Metrics for Marketing - Page 2

If these elements are prevalent on a firm’s website, it makes a strong case that they understand the fundamentals of a knowledge-based sale.

If you spend some time surfing the websites of legal, accounting, management consulting, private equity, and architectural firms, you would find that the majority of them lack the elements we have stated above. They are not commonplace for professional service websites.

Current, interactive, and well-written content is difficult to produce. These elements would not appear on a website haphazardly, or by mere chance. They demand dedication, conviction, and significant marketing department resources to ensure that the end product is engaging and knowledge-rich. To produce up-to-date case studies and whitepapers, continual pressure must be placed on the firm’s professionals to document their experience and work. Producing finished products from the collected data is a subsequent challenge, and accomplishment, as well.

Their presence on the website reveals the underlying marketing ideology that motivated the firm, and the adversity that was persevered in its development. They know that knowledge transfer needs to take place, and they take the necessary steps to make it happen.

Now that we have identified different factors that prove the competence of the marketing department, how can the contributions be quantified?

It can be derived in a number of ways. For example, this could include webanalytic data (the number of downloads, page views, online inquiries, content group analysis, etc.), used in conjuncture with prospect conversations and feedback during the sales cycle.

In a future post, I will elaborate further on effective metrics and methods to gauge the impact of content on the website. But, for now, I hope that we have laid the foundation of how the website can prove to be a viable contribution of the marketing department.

Article Author: Grant L. Aldrich

Grant Aldrich is the editor of the Professional Services Marketing blog. He has 6 years of internet marketing experience, and is Director of Client Services for Leadtank, Inc. A company that specializes in Internet Lead Generation.

Visit Grant L. Aldrich's author page — Grant L. Aldrich's Blog