Know-How Exchange : Research/Metrics

Dear Marcom,

Great question, my suggestion:

1) identify the KPIs of your company and boss: what are they trying to accomplish (eg increase profitability, broaden consumer base, build brand equity to raise prices, monitor online buzz to avoid crisis events, find new product ideas to promote organic growth....)
2) ask/think about what is needed to achieve these KPIs
3) now take a look at your responsibilities and opportunities and assess which of the KPI components are (partly) under your control. These are YOUR KPIs

For instance, if we need to broaden the consumer base by 10% , we may need to increase awareness for our company by 40%, Relevance by 30%, Liking by 25% and purchase intention by 10%. Or, thinking in the new 'consumer decision journey', we may need to increase website visits by 30%, and web conversion by 15%. Does that make sense?

Cheers

Also, I suggest you consider offering both short-term and long-term KPIs. As a colleague just told me:
"marketing needs to be understood in two time frames: Short-term, where the job is to support sales efforts to close the deal (thru branding, messaging, etc) and longer-term, where the job is to set a growth path that can be sustained. And this can be measured against a baseline of where the company was at the beginning of the strategy. But we still have to remember that marketing is not in control of product development (tho' it should influence it) or the economy or ineffective sales or...etc."

Hope this helps...good luck!