Measure a Program's ROI

Now that you have access to valuable data within Analytics, it's crucial to dive in and assess your program's performance. This article provides you with comprehensive guidance on reviewing this data, taking appropriate actions, and reporting key metrics tailored to your specific audience. Whether you're reporting to your team, stakeholders, or clients, we've outlined the essential steps to help you maximize your analytics insights.

Know who you report to and the metrics important to them

It's necessary to know how the person you are reporting to measures results. What is top-of-mind to them? Think about what their goals are and how the advocacy program is helping meet those goals.

Here are some examples of metrics to review based on the team who is reviewing the data.

Marketing teams
How much traffic is driven to the sales site because of the content the team shares?
How many clicks are webinar shares producing?
Sales teams
How many leads or deals are coming in based on content shared?
How many demos are shares producing?
Survey the team to learn how the tool is helping associates drive more sales.
Recruiting teams
How many clicks on job posts occurred on the team's shared content?
How much content is being shared about what it's like to work at the company? How much engagement are those posts receiving?

Know available metrics

Once you know what's important to the person who manages the program, you'll want to know what's available. You can find that information in the analytics article and in this metrics spreadsheet.

Let's look at some direct and indirect metrics to help measure the ROI of an advocacy program.

Direct metrics

Direct metrics are clearly assigned measurable attributes. These include the following.

Total reach of all users connected to social profiles/Company's social reach.
Total number of clicks, impressions, and engagements.
Earned Media Value (EMV), found on the ROI Dashboard.
Use tracking links to tell a story based on clicks to specific links.

Indirect metrics

Indirect metrics are usually harder to assign a measurable attribution solely based on the advocacy program. However, they can help display the importance of how the program contributes to the efficacy of the company's goals. These include the following.

How many people are viewing content and increasing word-of-mouth sales or impressions?
Employee shares can act as a touch point in the sales process, where it takes about 8-15+ touches to make a sale.
Conversion/purchase intent increases on other channels.

Ideal KPIs and Benchmarks

Exploring KPIs and diving into data can offer valuable insights into your content's impact, your company's communication, and its broader influence on your business. Check out these benchmarks we suggest monitoring!

Shares per user, per month: Users should be sharing 3-5 times per month, or about once per week.
Connections per user: Users generally have a combined total of 1000 connections for connected social networks.
Engagements per share: You should see 0.5 engagements per share, such as a comment or a like on shared content.
Clicks per share: Shares will receive about 3 clicks per share.
Branded content clicks: Shares that include branded content should have 25%-33% of the program's total clicks.
Branded content shares: Shares that include branded content should have 25%-33% of the program's total clicks.

Each program is different, and goals are ever-changing. If you would like to discuss how to best measure your program's success in greater detail, please reach out to your CSM, and they'd be happy to discuss your goals and how best to measure and meet those.