the company's revenue on the level of its popularity or the popularity of its product. This dependence can be built on the basis of a survey of consumers about which brands of a certain product they know and which brand products they use constantly. The resulting dependence will allow you to determine how much brand awareness should be increased (as a percentage of the target audience) in order for revenue to increase to a given level.

Loyalty buyers Can interpret How degree insensitivity goods To actions competitors accompanied emotional commitment To product. This indicator characterizes the quality of the work of the marketing department with customers and determines the level of development and organization of the marketing department itself. The tasks of increasing the company's market share and fame can be solved in an extensive way: invest more money in advertising, expand the staff of marketing specialists, develop new products, consumer segments, geographic markets. Another way is intensive, when revenue increases on one product and consumer segment due to better construction of work. Customer loyalty is a parameter for assessing not only the effectiveness of marketing activities, but also the quality of the work of the marketing department.

During the year, the average company loses about 10% of its customers. In practice, it is not uncommon for the customer loss ratio to reach 60-70%. This means that the company annually loses more than half of its customer base. Faced with the problem of insufficient demand, the company is forced to invest more and more money in advertising, conduct programs to stimulate demand, and use additional resources of the client department. The reason is the poor quality of customer service. Consumer loyalty can be determined through the retention rate - the ratio of the number of regular customers to the number of current ones. It has been calculated that a 5% increase in customer retention rate can increase profits by 15-25%. Unlike measuring market share and brand awareness, customer loyalty does not require information from the market, there is no need for marketing research. All data must be contained in the company's information system. No such data? Is there such a system? Do they differ if collected from different sources? This means that the work of the marketing department is poorly organized.

If customer loyalty can be assessed by the company's own efforts, when implementing a project to increase it, third-party specialists cannot be dispensed with. Such a project usually involves setting up a customer relationship system and building a marketing information system. The first part of the project includes the development of a normative business model using client-oriented technologies, optimization of the workflow system, adjustment of the sales staff motivation system, introduction of a normative model. The second part involves the development of a system of indicators of the state of internal and external marketing environment company, regular collection of information, determination of the procedure for acceptance management decisions.

So, to estimate work department marketing, Can use system three indicators, which already mentioned. These are market share, brand awareness and customer loyalty (retention rate). The data obtained make it possible to characterize the current (market share) and strategic work of the marketing department (brand awareness), to assess the quality of the organization of its work (consumer loyalty). It is impossible to reduce the complexity of obtaining information for evaluation, but the very fact of its absence in the marketing department characterizes its work extremely negatively. This means that none of the tasks assigned to the department is justified. It may be unattainable, unrealistic, or simply not needed. It is necessary to evaluate any type of activity, including the work of the marketing department, from the standpoint of achieving / not achieving the goals.

Also provided opportunity lead analysis marketing shares And events - newsletters, publications, advertising, seminars, any others impacts on clients.

Thus, the compilation of a methodology for assessing the effectiveness of the marketing activities of an enterprise comes down to setting research objectives in which these methods will be used, for which it is necessary to determine the objectives of the study, which will narrow the range of research objects and, as a result, reduce research costs.

The development of the company's strategy is carried out in conditions of uncertainty. Moreover, uncertainty is generated both by processes outside the organization and within it. The external environment is characterized by the instability of the factors that force the organization to change. Uncertainty internal factors is determined by the interconnection and interdependence of the components and subsystems of the organization as a complex system. However, it is impossible to model the behavior of complex systems accurately and in detail; one can only identify and foresee the tendencies of their self-development. This results in the following differences between strategic and operational management: the discontinuity and consistency of the management process, as well as the predominance in strategic management"soft" problems, i.e. those that are characterized by the uncertainty of the initial parameters and boundary conditions. Discontinuity means that strategic decisions accepted, not so often, and their implementation takes a long time, sometimes several years. Very serious reasons are needed to suspend the development of a strategy already adopted for implementation. Operational management is less intermittent, planning is carried out daily, tasks are short-term; it deals mainly with "hard", specific problems.

At strategic planning important on early stages process nominate And consider maximum possible quantity alternatives. This procedure reduces the risk of planning errors, which can be costly. However, the more alternatives, the more time and effort is required to evaluate them. In the case of operational management, managers deal either with well-structured, "hard" problems, the solution of which is programmed, or with "soft" decisions, but with a low risk of serious damage if an error occurs.

To develop a strategy, a large amount of information is needed from various sources and about a wide variety of processes, both in the external environment of the organization and in internal organizational systems. In this case, it is possible to make wider use of machine information processing and automated systems management.

During the implementation marketing strategy it is important, on the one hand, to try to stick to the original plan and, at the same time, to show some flexibility if changes external environment dictate the need for adjustment. Monitoring a marketing strategy involves evaluating its results, comparing them with targets, and choosing corrective actions to correct an ineffective or improve a successful strategy.

The modern concept of marketing strategy is that all activities of the enterprise are based on knowledge of consumer demand and its changes in the future. Moreover, one of the goals of marketing is to identify unsatisfied customer requests in order to orient production to meet these requests. The marketing system puts the production of goods in a functional dependence on requests and requires the production of goods in the assortment and quantity required by the consumer. That is why marketing, as a set of established methods for studying markets, in addition, still directs its efforts to create effective distribution channels and conduct integrated advertising campaigns.

The leaders of modern enterprises of the Republic of Kazakhstan need not only to study the concept of marketing, but also to be able to use it, this is how you can achieve an increase in the effectiveness of the marketing activities of the enterprise.

Practical guide

Your KPIs are your results. I think you will agree that you cannot move forward if you do not know where you are now. Unfortunately, many entrepreneurs realize this too late…

Do not consider key indicators? Expect trouble!

For 10 years of his entrepreneurial activity I participated in the creation of 10 different companies:

sale of commercial real estate;
sale of rolled metal products;
sale of houses from a bar;
dentistry;
automobile portal (publishing house);
marketing agency;
sale of video surveillance systems;
organization of events;
pension broker;
center for the development of educational projects.

Only 3 out of 10 companies have survived to this day and are successfully developing. The main reasons for the failure of other projects are cash gaps, lack of money for development, growing accounts receivable etc.

Now I can say with confidence that the main troubles were brought by the absence financial planning. That is, such planning, in which everything is subject to numbers and analytics.

To date, our agency serves more than 130 projects. And I had a chance to get to know each of these businesses very carefully. With great regret, I can say that only 10% understand why it is necessary to calculate key indicators and apply financial planning.

What and how to count

I know that an entrepreneur often does not have enough time for this work. But let's figure it out together why you need to know what key indicators you need to calculate and based on what to make decisions.

Let's consider the simplest example.

Input data

Imagine that you have an English language school.

The cost of 1 month of training is 10,000 rubles.

contextual advertising in Yandex;
targeting advertising in social networks;
outdoor advertising (lightboxes in the subway).

The profit is less than 100,000 because taxes, rent and wages must be paid.

Imagine that you have 30,000 rubles left for personal needs.

On the one hand, you have a profit, which means you are on the right way. The only problem is that there is no room for maneuver.

Solution

The first thing to do is to measure the effectiveness of each advertising channel separately.

If you have any questions about how to properly measure the effectiveness of advertising channels, then write to me at my personal address vi [email protected] I will make a special video on this topic.

The simplest thing is to install a separate phone with the ability to record all incoming calls for each advertising channel. To solve this problem, you can use special services - for example, such as zadarma.com.

This way you can determine how many new customers came from each of the 3 advertising channels. I assure you that quite a lot of new customers come by recommendations, that is, without the participation of paid advertising.

Have you calculated how many new customers came from this or that advertising channel? So, you just need to understand how to redistribute the advertising budget depending on the return.

Therefore, the first indicator that you need to consider is the return on marketing investment.

ROMI (Return on Marketing Investment) is the rate of return received as a result of the cost of marketing activity.

Formula: ROMI = (revenue - expenses) / expenses * 100%

Example: we consider the effectiveness of one advertising channel (Yandex.Direct), with the help of which we attracted 10 customers. These clients bought courses from us for 100,000 rubles. At the same time, the advertising budget of the campaign amounted to 110,000 rubles.

Then ROMI = (100,000 - 110,000) / 110,000 = 0.9 * 100% = 90%

It turns out that we went to minus 10% of the money invested. Since we do not need losses, we stop advertising in Yandex.

But everything is not as simple as it might seem at first glance. The second most important enters the scene financial indicator. This is the profit that the client will bring for the entire time of cooperation.

LTV (Lifetime Value) - total profit company received from one client for the entire time of cooperation with him.

Formula: LTV = customer revenue - the cost of attracting and retaining a customer

The purpose of this indicator is to clarify the true value of the advertising channel, taking into account how much money each new client will bring us for the entire time of cooperation with him.

How many students do you think will continue after the first month? If you have quality education, then more than half of the students will transfer to the next month. And now let's calculate how this will affect the overall picture of our progress.

Example: we invested 110,000 rubles in attracting 10 new students through Yandex.

In the first month, we earned 100,000 from 10 sales. And in the second month - another 50,000 from those who continued to study. That is, in total we earned 150,000 rubles.

In total, we got LTV + 40,000 rubles. Accordingly, it makes sense to continue to advertise your courses using Yandex.

If something cannot be measured,

then it can't be controlled.

and if it can't be controlled,

then it can't be improved

Bill Hewlett

If we measure our key indicators, then we can influence them. So, we can only improve them.

I hope this article was useful to you and clarified a little why you need to measure the effectiveness of each advertising channel and the value of the client at all stages of interaction with him. In the next part of this material, I will tell you about such indicators as:

cost of attracting a new customer CAC (Customer Acquisition Cost);
conversion rate CR (Сonversion Rate).

If you still have any questions on the topic of this material... Or have any wishes for the content of the second part of the article... Leave them in the comments, I will definitely answer them!

In any research, the initial stage of its implementation is the formulation of tasks. Certain tasks allow you to produce right choice research methods. So, to develop a methodology for evaluating the effectiveness of marketing, it is necessary to develop a system for monitoring the success of marketing activities.

The development of control systems for assessing the success of marketing activities at the level of product and market positions and individual events involves obtaining the following results:

1. the need for information;

2. timing of information collection;

3. frequency of information collection;

4. method, format, level of information aggregation.

Marketing performance measurement systems are developed to ensure that a company achieves a given level of sales, profits, and other goals formulated in its marketing and strategic plans. Taken together, these plans reflect the results of the company's planning activities, which indicate how resources should be allocated between markets, products, and activities of the marketing mix. These plans include line-item budgets and usually detail the actions that are expected of each organizational unit - inside or outside the marketing department or division - and considered necessary to achieve the company's competitiveness and financial goals. First and most the main objective for marketing, it is the level of sales that a company achieves or standalone item product/market. Voevodin E.N. Development of systems for evaluating the effectiveness of marketing.

Sales analysis involves breaking down aggregated sales data into categories such as products, end customers, resellers, sales territories, and order size. The purpose of the analysis is to identify strengths and weaknesses; for example, the products with the highest and lowest sales volumes, the customers who account for the most revenue, and the sales agents and territories with the highest and lowest quality of work.

Obviously, aggregated sales and cost data often mask the real situation. Sales analysis not only helps evaluate and control marketing activities, but also helps management better formulate objectives and strategies, and manage non-marketing activities such as production planning, inventory management, and capacity planning.

An important decision in the development of a company's sales analysis system is the choice of objects of analysis. Most companies group data into the following groups:

Geographic areas - regions, districts and sales territories;

Product, package size and grade;

Buyers - by type and size;

Distribution intermediaries - for example, by type and/or size of the retailer;

Sales method - mail, telephone, sales channel, Internet, direct sales;

Order size - less than $10, $10-25, etc.

Analysts use procedures similar topics, as described earlier, to analyze the distribution of their sales to customers. Such an analysis usually shows that a relatively small percentage of customers account for a large percentage of sales.

Sales Volume/Market Share Factors. Sales volume and market share are functions of a number of primary determinants. For consumer products, these factors include efficient distribution, relative price, retention or change in the perception of one or more of the product's essential characteristics compared to competitors' products, and product placement on store shelves. These determinants, in turn, are functions of secondary factors, such as the number and frequency of sales visits, sales transactions, the effectiveness of advertising with a specific reach plan, and the frequency of impressions. An analysis of market share factors should provide an understanding of the expected relationship between inputs and firm performance: for example, the number and frequency of trade visits and efficient distribution. This, in turn, leads to a clearer understanding of the success of the firm's marketing activities.

Marketing research is usually required to reveal the levels of key sales drivers. For example, maintaining a lower price for a similar product relative to major competitors is an important determinant of sales volume.

Sales data is, of course, not the only information needed regarding the success of a marketing activity. It is necessary to track the values of gross margin and marginal profit, as well as measure the effectiveness and efficiency of all items of marketing expenses. Designers of marketing performance measurement systems must develop suitable metrics to track critical performance indicators in terms of profits and expenses, so that intermediate adjustments can be made in a timely manner.

Since budgets consist of forecasts of income and expenses over a certain period of time, they are the most important component of the firm's planning and control activities. They provide the basis for the ongoing evaluation and comparison of planned and actual performance. In this sense, budgeted revenues and profits serve as targets against which performance should be measured in terms of sales, profits, and actual costs.

Budget analysis requires managers to keep a constant eye on marketing spending to make sure the company isn't spending too much money trying to reach its goals. In addition, managers evaluate the magnitude and structure of their deviations from target levels. Managers of different marketing departments have their own benchmarks. For example, advertising managers track advertising expenses per 1000 people of the target audience, number of buyers per one advertising medium, readership print media mass media, the size and composition of television audiences and changing consumer attitudes. Sales managers typically track visits per salesperson, cost per visit, sales per visit, and new customers acquired. The main marketing expenses are those related to marketing research marketing, branding, sales force compensation, distribution costs, media advertising, end-user and reseller promotions, and public relations. Before taking corrective action on any spending that is excessive, managers should drill down into the aggregated data to identify the problem. For example, if the total commission payments as a percentage of sales deviate from normative value, analysts must examine them for each sales territory and product to determine exactly where the problem lies.

Timeliness is a key criterion in developing a system for evaluating the effectiveness of marketing activities. Managers are more likely to track performance information—whether related to sales, profits, or expenses—at intervals because they don't have the time or need to evaluate performance for every position every minute. Purchasing managers and merchandisers in retailers typically evaluate the performance of an item or category on a weekly basis. For certain categories of fashion products such as women's clothing where timeliness is particularly important, having sales information days or even hours ahead of competitors can be important in terms of acquiring more of the best-selling product. Stores spending on employee salaries is another key indicator efficiency of retail firms, which affects both customer service and profitability.

It is usually measured weekly, but store managers may be encouraged to send employees home if sales are unusually sluggish on a given day, or call in extra help when more salespeople are needed. The performance of the sales force of industrial firms—measured by number of sales visits, sales volume, expenses, and other metrics—is typically assessed on a monthly basis, although some firms may do so more or less frequently. Indicators of strategic control, such as market share change, dynamics of macro-environmental factors, etc., are likely to be intentionally and reported less frequently because these kinds of long-term aspects, examined at frequent intervals, may not be as obvious or may create false alarms.

Development success information technologies have made it possible to measure and communicate marketing performance with never before seen ease and speed, even without printing the data. Having the right and timely information and presenting it in a way that can be easily and quickly used are two different things. Manual scoring of sales performance metrics must provide a certain degree of aggregation, so it is necessary to determine what kind of aggregation is most useful for each consumer of information.

Even the format or way in which performance information is presented can be great importance for the manager using this data. Weekly sales reports that include the "weeks in stock" metric, which are very important to retailers and merchandisers, are most useful when models are presented in descending order of their sales rates rather than in alphabetical or some other order. . Models at the top of the report (with little available stock as measured by their sales rate in terms of “weeks in stock”) are “candidates” for reordering. The models at the bottom of the report (for example, the ugly sweater with 25 weeks in stock as of mid-November) are candidates for markdown. Models that are in the middle can be left unattended. At the end of the season, another report can be useful that aggregates models by supplier and measures the performance of suppliers across the range of models they supply. Close attention to the format in which information on the effectiveness of marketing activities is presented, to the level of its aggregation for various kinds decision-making tasks and for different users can provide a company with a significant competitive advantage.

Since all strategies and action programs developed for their implementation are based on assumptions about the future, they are subject to significant risk. Too often assumptions are taken as facts and little attention is given to outlining the specific actions to be taken if any or all of the assumptions turn out to be wrong.

Therefore, managers often follow a contingency planning process that includes the following elements: identifying critical assumptions; determining the likelihood that the assumptions will be correct; ranking the importance of assumptions; monitoring and control of the action plan; setting "triggers" that will activate the contingency plan; and details of alternative response options. Next, we briefly discuss these steps.

Determination of the most important assumptions. Since there are too many assumptions, contingency plans should cover only the most important ones. Particularly important are assumptions about events that are beyond the control of individual firms, but which strongly influence the strategic goals facing a particular product. For example, market growth assumptions that affect the market share of a particular product will greatly influence that product's achievement of profit targets. The impact of an erroneous assumption in this case can be both positive and negative, and a contingency plan must be prepared to respond effectively to both.

Another type of uncontrollable event that can greatly affect sales and profit margins is the actions of competitors. This is especially true in the case of a new product being introduced to the market (when the competitor's response is to launch its own new product), although it may apply to products in mature markets (e.g. Advertising activity competitor). Industry price assumptions need to be carefully examined because any price change can quickly lead to lower profits.

It is also necessary to carefully consider the assumptions about the impact of certain actions taken by the firm on the achievement of its strategic goals. For example, this refers to a firm's advertising objectives, which are based on assumptions about improving or maintaining consumer attitudes about product characteristics compared to competing products. trademarks, or to monetary amounts allocated for merchandising in order to increase the availability of the product. Moreover, once the target levels of the various priorities are reached, assumptions must be made about what will happen to sales volume and market share.

The next step is to detail what information (or criteria) is needed to determine if the action plan is on track, and if not, why. Thus, the contingency plan is an early warning system as well as a diagnostic tool.

In fact, the term "contingency plan" is somewhat misleading. It implies that a firm can know in advance exactly how it will react if one or more of its assumptions proves to be wrong. This premise is unrealistic because there are a huge number of situations in which the most important assumptions turn out to be wrong. Further exacerbating the problem is the fact that implementing the firm's specific planned responses can be challenging, depending on the situation and how it develops. This can lead to a series of actions taken in a hurry. Therefore, most firms develop a set of alternative response options that are not highly detailed, with the goal of providing flexibility and ensuring further investigation of factors that raise certain concerns.

These tasks, as noted above, allow for a more detailed assessment of the effectiveness of marketing in accordance with the needs of a particular enterprise.

There are many different approaches to solving this problem, which allows us to distinguish the following classification of methods for evaluating the effectiveness of marketing.

Qualitative methods involve the use of a marketing audit, during which a comprehensive analysis of the organization's external environment, as well as all threats and opportunities, is carried out. At the same time, two areas of marketing control can be distinguished: results-oriented marketing control and marketing audit, i.e. analysis of the qualitative aspects of the organization 's activity .

Quantitative methods for evaluating the effectiveness of marketing require comparing marketing costs to gross profit and advertising costs to sales; they characterize the final financial results organization's activities. IN general view the effectiveness of marketing activities (profitability index) is defined as the ratio of the total discounted profit received from the implementation of marketing activities in each year of the billing period to the total discounted costs of these activities. At the same time, marketing activity is effective if the profitability index is greater than the capital rate, and ineffective if it is less. Conducting profitability analysis and cost analysis can also be one of the options for a quantitative method for evaluating the effectiveness of marketing. When evaluating marketing activities, it is necessary to present parameters that characterize the activities of a particular business unit - sales volumes, the organization's market share, marginal and net profit. At the same time, the volume of sales (gross turnover) is a complex indicator and reflects not only and not so much the success of efforts to sell the goods, but also the correctness of the chosen price, and most importantly, how much the goods "hit" in target group consumers. The dynamics of sales volume is an indicator of the organization's position in the market, its share and trends. It should also be noted that an independent place in the analysis of the cost structure and the assessment of the organization's development potential is occupied by the analysis of the break-even point - the break-even volume shows how much goods must be sold in order to receive contribution margin covered everything fixed costs. This volume is an indicator of the organization 's ability to maneuver in the market .

sociological methods marketing effectiveness assessments are aimed at using the tools of applied sociology - the development of a sociological research program and, in accordance with it, the conduct of the study itself. Efficiency assessment is also focused on the use of applied sociology tools. marketing communications(effectiveness of advertising, sales promotion, public relations, personal selling, direct marketing).

Scoring methods for evaluating the effectiveness of marketing "isolate" its effectiveness for each event to comply with the list of criteria for matching the structures and processes of the marketing concept with the assignment of certain points for each criterion.

Currently, there is an increasing number of information methods for evaluating the effectiveness of marketing, which are most widely considered on the Internet. The essence of these methods lies in the fact that Sales Expert 2, Success, etc. programs are used to evaluate the effectiveness of marketing. It is also possible to analyze marketing campaigns and events - mailing lists, publications, advertising, seminars, and any other impact on customers.

Thus, the preparation of a methodology for assessing the effectiveness of the marketing activities of an enterprise is reduced to setting research objectives in which these methods will be used, for which it is necessary to determine the objectives of the study, which will narrow the range of research objects and, as a result, reduce the cost of conducting research.

Summing up this chapter, we note that the practice of marketing development at domestic enterprises shows that at the initial stage it is perceived mainly as a trade and marketing or even advertising activity.

As the market relations marketing will increasingly be integrated into common system enterprise management, when the adoption of virtually all production, marketing, financial, administrative and other decisions will be based on information coming from the market.

Thus, marketing in our time is becoming a very promising area. Managers must understand that it makes no sense to produce something that no one will ever buy, which means that it is necessary to have people on their staff who know and understand the needs of the population. This is the only way to ensure a stable growth of the company's profits and take a worthy place in the international sphere of economic relations.

Making a conclusion about the theoretical substantiation of the relevance of such a topic as improving marketing activities, we note that marketing is an integral part of the life of society. It is the process by which activities are analysed, planned, implemented, and controlled to establish, enhance, and maintain beneficial exchanges with target customers in order to achieve specific organizational goals. A marketing specialist should be well able to influence the level, time, nature of demand, since the existing demand may not coincide with the one that the company wants for itself. Therefore, interest in this activity is increasing as an increasing number of organizations in the field of entrepreneurship, in the international sphere, realize how exactly marketing contributes to their more successful performance in the market.

Unfortunately, marketing activities require large financial outlays, which is practically impossible in our still unstable economic situation. However, examining various aspects of the functioning of domestic firms and organizations, we can conclude that the marketing approach to business will soon help our enterprises to overcome the crisis and take their rightful place in the field of international economic relations.

Any work can be appreciated. Even the work of a shaman, although the assessment will be simple - did it come true or did it not come true.

And if we are talking about the evaluation of marketing activities, then there is complete expanse for measuring results. Marketing Metrics efficiency can be sorted out for hours, it is easy to get confused in them.

But still, we, marketers, and you, managers, need to understand what to focus on when generating a report on attracting, retaining and monetizing customers.

INFINITE INFINITY

And for this you definitely need to be able to. In short, you see how much you spent on each advertising channel and how many people came through this channel who bought something.

Carefully! The result may shock you, as you will see that some channels are simply not profitable.

Indicator 4. Market share

You have competitors - that's a fact. You are fighting with them for the same clients - this is also a fact. So the “pie” is divided into several parts, and you need to know what share is yours.

This is not to tickle your ego. This determines your strategy for several years and shows the effectiveness of the actions taken now.

I have an illustrative case that proves the usefulness of this measurement. We were very surprised with my client (construction special equipment) when we learned that his market share in the sales area is 60%, and this is with 6 competitors in the entire sales area.

As you understand, the right decision in this case was no longer to win back a larger piece of the pie, but to expand into other sales territories.

Metric 5. Leads

“Maybe they will buy it, or maybe not. I don’t know it yet,” – this phrase describes the concept of “lead”. You can also describe it like this - “a person interested in your product”.

Most often this is expressed in the form of a call to the company or an application for. And it is the marketer who generates these leads through.

Since attracting leads is not difficult, you just need to make it as free as possible. It is much more difficult to make really high-quality applications that do not waste the time of your employees and buy for big checks.

Indicator 6. Conversion

At the marketing level, one conclusion can be drawn - the higher the conversion, the more quality traffic came to your business.

At the sales level, this indicator shows the quality of processing of these applications. With this indicator, you can understand whether your marketing is bad or your salespeople are bad.

For those who like to look at everything under a microscope, you need to break down the entire customer journey from the first contact to the purchase, and count the conversion at each stage. For those who do not like to worry, it is enough to calculate the conversion from a lead to a deal. Of course, this is rude, but still it is also an indicator and speaks about the efficiency of the business.

If you want my opinion, then I think conversion is a very controversial metric (watch the video below).

Indicator 7. LTV

I decided to dilute the Russian language with a fashionable English word “ ” so that you do not fall asleep.

In simple terms, it stands for the total amount of money that the client gives you during the time while interacting with you.

Example: average duration typical person in the gym - 6 months. With a subscription price of 5,000 rubles. For his LTV, the client will bring you 30,000 rubles (6 months * 5,000 rubles).

Wow...

Marketing affects customer retention and return. You need to remember that the longer the client is with you, the more often he comes to you, the more you earn.

This is related to the idea “How to earn more without additional investments”. Moreover, if you do not know LTV, then you do not know the real value of the client (indicator No. 3). It is possible to accurately calculate this indicator only after the data has been generated (someone even needs it).

But after you find out that for the whole period of his life he will actually bring you more than he does in the first purchase, then the attitude towards him changes. And the cost that you are willing to pay for a client is growing by leaps and bounds.

Metric 8. Lost customers

Customers not only come, but also leave. This is a sad fact that will not change, no matter how much you want to be with a client until death do you part. In addition, competitors are not asleep and always add fuel to the fire.

WE ARE ALREADY MORE THAN 29,000 people.
TURN ON

Indicator 9. CTR

This ratio will show how interesting and relevant your ad is for potential customers. But you need to have a clear eye, because too much value is not always good either. It's the same with conversion. There can be many clicks, but few requests.

You need to keep this indicator at a level so that the maximum number of clicks goes into the “Lead” status.

Metric 10. Cost per click

Clack-clack, click-click. Do you think that's what a mouse click sounds like? No! This sounds like a waste of your money when a client goes to your site through advertising.

You also need to know this value in order to understand how profitable a lead is, and even better, a client.

Interesting. We deliberately lower the CTR (although everyone increases it) by writing the cost in the advertisement.

Thus, we save our money, because we do not pay for people who initially value it.

Indicator 11. Number of clients

Here we come to one of the dearest and most beloved business performance indicators for executives - the number of customers. Usually everyone considers it the default. Since according to the majority, a marketer is needed only to attract customers. If there are no customers, then marketing is at the donut level. Although this is not always true.

True, usually new customers are counted according to the formula: number of sales = number of customers. This is the catch, there are always both new and old customers among sales.

Therefore, I recommend counting separately the number of new customers who have never bought anything from you, and separately the number of old customers who have made one purchase before. Naturally, it will be possible to see this only if available (I advise Bitrix24 or Megaplan. By the way, the latter has a promotional code "Megastart" 10% discount on everything, and another 14 days of a free period - if you tell it to a company specialist).

Again! I draw your attention to the fact that you need to separate new and old customers. You need to work on both flanks, and most often you think about stimulating repeat sales at the last moment, the whole emphasis is only on new ones. But in vain!

An old client is always cheaper and brings a lot more money, because he already trusts you.

Indicator 12. Average check

When you have a small, then determine average check is not difficult. And when you have a lot of products and customers are all different in status, you start to “swim”. Both in the first and in the second case, the average check can and should be calculated.

Since it shows how high quality your customers are and how much you motivate them to buy for a larger amount. For many, increasing the average check is the task of sales managers, but I will tell you a secret, marketing also affects it.

To increase this figure, you can run , bundle (kit), or just . There are a lot of options and, most interestingly, almost all of them do not require additional investments.