The start of a new year is a popular time for resolutions. Many people resolve to eat better (read: ‘eat less’). Or exercise more. You know the drill.

And right about now, three weeks into a new year, is when the vast majority of those resolutions start to break down.

Of course, even among marketing cognoscenti new year’s resolutions rarely involve analytics and key performance indicators (KPIs) — so I’d like to take this opportunity to outline a plan you can follow to slim down and shape up in 2012, metrics-wise.

What Are Metrics For?

Now, in many ways there’s a direct correlation between the everyman’s resolutions (and  subsequent frequent failures) and those you can practice for marketing metrics. When we talk about “eating less” or “exercising more” what we really mean is practicing those activities in the overall context of “being more fit”. Let’s face it, isn’t that the real goal? If you actually end the year healthier than you started, would it matter nearly so much if you’d also eaten more? The purpose of a metric is to support incremental improvement toward a goal.

When companies want to get more out of their numbers they often suffer from what might best be described as “number glut”. They figure if they measure more, they will have more data (ok, true enough) and that more data means better insight (dubious, at best). In fact, I’m going to assert that the more metrics you add to your arsenal of KPIs, the more likely you are to be confused as to your true current state of business health, possibly even unconsciously. In such a case, you don’t have metrics, you have a fetish.

Let me suggest a plan for improvement that can be part of your professional new year’s resolutions.

Step 1: Identify The Real Goal

Back away from any metrics you currently look at and instead ask yourself what you want the end state to be. Make it concrete. Some common retail or lead gen goals might be: “This time next year I want to lift conversions on my site by 25%” or “I want us to double sales in 2012” or “I want to halve the number of unsubscribes from our email list”.  For simplicity, I’ll chose  one — “increase conversions by 25%” — for the remainder of this column.

While macro goals are different for each business, there’s nevertheless a rather finite number of them. Therefore, explicitly stating a primary goal might feel obvious — until you find yourself listing two, three or even more such goals, some of which might be mutually exclusive. Simple and “obvious” exercises like this help define which goals are more important than others.

Step 2: Lay It All Out

Look at all the metrics, KPIs, and other data streams bearing down on you every day, week, month.  For each one, describe how it should change if it’s moving you toward your goal. You might even choose to add some conditions just to keep yourself honest. Here are some examples:

• “Gross revenue” — Revenue can be a great measure of conversion improvement, and certainly both should rise at the same time. Just be sure to question yourself as to your goal: was it really “increase conversion” or was it “increase revenues”? If the latter go back to step 1.
• “Conversion rate” — This one is almost a no-brainer. If conversions are going up, then the conversion rate will go up, too. But the opposite isn’t necessarily true — you can improve conversion rate without necessarily improving total conversions (see the following)
• “Visitors per weeks” — Normally, you want visitors rising to get more conversions, but the caveat is that you have to be driving more of the right sort of traffic for this also to be reflected in increased conversions. If you sell red sweaters, and you drive more visitors from south Florida to your site, we can agree we’re unlikely to see a huge spike in conversions. Or you may drive too specific a niche market to the site — those red sweaters might be mighty popular to folks in Nome, Alaska, but are there enough such customers to keep your business alive?

When I said “lay it all out”, I mean it. I use 3×5 cards for this and lay it out on a table. Old school, yes, but fast and effective.

Step 3: Pick Your Favorite Date For Saturday Night

Now pick out the metrics you see as most important. I’ll let you decide what’s constitutes “important”, but personally, I ask myself “if I could have one (and only one) of these metrics, which one would I pick? What can’t I live without?” Then, “if I could only have two, which two would I pick?” (doesn’t have to include the single metric answer). This is when you’ll be glad you used the 3×5 cards. You can include as many of these as you’d like to list out, but I highly recommend you keep this to a manageable list, say 10-12 (max) of your most important metrics. If you only come up with 4, then so be it.

Step 4: Insist On Delivery

Once you’ve got your prioritized metrics listed — and remember you’ve already pre-described how each of these feeds into the goal from Step 1 — you now want to hold them to account for producing results. For the next 90 days, measure how each of these KPIs changed with respect to your goal. And make changes to your online efforts with techniques designed to move these metrics in the direction you’ve already outlined. In our example, driving better qualified traffic to the site is expected to lead to an improved conversion rate, so ask how you can drive better qualified traffic — more compelling and relevant copy to improve organic search? Goal-focused paid search ads? Paying more for specific search terms? Or, perhaps better use of negative match terms to weed out unwanted traffic? You already know a boatload of tactics for driving traffic, but which specific tactics can drive strategic improvement of each metric?

Step 5: Vote Someone Off The Island

At the end of the 90 days, list out the same metrics from Step 2, but this time prioritize them by the relative “bang for the buck” you got from each one.

Some of your KPIs will have done quite well, yielding you the most insight toward improvement of the goal. Keep those little nuggets.

But some of your KPIs are likely not to have performed as expected. If so, it’s time for someone to leave the island. Whoever is last on the performance list, well, it’s best that you part company and make room for someone new. Remove it from the list.

It may well be that a particular metric in such a sad state is one which you’ve always thought about as “important” or is perhaps considered sacrosanct in your industry — yet if this metric performs poorly in moving you toward your goal, then it is as dangerous to your new year’s resolution as a 24-hour Krispy Kreme donut shop. Drive on by!

Keep the other metrics; and, to replace the metric voted off, plug in one of your other metrics that didn’t quite make it onto your list in step 3. What we want to do is create a meritocracy — or better yet, a “metric-ocracy” — where only those KPIs who actually prove themselves effective at moving you towards your goal stay in the mix.

Now that you’ve gotten through the first 90 days, the exercise will become progressively easier. Repeat it again. And again. You’ll be amazed where you get a year from now when you’ve finished your fourth iteration.

Good luck!

P.S. Don’t combine Step 2 and Step 3 at the same time, because you think you’ll save time. I guarantee you’re doing yourself a disservice. Step 2 is about left brain specifics, whereas Step 3 is about your right-brain instincts. Good business people use both sides of their brain, but get the best outcomes when done separately.

P.P.S. Let me pre-answer the obvious question: What to do with a metric that has been voted off? Kill it forever?  I’d answer “absolutely not.”  I’d keep it available and every once in a while mix it back in to see if a second chance is merited.

I’ve been able to restore multiple years of blog posts, but will have to handle all the posts from late 2010 and all of 2011 by hand.

This applies unfortunately to my popular posts “Math for Marketers”. The good news i I’ll be posting those separately to a new blog dedicated solely to that topic (www.MathForMarketers.com) starting in January 2012

“What if we create a completely new site from scratch using the persuasion framework you developed and then A/B test it against our old site — What would happen?”

Let me answer the second part of the question first: The one thing I’m quite certain of is that humans are awful at predicting the future. If someone tells you they  know what’s going to happen in the future put it to the test. I’ve got one buddy who claims that he can “often” predict the future, albeit only about 10 seconds forward. “Great!” I told him. Let’s go to Vegas, and I’ll put up the money and we’ll play craps all weekend.  That’s surely a fast enough game that your 10 second limitation won’t stop us from getting rich!” We never did make it there — somehow it was never the “right time” to predict the future, I suppose.

But when it comes to optimizing your online efforts and you (or, more typically, the boss) presumes to know what will happen next, hold yourself and your team to a hard objective measure: TEST! It’s the best way to leave the subjective world of opinion and enter the objective world of reality.

But of course, that’s what our client really meant with his question.  To rephrase it, one might ask,  ”Is it more efficient to A/B test large scale changes by jumping into a vastly improved architecture first and then proceed with incremental improvement of that new architecture?”  As your instincts might indicate, this can be an ambitious way to jump-start optimization efforts, under the right circumstances.

Most sites have a legacy architecture that actively works against persuasion and conversion, and if your pockets (and your nerves) are big enough, the ultimate A/B test is to say, “Hey, what we have now is a Control benchmark. What we really want to to make sure that the major persuasive scenarios are aggressively planned to be ready for optimization and then go from there.”  You’ll note that I’m emphasizing the persuasive planning portion because just throwing a new design up isn’t likely to leave you in a position to learn from future optimization as efficiently as possible. Instead the purpose of the newly revamped site is to accept the old site as a benchmark to measure against, and to put in place the series of key performance indicators and measurement points which will be used in ongoing optimization quarter after quarter, using experience and insight.

There are some additional issues that should be thought through of course: First off, the technical implementations that will continue to send a portion of your traffic to the old site. Second, make sure you have your apples and oranges understood so that you compare the correct new analytics with their counterparts from the old site’s analytics.  And third, don’t forget that you’re not testing in a sterile academic environment where the goal is to understand all permutations completely, but rather in the living, breathing biodome of a company with live customers and a live income stream. As improvements are verified more and more traffic should be assigned to those improved points of conversion and persuasion — much like the medical profession where the adage “first, do no harm” is the rule.

Personally, I have to give this client props for the sheer nerve of bringing this topic up. It shows a confidence in his team’s ability to implement and live with change  — “the only certainty is change” — as well as a willingness to quickly say “ok, we were wrong in this aspect, so let’s analyze/test/optimize yet again”.

I think this is going to be a fascinating long-term experiment. What about you?

Or are you a lettuce picker? The sort of person that toils for long hours in the field and accomplishes an honest day’s back-breaking labor of work that most white collar business execs would consider a less-than-optimal career.

That fact is, when it comes time to harvest, virtually the entire crop must be worked on at the same time. You don’t have time to cherry pick, and anyway the average business isn’t expert enough in how and what to optimize to know which portion of the crop should be cherry picked. Instead, when that crop is ripe, it’s time to get out there in the field and put in a 14-hour day getting it harvested.

Often when we speak wiith prospective clients, they have the impression that there is some magical formula that leads to higher conversion rates and that it can be achieved without any hard work or commitment. The reality, however, is that our most successful clients who enjoy on-going regular improvements of 40-80% in their conversion rates year after year are the ones who are implementing change on a regular basis. They’re lettuce pickers, and not so proud as to let hard work get in the way of increased revenue.

Are you a hard-working lettuce picker when it comes to your website? Are you guessing at what changes will improve your site? Or do you work diligently every week, every month, and every quarter to effect continuous improvement?

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vmpisOn4FmE[/youtube]

Now I’ll be the first to admit: normally this sort of humor is right up my alley — I’m the one in the office who sees “giggle-value” every time a new iPhone flatulence app comes along — but seeing this as an advertisement was funny the first time, and each time I re-watched I became less and less enthusiastic and more and more offended. What’s next? Shall we be subjected to Dunkin’ Donuts Butt Munchkins?

I’m guessing most people would be offended by this ad. But leave personal sense of what qualifies as funny aside for a moment, and consider: At the end of the day, the purpose of the ad is to sell more product. Perhaps in this case one might argue the real focus is on creating product awareness, so that at some point in the future I *might* try the product. Either way, I’m dubious as to whether the ad does anything more than make me aware of Hardee’s new product but lacking the inducement to act.

Did you watch the video? What’s the actual product name? As I wrote this post,  I had viewed the video 8 times, but actually cannot recall the product name since my mind wants to refer to it as “Hardee’s B-holes”. Now there’s an anti-inducer.

What do you think? Offensive, or just puerile humor (not that there’s anything wrong with that, fellow South Park fans!). And what does it say when the more times the audience is exposed to the marketing, the less likely the viewer is to choose the product, or even remember its name?

[Update: as of May 2010, this product doesn't seem to appear on Hardee's menus anymore. Funny, successful commerical; non-successful product. I rest my case.]

Sometimes it takes your customers a while to “get used to” the changes you made (think of how long your customers’ buying cycle is), especially when they are surprised to wake up one morning and discover such changes implemented. You knew the changes were coming; the customers are generally taken off guard. A short video illustrates:

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yH52XesnqJQ[/youtube]

Not only will the dog not go out the door, despite evidence it’s not there (she sticks her head thru, for goodness sake…sounds like logical, rational, tested evidence of no door, right?), but instead is cued to the behavior of the door handle. And it’s not immediately clear that she believes the evidence since she then waits outside for the door handle to be involved in re-entering the house. What she really needs is the repetition of the new activity several times before modifying her own behavior. So there’s a delay between the implementation of the change and its measured improvement.

What’s interesting is that you see this behavior in humans too. How many diet solutions focus on giving one a sense of “feeling full”, not because one needs to eat so much, but simply one has gotten used to eating a certain relative volume of food and therefore reinterprets a smaller volume as “I’m not done yet”. Or, your City fixes some streets and roads and months later drivers still need “Warning: New Traffic Pattern” signs to remind them that something different, even something improved,  has come along.

Of course. over time we all become used to the new way of doing things and that’s when the actual benefits of optimization will start to yield your company the long-tail, long-term results.

This is why we so often talk about a “cycle of improvement” and a “culture of testing”, because optimization gets its biggest bang from operating continuously. So the next time you make some improvements to your site, consider the idea that it’s completely normal for a dip in conversion to occur at that point in the persuasive process; use the time to plan your next round of improvements, so that when you come out of the dip you’re ready for the next cycle. Get realistic about your expectations and you’ll be pleasantly surprised.

Reason #1: The Easter Bunny hides his products.  I mean seriously, this is Bad Marketing Commandment Numero Uno, “Hinder Thy Customers From Finding Thy Products”. Now think about this: Senor Bunny has these colored eggs — (the plastic ones have candy inside, in case you grew up in a Easter-Bunny-Free-Zone) — and his merchandising goes to great lengths to hide these eggs from you. Not only is this bad marketing, it’s a stupid technique for the product itself: hide something you just finished painting in pastel colors?

Reason #2: The Easter Bunny provides a product that is unethical. The Evil Rabbit promotes addiction and ill health, by giving kids candy and eggs (hmm, so maybe The Bunny is a secret marketer for the World Dentistry Council and drug conglomerates peddling cholesterol-lowering meds?). Nevertheless, everyone knows candy rots your teeth, and Aubergine Dye #2 is carcinogenic. And when the kids are too old for candy, I bet Mr. Bunny stays “kewl” by slipping them a few smokes. Any marketer that preys on unsuspecting kids and teens ought to be fired on the spot.

Reason #3: The Easter Bunny’s market share is based on incompetence, of his competitors. I mean, let’s face it: the only nearby competitors in the calendar are a Ground Hog (too shy) and St.Patrick (too hungover). Even with a merger, they’d still just be a drunk guy in a green suit with a clover-eating pet rodent.  Not the sort of marketing image that sells. The Easter Bunny is only doing well because he showed up, and looks cute. Now, while it’s true that success is often achieved by those who simply show up, a recession is the best time to grab market share from complacent competitors. Just imagine the run Mr. Bunny would get for his money if you put him up against some real competition, like a Turkey serving Pumpkin Pie and Football, or the commerce god himself, The Fat Man in the Red Suit.

And that’s why this Sunday I shall enjoy not a traditional Ham but rather Easter Hassenpfeffer.

[If you're looking for two quick Easter-Bunny themed laughs, check out Doug Savage's cartoons at: http://www.savagechickens.com/2007/04/easter-egg-hunt.html and http://www.savagechickens.com/2008/03/easter.html .  The latter just cracked me up. The former I had think for a bit before I got the reference (hint: famous horror movie)]

[Extra thanks to whoever the author is of the funny cartoon at the top of the post.I don't recognize the signature, although the style looks familiar. So if you know who this is, please let me know!]

Is it Walmart-ish? Is it a Mom’n'Pop? And does it even matter, if they have what I’m looking for? That’s just an outright good point to keep in mind, even when tabs aren’t involved.

Of course, lack of physicality also manifests as the “great leveler” that allowed an Amazon.com to compete with Barnes and Noble and all the other bookstore chains. It’s also the driver as to why a singular fellow like Matt Drudge (from DrudgeReport.com) or Craig Newmark (from CraigsList.com) give the Associated Press and other news orgs at the Newspaper Association of America a hissy fit.

While there’s a few points I think I’d debate with David over a beer or coffee — such as, “Tabs Can Connect With Secondary Navigation”, to which I’d ask, “well, how did the visitor get to the point where they needed the Navigation after they got their bearings anyway? Doesn’t that imply a lack of (or broken) persuasive engagement with the content? And therefore tabs are operating more like a crutch for someone with a busted leg: a way to re-enable mobility when it’s broken, rather than a vehicle to increase velocity” — I think the conversation itself would be a lot of fun.

Check it out! It’s a 5 minute read and well-worth your coffee break time.

Over New Year’s, I went on a dance cruise to Mexico — a group of dancers goes on a regular cruise ship and effectively “takes over” the dancing, especially late night — and everyone (including non-dancers) ends up having a great time. We’d planned this trip back in the summer, with my two wacky cabin-mates absolutely insisting that we upgrade to a Junior Suite something-or-other which had a lot more room and a balcony. This was August, “pre-Recession” for readers with short memories, and so splurging seemed like a good idea.

Despite FutureNow’s having a record quarter ending in September, by early November my more practical side was fretting we should’ve just gotten a regular inside cabin with the fake porthole. Or maybe even save some money by not going at all. I may well have chickened out but The Hummingbird and Dr. Evil (right) reminded me everything was already paid for and non-refundable so there was nothing to do but relax and enjoy it.

You know what? I had a blast. Wouldn’t have traded it for anything.

And not because of the balcony but rather despite the balcony. It was the people I was with that made the experience into a rocking-chair tale fifty years hence; in fact, a fake porthole might even have lent further spice to the story. [Almost at the business part!]

As I’ve thought about the trip the past week, this concept of remembering to live in the present came back to me again and again. How many of the hundreds of people who just stood and watched for hours from the railing wished they’d learned more from their Aunt Ethel’s b-day gift of 6 lessons at Arthur Murray’s so they might’ve joined in? What about the singular, nutty fellow who despite his lack of dance lessons joined in anyway and ended up trading an appetizer of “looking foolish” for a main entree portion of “priceless”?

Are you too busy to take a dance lesson? Or walk your dog? Or take your Mom out for ice-cream? Or – let me segue this to my business theme — work on some project you’ve been putting off, say, increasing your conversion rate? or getting started in testing? or revamping your website?

Recently, I’ve been listening to some Alan Watt’s Zen-ish podcasts and he talks about one translation of the concept of nirvana being “to exhale”. Which is to say, literally and figuratively, action comes when we “breathe out”.

Are you holding your breath waiting for the Recession to end before you try something new? You’ll have suffocated long before then. Exhale, and start acting now to change your company’s situation.

Are you just waiting for your Dev Team to have enough free time before they get around to improving that shopping cart? They’ll never get to it, unless you stop thinking about it and start doing something about it.  Exhale, and start.

Not enough budget to start testing and optimizing? When have you ever had enough budget for everything? Stop worrying about it and exhale. Right Now is always the Right Time.