Marketing performance indicators are not something separate, separate from the company. Marketers have developed several models that help to show the company's activities in a complex.
The first model that we will consider, and which is widely used, is the balanced scorecard model developed by N. Kaplan many years ago. The essence of this model is that researchers distinguish four groups of factors:
· Factors related to finance;
· Factors related to customers;
· business processes;
· Factors that are related to the market and customers.
The latter are very important for marketers. This block includes questions about the market, what and how you can attract customers, all questions about the advantage of the company or the products it provides. All factors in general make it possible to get an idea of the company's activities.
Another model that allows you to see how financial metrics relate to company performance is the process approach. The essence of the model is that the company's activity is considered as a process with separate metrics that act at the input, and some parameters that act at the output of the process.
Entry metrics show how high the load on the process is, for example, what the advertising costs, their calculation for one consumer who sees this advertisement. Exit metrics make it possible to measure the result, to determine how much the process has achieved its goal. In addition, the company analyzes the resources that the company has, and the management - to what extent it is predicted, how effective it is and what deviations can be: after all, the more complex the project, the more unmanageable it becomes.
Finally, the third approach that allows you to generalize and streamline marketing efforts is MRM, or an approach to measuring marketing performance. There are several levels within this approach:
· Marketing metrics that measure activity such as site visitors, trade show behavior or tasting. This data is then processed and used for reporting. It's worth noting that they rarely allow marketing and business results to be combined.
· Indicators that enable us to analyze the operating activities of the company. This can include all the data on the products that the company offers, how the processes for attracting customers are organized and how everyday life is organized, what communications the company has and how effective they are. All this makes it possible to determine the degree of rationality of marketing actions.
· The third level is the indicators of the efficiency of using the company's main resources - how well capital, assets and people are used. Business results are also measured: how satisfied customers are with the company's performance, and how efficiently the company is compared to competitors. This is where the performance metrics that the company wants to track are defined.
· At the last, fourth, level, a portfolio of metrics is formed that are used in management.
These approaches enable the company to determine the effectiveness of marketing activities in conjunction with the financial activities of the company.
