Episode 20: Track these 4 KPIs to make your marketing easy and measurable

If you're like most HR consultants I speak to, you probably find that marketing is a mysterious dark art.

And I completely get why...

For your marketing to work, you have to get a HUGE happy magic mix of dependable factors right.

Which is why results can feel impossible to predict or measure, because you just don't know how it's going to go down.

I suppose it's how business owners feel about HR really.

They think it's this big intangible and unmeasurable thing.

But you and I know that it has a huge impact on the business and by using the right KPIs and metrics, you can measure the performance of your HR programmes quite easily.

You can do the same for marketing too.

Which is why, in this podcast episode, I'm going to talk you through 4 KPIs you could track to help give you focus and direction.

While also helping you to make your marketing easy, predictable and measurable.

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Before I do, I need to talk to you about what you're doing wrong and what you need to do instead.

Lot's of business owners I know do something called one step marketing.

That's when you try to grab someone's attention - like send an email or post on LinkedIn -  and try to sell to them straight away.

This approach doesn't work.

Just think about your own behaviour right now...

How often do you read an email from a business and buy from them straight away?

It never happens in fact.

It could take weeks, months, or even years of consistent contact before you're ready to take action.

And that's why you need to add a step.

So you now have attention, relationship and then sale.

Building a relationship with your prospects is a really important part of your marketing.

So instead of marketing your consultancy with a scatter gun approach, you need to use my 3 step lead generation system instead.

Step 1 is to build multiple audiences like your LinkedIn connections and email marketing list.

Step 2 is to grow a relationship with your audiences

And step 3 is to convert the relationship.

I use this 3 step system in every business that I work in.

This 3 step system is your lead generation funnel.

And everything you do marketing and sales wise can fit into one of these 3 steps.

And whenever I get stuck with my own marketing and sales, I sit myself down and ask:

What am i doing to grow my audiences this week?

What am I doing to build a relationship with my audiences this week?

And what am I doing to convert the relationships I have into clients this week?

And from there, I can create a to do list that's very focussed on the outcome I need to achieve to grow my business.

And you can do exactly the same.

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So now you know what steps you should be taking to grow your consultancy.

You can now use this 3 step system to create KPIs.

Now, you're probably thinking... but why would I create marketing KPIs for myself.

Doesn't that feel a bit overkill?

Well, I think that they're really important because they hold you accountable.

They not only hold you accountable to implement the right strategy.

They also hold you accountable to drive activity.

And of course, they can also help you to measure the success of your marketing.

So let's jump straight in with the first KPI that you should be tracking and that's how many people have you added to your list? 

On a weekly basis, I want you to track how many new LinkedIn connections and email contacts you're getting.

This is step 1 of my 3 step lead generation system.

And this is how you're feeding your consultancy's funnel.

So this is a really important activity and KPI to track.

Because if you aren't building these audiences than your funnel will immediately dry up as a result.

And if you check out episode 17 of this podcast, I'll talk you through how you can do this in an automated way using clever software called Meet Alfred.

Let's move on to our second KPI and that's: How many appointments have you had?

On a weekly basis, I want you to track how many new appointments you've had that week.

So if you listen to episode 17, I'll also talk you through a campaign you can do to try and get a call booked in with your new leads as quickly as possible.

In terms of funnel actions, getting an initial discovery call booked in with your prospects is your second priority and that's why this KPI is really important to track.

As part of my flagship video programme: How to package up and sell HR to make more money you'll receive a promotional deck that you can use to guide you through these discovery calls.

It includes all of the information a business owner needs to understand HR and make a decision to buy from you, so be sure to check that out if you haven't already.

Obvs you can make this KPI a little more complex by tracking the number of appointments booked vs number of appointments attended - because some will inevitable cancel - but try to keep it simple for yourself.

And then, what will be really cool, is for you to track your connection to appointment conversion rate as a percentage.

By tracking your connection to appointment conversion rate, you'll be able to make tweaks to your campaign and see if it's working or not.

Let's move on to our third KPI and that's: How many proposals have you sent out?

So once you've had your appointments, you ideally want to get those prospects to proposal stage which is your third priority in terms of funnel activity.

By tracking this KPI, you can then create a conversion rate from appointment to proposal which is really important to know.

And again, you can use the promotional deck we've created for you as part of the video programme to use as your proposal which includes all of the information a business owner needs to buy from you.

And then your fourth and final KPI to track is how many new clients you've got that week.

This is obviously the big one that you want to track and by doing this, you'll be able to create your proposal to sale conversion rate which is really important o know too.

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So let me just summarise those 4 KPIs for you again.

The first is how many new connections have you made this week. 
The second is how many appointments you've had this week. 
The third is how many proposals have you sent out this week. 
And the fourth is how many clients have you got this week.

Tracking these KPIs, like I've said, not only holds you accountable to implement the right strategy and drive action.

But by working out the conversion rates between each step, you can also look at your results and think about how you can improve them.

I do this with a lot of my consulting clients.

We look at each step of their funnel and we look for the weak links.

Are you getting enough appointments booked in?

What are the quality of your appointments?

How many proposals are you sending out and how many of them are converting intro clients.

If you're only converting 20% of proposals we know we have an issue.

And we can look at the way you're packaging up your services, your prices and how you're presenting the proposal in order to help you get the results you want.

So there we are...

I stress the importance of tracking HR metrics to make it feel more tangible and measurable for business owners.

And I think we should be doing the same for marketing too.

Start tracking your progress today and let me know if you need any help.

Lots of consultants I know struggle to find the time to grow their business.

They're so busy delivering client work or fire fighting, any sort of business development keeps getting pushed to the bottom of their priority list.

Month after month, they aren’t making any progress and they feel stuck.

I get it... running AND growing your consultancy can feel like two full time jobs.

But remember that your future income and happiness depends on the growth of your business and that requires constant action.

To help you take action and move the dial,  I've adopted the term “Continual Personal Development” and made it my own to help you do just that…

So C is for Clarity.

If you’re feeling stuck, the best thing you can do is create clarity for yourself.

Often people don't take action because they don't know what they should do.

And that's why it's really important to seek clarity in everything you're doing.

What services are you selling?

Who are you selling those services to?

And how are you going to start a conversation with them?

All of these details need to be thought about and clarified before you can take action.

P is for prioritise.

Once you’ve created this clarity, you then need to look at what you’re doing on a daily basis to help you achieve your goals.

Obvs you'll have to do some operational stuff and firefighting.

We all do.

But your priority should be on future growth and you have to prioritise time to make that happen.

That might mean starting the day with business growth stuff and finishing the day with emails instead.

A simple switch round of your day and can help you make stuff happen in your business.

And finally D stands for delegate.

The sooner you realise you can’t do everything, the better.

If you aren't delegating, you're the bottle neck and you're massively slowing down progress.

Often, the quickest way to get something done is by delegating it to someone else.

Whether that's marketing your consultancy - you could sign up to the HR Marketing Box and get one of our marketing VAs to personalise and schedule all of your content for you.

Or maybe that's delivering client work for you - you could find an associate or HR assistant to do some of the work for you to free your time up while still making a profit.

If you don't have the time, think about how you can get it done fast and delegate it.

So that's my version of the CPD framework.

Clarify. 
Prioritise. 
Delegate.

Think about your business goals and use this framework to help you take action, fast.