We all know that data analytics is a crucial element in improving business operations and working more efficiently. However, not all of us are aware of what kinds of data are important to track and how to do that in the most effective way. This is why this week on our chat, we invited ROI trainer and consultant, Amanda Webb, to talk about how businesses can get more from their efforts. Here’s a summary of our chat.
Guest: Amanda Webb
Topic: Using analytics to improve ROI
Format: Eight questions directed at the guest. Everyone’s welcome to share.
Return on Investment is a crucial indicator of your business progress. It’s the amount you receive after adjusting your investments in marketing and operations. When working out the value of your investments, it’s also important to include your time and effort, as our guest pointed out.
A1:
ROI = Return On InvestmentThe amount of money you get in return for the money and time investment you put into your business or marketing.
Most people measure just the money in and out but you should also include time in your investment calculations. #TwitterSmarter https://t.co/l0GBzYB99B
— Amanda Webb – Digital Marketer 👩💻 (@Spiderworking) February 16, 2023
There’re many ways to calculate your ROI, and our guest shared her trusty method: Deduct your total investments from your total returns, and then calculate what that is as a percentage of your investment. In other words, (Return – Investment) / Investment x 100.
A1:
There are different formulas you can use for measuring ROI but the one I use is (Return – Investment) / Investment x 100
Where people tend to go wrong is measuring each of these things. Particularly investment.
#TwitterSmarter pic.twitter.com/IlyFDZe7bC
— Amanda Webb – Digital Marketer 👩💻 (@Spiderworking) February 16, 2023
According to our guest, many people miscalculate their investments because they don’t account for expenses related to an investment, such as salary, time, software subscriptions, etc.
A1:
You can go wrong when measuring ROI if you don't measure everything.
For example, your social ads can look profitable when you measure ad spend v revenue. But you also need to account for staff/time, software amongst other things.
— Amanda Webb – Digital Marketer 👩💻 (@Spiderworking) February 16, 2023
Amanda told us about the importance of measuring analytics from various sources, including Google Analytics for website, social analytics tools to measure your social media performance, and CRM analytics to measure the efficacy of your sales processes.
A2:
Gather all the data you can. Use whatever you have access to including:☞Google Analytics
☞Social Analytics
☞CRM AnalyticsBut there are some things analytics tools can't tell you…
#TwitterSmarter https://t.co/uvB1FrjbY6— Amanda Webb – Digital Marketer 👩💻 (@Spiderworking) February 16, 2023
Our guest likes the built-in social analytics tool in Agorapulse. It outlines which social posts performed well and which ones converted into measurable sales.
A2:@AgoraPulse have an amazing ROI tool built in that will tell you exactly which social posts drive sales and conversions.
But there are some things analytics tools can't tell you…
#TwitterSmarter— Amanda Webb – Digital Marketer 👩💻 (@Spiderworking) February 16, 2023
All that said, however, there are a lot of things that your standard analytics tools don’t track. For example, your reputation and credibility grow through your blogs, podcasts, videos and live streams, and Twitter chats and Spaces. These data don’t always show up on analytics tools. How much people like and trust you is a significant factor in determining your success. That’s why it’s important to pay attention to what people are saying about you and whether they’re engaging with and sharing your content.
A2:
People get to know, like and trust you through your live shows, blogging, podcasts, and Twitter chats but that doesn't always show up in analytics tools.So also pay attention to what your customers say to you.
Do they reference specific content you create? #TwitterSmarter— Amanda Webb – Digital Marketer 👩💻 (@Spiderworking) February 16, 2023
If you’ve never used Google Analytics before, start here. That Google page will give you a step-by-step walkthrough of how you can set it up.
A3:
Is this your first time setting up Google Analytics?
If so get started here>> https://t.co/RX3hV5SC4kIt will walk you through what you have to do.#TwitterSmarter https://t.co/KvnjQGqG2U
— Amanda Webb – Digital Marketer 👩💻 (@Spiderworking) February 16, 2023
If you’ve already used Google Analytics in the past, you might have to move to the latest version: GA4. To do this, go to the admin area and click ‘Create Property’. Take a look at the screenshots Amanda shared for more clarity.
Next, you have to add GA4 to your website. To do this, you’ll need your measurement ID. Go to Admin > Data Streams and click on your website’s name. It’ll open up a panel where you’ll see your measurement ID starting with the letter G. You can then add this ID to your website to start tracking it. How exactly you set this up depends on which platform your website is hosted on. Here’s a comprehensive guide to setting up GA4 on your website.
A3:
Once you've got GA4 set up add it to your site. For this you'll need the Measurement ID.
You'll find this under 'Admin / Data Streams' click on your website name. Here you'll find the measurement ID it begins with a 'G'. #TwitterSmarter pic.twitter.com/rdHTe2Mlom
— Amanda Webb – Digital Marketer 👩💻 (@Spiderworking) February 16, 2023
Google is retiring its Universal Analytics from the 1st of July this year. So if you haven’t already, now’s the best time to move to GA4.
A4:
Most importantly, get it installed ASAP. Universal Analytics will stop collecting data on the 1st July and you need to get to grips with GA4 before that happens. #TwitterSmarter https://t.co/7oQNeXvoIq— Amanda Webb – Digital Marketer 👩💻 (@Spiderworking) February 16, 2023
When you move to GA4, however, not all of your setup on Universal Analytics will be moved over automatically. Firstly, keep an eye on your Goals to Conversions setup, so that you can manually fix them if they don’t move over correctly.
A4:
Don't trust Google to convert your Goals to Conversions correctly. You may need to configure these yourself.
#TwitterSmarter— Amanda Webb – Digital Marketer 👩💻 (@Spiderworking) February 16, 2023
Next, make a note of any audiences you’ve created on Universal Analytics so that you can recreate them on GA4.
A4:
If you have audiences set up in Universal Analytics make a note of these before you move so you can replicate them in GA4#TwitterSmarter— Amanda Webb – Digital Marketer 👩💻 (@Spiderworking) February 16, 2023
If you move to GA4 well before July, you can use GA4 and Universal Analytics simultaneously until it’s retired. This means that you can set up your tracking on GA4 while you still transition out of Universal Analytics.
A4:
The good news is that you can install GA4 to run alongside Universal Analytics.That means you can get used to the new things whilst still getting data from the analytics you know.
— Amanda Webb – Digital Marketer 👩💻 (@Spiderworking) February 16, 2023
The biggest thing to note, though, as our guest told us, is the new language that comes with GA4. Have a look at our guest’s phrasebook to help with the new terminology.
A4:
Annoyingly…
There's new lingo that comes with GA4.
'Goals' are now 'Conversions'. 'Bounce Rate' has changed and there's a whole new thing 'Default user group'I created a FREE phrasebook that will help with the basic terminology: https://t.co/2a1AO6JZUi #TwitterSmarter
— Amanda Webb – Digital Marketer 👩💻 (@Spiderworking) February 16, 2023
That’s subjective. What you should measure depends entirely on your business goals. If you want to know how many people visiting your website sign up for a product or service, you should look at the conversations report and add a secondary dimension for Source. This way, GA can show you where exactly each conversion came from—social media, search results, an email campaign, a webpage, or somewhere else entirely.
A5:
That’s a tough one because every business will have different metrics to measure.For example. Do you want to know if Twitter is driving conversions on your website?
If so, look at your conversions report, and add a secondary dimension for 'Source'.#TwitterSmarter pic.twitter.com/08VtuzhGGE— Amanda Webb – Digital Marketer 👩💻 (@Spiderworking) February 16, 2023
To identify what other metrics you should track, ask yourself some simple questions about your business. For example, how many people look at your pricing page, and how many of those end up buying? How many of your blog followers buy from you regularly? Do your buyers have common traits? Are your ads bringing in visitors who end up buying from you?
When you try and answer these questions, you’ll automatically think of metrics that you need to keep an eye on.
A5:
Start with the questions
☞How many people visit sales pages compared to how many buy?
☞How many people who read my blog buy from me?
☞What do my buyers have in common?
☞Are my ads working?Then find the metrics and dimensions that answer those questions. #TwitterSmarter
— Amanda Webb – Digital Marketer 👩💻 (@Spiderworking) February 16, 2023
Calculate the amount of money you spend on social media. Then calculate the time and effort you put into it, and associate a monetary value. This should be at least minimum wage.
A6:
To measure your social media ROI start with investment.
☞How much money are you spending?
☞How much time are you spending?Then measure time spent on social & give it a cash value. This should be at least minimum wage.#TwitterSmarter https://t.co/BtoqMDN1LF
— Amanda Webb – Digital Marketer 👩💻 (@Spiderworking) February 16, 2023
Then go to your GA setup and look at your traffic reports and your conversion reports. Do you see people coming in through social media and converting into buyers? If so, that’ll be part of your social media ROI.
A6:
In your GA4 look at your traffic acquisition reports and your conversion reports.
Are you seeing results there? #TwitterSmarter— Amanda Webb – Digital Marketer 👩💻 (@Spiderworking) February 16, 2023
It’s worth remembering that there are variables that won’t show up on GA or any other social analytics tool. If you run a social media campaign, does that positively affect your sales? Would doing two campaigns at the same time increase your sales significantly? If you took a break from your regular chats and Spaces conversations, would that impact your sales? Answering all these questions is important for understanding your real social ROI. Tools won’t do them all—you have to be a sleuth, too.
A6:
Then there are 'Covert benefits' 🕵️
The things analytics can't tell you. You need to do detective work and compare cause and effect.If you run a campaign do you get more revenue?
If you stop doing #TwitterSmarter for a year, do you get less revenue?#TwitterSmarter— Amanda Webb – Digital Marketer 👩💻 (@Spiderworking) February 16, 2023
As we said before, a lot of people forget to valuate the time they spend on marketing their business. It’s important to have a proper monetary value for your efforts.
A7:
Time spent is the thing that gets totally overlooked by marketers. Particularly when you’re marketing your own business. We don’t tend to value our own time.Firstly you need to put a value on your time. At the VERY LEAST this should be minimum wage.#TwitterSmarter https://t.co/KoCXdJiSaQ
— Amanda Webb – Digital Marketer 👩💻 (@Spiderworking) February 16, 2023
Our guest suggested using Toggl. It’s a tool designed to track time spent on projects, but you can use it for other activities also, as our guest does.
A7:
Toggl is a tool designed to measure the time you spend on client projects but I use it to measure everything.
It tells me I spend 4 hours a week on my live show. I can add that time to my ROI calculation for that project.#TwitterSmarter— Amanda Webb – Digital Marketer 👩💻 (@Spiderworking) February 16, 2023
A lot of businesses are cutting back on their marketing budgets as inflation rises. If that’s happening to you, this is the best time to analyze your data and measure what’s working for you and what’s not. Doing that will help you plan more effectively for the future.
A8
If you work in marketing for an organisation your budget is probably getting slashed. You need to fight for every penny.That means you need to prove what's working and what's not and that's where analytics and measurement tools come in.#TwitterSmarter https://t.co/WP9iIZlVKk
— Amanda Webb – Digital Marketer 👩💻 (@Spiderworking) February 16, 2023
For more regular advice and tips on measuring and improving your ROI, check out Amanda’s newsletter here.
A8:
And may I recommend my newsletter?
It will help you get more bang for your marketing buck
>>Stay on top of your ROI and get daily tips on analytics, get on the list:https://t.co/TawPdoUIn0 #TwitterSmarter
— Amanda Webb – Digital Marketer 👩💻 (@Spiderworking) February 16, 2023
Well folks, that’s all from me this week. Thanks for reading through and for more great insights from our chat with Michelle, have a look at this Twitter thread. If you like this summary, you’ll love the real-time chat. Join us next Thursday at 1 pm ET for #TwitterSmarter. We also have an after-chat on Twitter Spaces at 5 pm ET. See you there!
About me, Narmadhaa:
I write all the things—marketing stuff to pay the bills; haiku and short stories so I feel wholesome. A social media enthusiast, I hang out with the #TwitterSmarter chat crew, and am always happy to take on writing gigs.
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