If you’re new to Marketo, you are probably impressed by the plethora of features that the platform has to offer. But, with so many elements, it can be difficult to figure out where to start, in order to make the most out of your instance. If this sounds like you, have no fear – we can help! And where better to start than to make sure your reporting is optimized, so you can make better informed decisions about your marketing strategy? Here are three ways that you and your marketing team can make sure your programs are set up to get better insights from your campaigns.
1.Update statuses within channels for reporting
As you may already know, programs are the core organizational building blocks for your marketing activities. But what is a channel? Channels are essentially Program type labels which we place on programs to sort them into different categories. Email blasts, Newsletters, Web Forms, Webinars, and Nurtures are all examples of typical channels.
Whenever a program is built in Marketo, it needs to be associated with a channel. This allows us to set program statuses, which indicate the level of engagement a lead has had with the marketing program (for example, a webinar may have the statuses: Invited; Registered; Attended;No Show;Attended On-Demand). Leads flow through the program statuses based on their activity.
Statuses allow us to calculate revenue attribution by identifying who engaged with which program and comparing that to opportunities that have been created since. This is extremely valuable to help us differentiate which program “actually” performed the best.
For instance, let’s say Program A generated 100 leads… and 10 of them ended up buying $1 worth of product. 100 leads is impressive, but this means Program A would be responsible for generating only $10 worth of revenue. Lets say, by comparison, Program B only generated 50 leads… but 3 of them bought $10 worth of product. Program B would be responsible for generating $30 worth of revenue.
If we look only at total leads generated, Program A would appear to out-perform Program B (Program A generated 100 leads, Program B generated 50 leads).
If we look at conversion rate, again Program A out performs Program B (10% of Program A leads converted, 6% of Program B leads converted). However, if we look at revenue attribution, program B was clearly the winner (Program A generated $10 of revenue, Program B generated $30 of revenue).
You see? When deciding where to invest your money, when it comes down to what really matters (ROI) Program B might not be such a bad contender! But we only know that if we are setting up program statuses!
2.Leverage tags on top of programs
Tags are very similar to channels, in that they are labels which we can place on programs (and actually, Channels and Tags are found in the same area in the Admin section!). However, the difference is, Tags are not mandatory, and are a lot more flexible on what kind of information you can pull in. For example, you could create a tag for the product the program is related to; the team that owns the program;the Fiscal year the program is tied to; the geographical Region it relates to; or anything else that would be of interest!
The main purpose of tags are to filter your programs into sub-reports, in order to better understand which programs or campaigns are performing the best. So make sure you are choosing tags that are meaningful from a reporting standpoint.
But don’f forget to use your tags consistently across programs to get the most out of them!
3.Associate period costs with programs
Period costs in Marketo refer to the amount of money spent on a program in a specific period of time. Neglecting to add period costs into your program setup can cause you to miss out on being able to use valuable built-in Revenue Cycle Analytics (RCS) reports, such as Program Cost Analysis, Program Opportunity Analysis, and Program Revenue Stage Analysis.
Furthermore, in order for Marketo Performance Insights to function, setting a period cost is critical. This allows you to compare the ROI between two or more programs, and make better business decisions going forward.
Going back to the example in the first point, if we spend $1000 on program A and $100 on program B, that would mean that for Program A, $1 was earned for every $100 invested. Thats a terrible ROI! For program B, $1 was earned for every $3 invested. Again, thats not a sustainable business strategy! We probably want to scrap both these programs, and try something new. But we only know that when we compare period costs reports to the to revenue attribution reports.
We hope these tips will help you set yourself up for success by ensuring that you are tracking everything that you need to in Marketo.
