Many business owners get a monthly marketing report full of charts, percentages and jargon… and end up not knowing whether things went well or badly. A report you don’t understand is useless: it doesn’t help you decide.
A good report answers one question in a few lines: did this month’s marketing bring customers to my business, and at what cost?
The metrics that do matter
Leads
How many people with real interest contacted you: WhatsApp messages, forms, calls, appointments. It’s the main sign that your marketing is working.
Cost per lead
How much each person who contacted you cost in ad spend. It tells you whether your ads are efficient and lets you compare campaigns and platforms.
Qualified leads and sales
Not all leads are the same. Knowing how many had real interest, how many booked and how many bought tells you whether you’re attracting the right people.
Cost per customer and return
How much it cost to get each new customer and how much that customer brought in. If each customer brings in more than it costs to get them, your marketing is a profitable investment.
This month's results Illustrative example
A simple dashboard: what matters, at a glance. The figures are illustrative.
The metrics that distract
- Likes and followers. They feel nice, but they don’t pay the rent. A video with lots of likes may not bring in a single lead.
- Reach and impressions on their own. They tell you how many people saw something, not whether they cared.
- Clicks without context. A click that doesn’t end in a message or a purchase isn’t worth much.
They’re not useless: they help with diagnosis. But they shouldn’t be the center of your report.
What a good report should include
- A three-line summary: how we did, what worked and what we’ll do differently.
- The key numbers: leads, cost per lead, appointments or sales, compared with the previous month.
- Which content and which ads performed best, and why.
- What didn’t work and what’s going to change.
- The plan for next month.
If your report doesn’t tell you what will be done differently, it’s just a data summary.
Where the data comes from
To measure properly, everything has to be connected: the ads manager, your website and its analytics, your WhatsApp and your CRM. When every lead is recorded along with the ad it came from, you can tell which campaign brought you customers, not just clicks. I explain how to do it in how to send your Facebook leads to WhatsApp or your CRM.
The report as a decision-making tool
How I handle reports
Every month I deliver a clear report with no jargon: how many leads came in, how much each one cost, what worked and what we’ll do differently. It’s part of working as a strategic partner: I don’t just do the work, I explain what’s happening so you can make informed decisions. I go into more detail in what a digital marketing strategist does.
If you’re getting reports you don’t understand today, or none at all, message me and let’s review your marketing.