One of the long-standing questions about branding and building a brand is how to measure branding campaigns. Unfortunately, there is not a direct answer that works every time. There are a few strategies (basic and advanced) that can provide key insights into your brand. Also, it helps evaluate if the strategy you’re developing is on the right track. Before we start it’s important to remember to benchmark your brand before your start. It’s important to have a starting point to compare to the long term.
First, we will take a look at a couple of basic strategies. These are tactics that can be done on your own; using free metrics that are provided to you through your website or social platforms.
Benchmark Organic & Direct Indicators
Before you start, take a look at the organic visitors on your site and the organic reach of your social media accounts. Take stock of how you are doing, and where most of your engagement comes from. This is a great practice as it provides a benchmark moving forward.
Some examples of these indicators are organic & direct website sessions, # of social media comments, or search keywords.
Once you have benchmarked some of these indicators, it’s time to collect some data. There are plenty of tools, like Agency Analytics, that can keep track of various metrics across multiple platforms or it can be as simple as creating an Excel document.
Be disciplined about keeping track of these metrics, and do your best to understand what works and what doesn’t. It’s important to remember to have a collection of key metrics rather than one. It provides a clearer picture of performance and campaign success.
Ask your audience (a basic form of marketing research)
A quick way to understand your brand’s reputation is to poll your audience. This is accomplished through email, text, or social media. Build a basic form/survey with some general questions about audience satisfaction. Also, ask questions about their understanding of your company and your brand. This provides key audience insights regarding your company and brand. Additionally, use the data to establish a net promoter score (NPS) and understand if your audience members are “brand promoters” or “brand detractors”.
Now, we’re going to transition to a bit more advanced methodology for measuring branding campaigns. These will require the help of a specialized partner.
Media Monitoring
Media monitoring is software that tracks all digital and printed records of your brand or organization. The tools track media sources such as television, blogs or articles, or what’s shared publicly on social media. These tools can track overall sentiment (whether it’s positive or negative press), and trends across months or years.
Marketing Research
Last is good old-fashioned marketing research. Marketing research is conducted by a specialized firm. It consists of both qualitative (in-person interviews) and quantitative (surveys and data). These both help to build a picture of an audience’s understanding of a topic or idea. Additionally, it is a great way to engage current audience members. Lastly, you can engage folks who have not heard of your brand before but fall in your target market or buyer persona.
It’s important to remember that there is not a single solution that always answers “How to Measure Branding Campaigns”. It takes a well-thought-out mix of indicators and strategies to ensure that you have a current idea of what your audience thinks your brand is and the best way to build it.