Pearl of wisdom? Or timeworn platitude?
Regardless of how you feel about it, the maxim “you can’t manage what you can’t measure” should be top of mind in every content marketing conversation. So suggests a recent article from MarketingProfs.com, which recommends (using paid or free analytics tools) tracking these five performance indicators to determine whether your content is a boon or a bust with prospects:
- Traffic: the number of people who visit the page on which your content resides. Factors that move this metric include: your number of social followers; size and quantity of your email database; how highly search engines rank the page (for quality and relevance), which you can learn more about in this Google Hummingbird post).
- Engagement: the duration and quality of user interaction with content are measured by indicators such as bounce rates, time on site (or page), and abandonment rates. Comments, feedback forms, and even results from your search box provide supplemental insight into visitors’ content likes, dislikes and preferences.
- Social Shares: that good (relevant, useful, credible, interesting) content gets shared is a universal truth among social networks. If you’re active on social media, set aside time each week to measure activity and results.
- Backlinks: the quality and authority of pages that link back to your content are another measurement of success. Connections to reputable, legitimate sources help in a big way. Linking to questionable sites (those with no traffic or Google Page Rank, for example) can hurt your content marketing efforts.
- Conversion Rates: content’s ultimate goal is conversions, which marketers define as moving visitors to take some action, such as: request information; schedule a demo or appointment; download a brochure; or perhaps best of all, place an order. You can increase conversion rates by making the desired action clear, quick and easy, with simple navigation as well as “visual cues” that might include the (judicious) use of colored buttons, frames or other graphic elements.
View our full archive of content marketing posts for more tips on creating, promoting and leveraging your content, including white papers and case studies, video, SlideShare presentations and more.
