Monthly reports are important! Providing our clients with monthly reports serves many purposes. For one — and the main reason we started doing it — we want our clients to see what they are paying for, both our activities and the results. Marketing used to be hard to measure or quantify. But now we have access to tons of online tracking and data that can break down our monthly efforts, so clients can pretty easily see what we are doing and the results of these efforts.
Our account managers at adWhite sat down as a team and figured out what we thought needed to be reported to clients. Within that discussion, we found that each client measures our efforts and the success of their online marketing in a different way. Here are some of the primary results we determined our clients wanted to see: website views, link clicks, email opens, blog traffic, social media interactions, Google ad performance and landing page conversions. Each client values a different aspect of what we do, and it really opened the door for us to discuss goals and expectations with clients.
Luckily for us, we have access to some great reporting tools that we love (we use HubSpot but also rely on Databox). These tools enable us to see what we are doing and what we NEED to be doing. For example, if we are looking at Monthly Website Page Views and see that a certain blog has skyrocketed in views compared to previous months, then we need to dig deeper — is it a hot topic that we need to make sure we are posting about for our client, should we recycle the blog so it has a newer postdate, and is there anything we can add to it to drive conversions? We love when this happens. On the flip side, if you see that your numbers are down, you can investigate why — could it be a broken link or bad URL? Month-to-month comparisons provide a wealth of knowledge for account managers.
When it comes down to it, it’s never a bad idea to show your work. We like to send monthly reports via email to clients, and the response has been positive. The goal is to keep the line of communication open when it comes to expectations. Online marketing sounds so ominous, but it really can be quantified once you and your client decide what you are being measured on. When contracts come around for renewal, it’s much easier for a client to sign on the dotted line if they can see the analytics behind your work. That’s a win-win for everyone!
