There are countless different apps and plug-ins to track B2B analytics, and there are even more blog posts, podcast episodes, and YouTube videos about them. With so much about analytics out there, how do you know what analytics you should be paying attention to and which you can put on the back burner?
In this article, we tackle this question, the key analytics to track, and the tools we use to track them. By understanding which B2B marketing tactics are working best, you can allocate your resources more effectively and generate more leads and sales for your business. And if you aren't already tracking B2B marketing analytics, now is the time to start. Doing so will help you fine-tune your marketing strategy and improve your bottom line.
Tracking Key Analytics
At the core of it, the most important B2B marketing analytics to track are your website traffic acquisition, leads, and marketing-generated pipeline. Doing so will give you a deeper understanding of how your marketing strategy is performing.
Without understanding these three key metrics, you won’t know if your efforts are reaching the right targets (i.e.., anyone on your target list or within your ideal customer profile) – this is especially critical if you are running account-based marketing (ABM) programs. ABM focuses on quality over quantity, so many of the traditional metrics don’t necessarily apply. A focus on conversions within your more targeted campaigns is more important in this case.
Paid media is a big part of most, if not all marketing strategies, so tracking your paid media performance metrics such as impressions, conversions, and CPC remains valuable. But it is also important to track B2B marketing channels beyond paid media. Make sure to track email marketing, social media marketing, and content marketing efforts, as well, so you can understand how successful your content is in reaching and attracting potential customers.
PPC is a great way to drive traffic to your website, but content marketing costs 62% less and generates approximately three times the volume of leads. Make sure all of the effort you are putting into developing a comprehensive marketing strategy is working for your bottom line.
Five Tools To Track B2B Marketing Analytics Across Platforms
1. Google Analytics To Track Website Traffic And B2B Conversions
Installing Google Analytics is critical. It provides you with valuable insights into your website traffic. For example, you can see how much traffic you're getting, where it's coming from, and what pages are being visited as well as how much time visitors are spending on your site.
With this information, you can determine what is and is not working with your strategy. For instance, if you have a PPC ad running that leads to a landing page and after arriving at the page, visitors are quickly leaving, you know the landing page isn't working. Or if you simply aren't getting enough website traffic, you know you need to revisit either the website, or your SEO, and determine how to generate more visits. This kind of tracking and insight allow you to make changes accordingly to improve the performance of your website and marketing efforts.
2. HubSpot's Marketing Analytics To Track Leads, Website Traffic, And Conversions
HubSpot offers a suite of powerful marketing analytics tools that can be used to track critical marketing data. A small sampling of these tools includes the Lead Flow report, which shows how many leads you're generating, and the Conversion Tracker, which not only tracks conversions but gives valuable insights into those conversions.
These tools and more are helpful for understanding which marketing channels are driving your traffic and the leads that convert.
3. Salesforce's CRM To Track B2B Leads And Sales Pipeline
Salesforce's CRM is a powerful tool for tracking B2B leads and your sales pipelines. It lets you see which leads are interested in your products or services and what stage they are in the buying cycle. From Salesforce you can interact with leads, track their activity, and expand your targeting to other buyers associated with a lead.
Again, this information is essential for understanding where your B2B marketing efforts should be evaluated, refined, and optimized. For example, if you're not generating enough opportunities from marketing, you need to find out why and make changes accordingly.
Salesforce offers many free and paid apps that allow you to maximize your marketing potential such as Kudoz: the Opportunity Analyzer. Kudoz improves your visibility into leads so you can improve conversions to drive revenue growth.
4. Mixpanel To Track Website Engagement And Conversions
Mixpanel allows you to see how people interact with your website and what pages they're converting on. The program tracks user interactions with your web and mobile applications and provides tools for targeted communication with visitors.
You can then use the data collected to build custom reports and measure user engagement and retention to improve your strategies.
5. A Custom-Built Marketing Analytics Dashboard To Track It All
A custom marketing analytics dashboard is a great way to track all your B2B marketing data in one place. This allows you the ability to track all of the data unique to your business, industry, and marketing campaigns in order to have the information you need to pivot your marketing efforts.
Building a custom marketing analytics dashboard is not as difficult as it sounds. Many software platforms offer drag-and-drop features that make it easy to get started. Marketing Cloud Intelligence (formerly named Datorama) is one example of a platform that allows users to connect to many marketing data sources in order to establish a unified view.
Understanding Your Analytics Drives Your Performance
Understanding your analytics needs may seem like a challenge. But without the right analytics tracking and insights, you are essentially marketing blind.
When you do get it right, you gain valuable data on how your strategies are performing for your business and how you can improve them to achieve your goals.
Using the tools and tips mentioned above, you can start tracking the most important B2B marketing analytics - improving your marketing performance, lead generation efforts, and ultimately revenue growth over time.