Is your marketing working? Five measures every business owner should understand

Your marketing team has been busy. The website has been updated, campaigns have gone out and your business has attended events. But is that activity helping you achieve your goals?

It is a fair question, and one that can be difficult to answer if you are looking at too many figures or measuring the wrong things. A report full of website visits and social media impressions might show that people are seeing your business. It does not, on its own, tell you whether marketing is creating worthwhile opportunities.

You do not need to track every available metric. Start with a small number of measures that connect marketing activity to your business objectives.

1. Qualified enquiries

How many enquiries are coming from people or organisations you would genuinely like to work with?

Total enquiry numbers can be misleading. Ten enquiries from customers who are a poor fit may be less valuable than two from businesses in your target market. Agree what a qualified enquiry means for your business. You might consider the customer’s sector, location, need, likely budget or readiness to buy.

Track both the number of qualified enquiries and where they came from. This will help you see which activities are attracting the right people.

2. Enquiry-to-customer conversion

Of the qualified enquiries you receive, how many become customers?

A simple conversion rate can help you spot where attention is needed. If enquiries are increasing but sales are not, the issue may be the quality of those enquiries. It could also be your response time, follow-up process, proposition or pricing.

For example, if you receive 20 qualified enquiries and win five customers, your enquiry-to-customer conversion rate is 25%. Compare this over time, while remembering that a small number of high-value sales can make monthly figures fluctuate.

3. Customer acquisition cost

How much are you spending to win a new customer?

To calculate a basic customer acquisition cost, divide your marketing and sales costs for a period by the number of new customers won in that period. Include the costs that are relevant to the activity you are assessing, such as advertising, agency fees, events and staff time where you can estimate it.

This figure needs context. A higher cost may be perfectly sensible if a customer makes a substantial purchase or stays with you for several years. It is most useful when considered alongside customer value and the time it takes to make a sale.

4. Repeat business and customer growth

Are existing customers buying again, buying more or recommending you to others?

Marketing is often associated with finding new customers, but your existing relationships may offer some of your strongest growth opportunities. Depending on your business, you could track repeat purchase rate, revenue from existing customers, contract renewals or referrals.

If winning new work is expensive, improving customer retention or helping customers understand your wider services may have a significant impact.

5. Revenue from marketing activity

Ultimately, you need to understand how marketing contributes to sales. That does not mean claiming that one advert or social media post caused every purchase.

In many businesses, a customer might hear about you through a referral, visit your website, read a case study and meet your team before making a decision. Ask new customers how they found you and record the interactions that helped move the conversation forward. Look for patterns over time rather than expecting perfect attribution.

This gives you a more useful picture of marketing’s contribution and helps you decide where to invest next.

Bring the figures together in a monthly scorecard

A simple scorecard makes it easier to discuss results and act on them. For example:

Measure	This month	Previous month	What have we learned?	Next action
Qualified enquiries
Enquiry-to-customer conversion
Customer acquisition cost
Repeat business or customer growth
Revenue from marketing activity

You may not have reliable data for every row immediately. Start with what you can measure, agree how information will be recorded and improve the scorecard over time.

The most valuable column is often “Next action”. If an activity is attracting the right enquiries, should you invest more in it? If enquiries are not converting, what do you need to investigate? Measurement should help you make decisions, rather than simply produce another report.

Measure what matters to your business

The right measures depend on your goals and sales cycle. A business seeking a small number of large contracts will assess progress differently from one selling frequently to many customers.

Choose figures that help you answer three questions:

Are we reaching the right people?

Are they becoming customers?

Is the investment worthwhile? 

Review them regularly, talk to the people closest to your customers and use what you learn to improve your plan.

At LMC Associates, we help businesses develop practical marketing plans and put clear measures in place to track progress. If you would like a clearer view of what your marketing is achieving, get in touch.