As a marketer and a parent of two kids under four years old, my days and nights are filled with analyzing data to find the best ways to optimize performance.

Whether it’s identifying a more efficient way to get everyone out the door by 7 a.m. (and not forgetting my lunch) or implementing a plan to increase revenue, optimization cannot and should not be done without first reviewing and analyzing historical data.

To say that I am a little obsessed with metrics and analytics would be an understatement, but this is not the case for all marketers. According to a study conducted by CMO Survey, only 42% of marketers are leveraging data and analytics in their decision-making process. This percentage is surprising as, on average, marketers are expected to spend over 17% of their total marketing budget on analytics in the next three years.

While the impediments or reasoning for not leveraging such valuable insights varies, the most likely reason is a lack of time and resources to sift through all the data and determine how to use it.

Here are three simple steps for leveraging your existing data and analytics to drive more revenue for your organization.

1) Leveraging An Analytics Dashboard WILL Save You Time

In today’s world of technology, hundreds (if not thousands) of marketing tools on the market provide their own set of performance data. But how much more powerful would your marketing strategy be if you could connect and analyze all of your data sources in one location?

Data aggregation from tools like Google Analytics, HubSpot, Facebook Advertising, Shopify and more is invaluable for developing and optimizing a revenue and marketing strategy. This aggregation puts everything in one place for easy review and interpretation, and it provides a way to quickly change direction when something isn’t working as planned.

Without an analytics dashboard, you’d need to spend hours (and sometimes days) sifting through the countless data sources, aligning the metrics and then determining what move to make next. This leads to lost opportunities. At Square 2 Marketing, we leverage Databox, which has helped us save time on data analysis for both our internal marketing and for our clients.

Browse more revenue dashboards here.

Editor’s note: Eager to see Databox analytics tool in action? Check out this data snack on how to do sales forecasting in HubSpot CRM.

2) Review Data Before Making Any Marketing Decisions

So, what’s next now that you have the data aggregated into an analytics dashboard? Well, now the fun begins (or at least I think so). Once your data is all in one place, you can more effectively analyze it to find ways to optimize your marketing efforts and drive more revenue.

As an example, say your company provides inventory management software to small businesses, and you recently launched a new landing page offering an assessment of the prospect’s current inventory management process.

When reviewing the results, you see that the assessment is not producing as much new business as the team initially expected. With your newly aggregated data, you can simultaneously look at each phase of the prospect journey to determine where the drop off is occurring and decide how to optimize your marketing for better results.

After reviewing the analytics dashboard, you have identified that you’re hitting your traffic goals and your conversion rate is low. However, when someone does take the assessment, you have a high new customer close rate. In this situation, you can infer that:

1. You are driving the wrong traffic to the page, or
2. A disconnect exists between what the prospect thinks they are getting based on the search results and what the page actually offers

Either way, the data is pointing to the need for better content alignment and audience targeting, which gives you a good starting point for optimization.

If your traffic numbers are high and your conversion numbers are solid, but you’re seeing a drop off after the assessment, the actual assessment might be the problem. Your team can dive in, review and optimize accordingly.

When something isn’t performing optimally in your marketing program, change is mandatory. But making changes without first pinpointing the problem could lead to wasting time and resources.

3) Test, Test, Test

So, you have pinpointed the potential issue by review the aggregated data, and you identified what you want to change. But what if multiple scenarios could improve the results? That’s where testing comes into play.

With options like A/B and multivariate testing, you’re never forced to make a permanent change unless you know it will work. Testing allows you to compare what you currently have against your proposed optimization. If you see an improvement in the new version, then you know it was the right move.

But if you see no change or a decrease in performance, then what? You go back to the data and see what went wrong. You might not have pinpointed the correct issue, or perhaps the planned optimization wasn’t enough to move the needle.

As you can see, testing takes us back full circle, making the analytics dashboard even more crucial to see the performance results so that you can continue to optimize until you get the results you’re seeking.

Following these three simple steps will help you to better leverage your time, resources and data, and let you make informed optimization strategies based on data rather than assumptions. These more informed plans will help you improve marketing program performance and drive more revenue.

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