Milton Keynes marketing expert David Dakramendjian of redrose.digital shares his expertise.
Marketing performance is talked about constantly, yet many businesses still struggle to understand whether their marketing activity is genuinely working. Reports are produced, dashboards fill up, but clear decisions can remain surprisingly difficult to make.
One of the biggest challenges is volume. Modern marketing tools make it easy to track almost everything, which often results in too much data and not enough insight. Over time, this can make performance harder to understand rather than clearer.
Focusing on a smaller set of meaningful metrics usually provides a far more accurate picture of what marketing is actually achieving.
Revenue First, Not Vanity Metrics
For most businesses, marketing exists to support growth. That makes revenue linked to marketing activity one of the most useful reference points when reviewing performance.
While it’s rarely possible to attribute revenue to a single campaign with complete accuracy, having a reasonable view of how marketing contributes to sales helps keep discussions grounded in commercial reality. Metrics like Customer Acquisition Cost (CAC) also add important context, highlighting whether increased spend is delivering proportionate returns.
Why Conversion Rates Matter
Conversion rates show how effectively marketing turns interest into action. Rather than focusing solely on traffic levels, tracking how people move through key stages — from visit to enquiry, or from product view to purchase — helps identify where potential customers drop off.
Even small changes in conversion rates can reveal more about performance than large swings in traffic, as they often point to clearer messaging, better targeting, or fewer points of friction.
Look Beyond Lead Volume
Lead numbers alone rarely tell the full story. Two campaigns can generate the same number of enquiries but deliver very different outcomes further down the line.
This is where lead-to-sale conversion becomes important, helping businesses understand lead quality, follow-up effectiveness, and how well marketing and sales activity align.
Engagement Over Clicks
Traffic figures still have a place, but they’re far more useful when combined with behaviour. Metrics such as time on page, scroll depth, and engaged sessions help indicate whether visitors are genuinely interested or simply passing through.
These signals are particularly important for content-led strategies, where trust builds over time rather than instantly.
Keep Measurement Simple
The businesses that gain the most clarity from marketing data are often those that measure less, not more. Reviewing a consistent set of meaningful metrics over time makes it far easier to spot patterns, prioritise activity, and make confident decisions.
For businesses looking to bring more structure to how they measure marketing performance, insights from specialists such as redrose.digital can help clarify which metrics genuinely matter and how to use them effectively.