TME Troubleshoots
Your biggest challenge
“How are we supposed to set goals that are meaningful to the business?”
What tme says
Marketing goals (and every other department’s goals) should fall under the broader company’s goals.
Company goals should be ambitious and SMART and they should include leading and lagging indicators. One of the tools we’ve seen work well for teams is OKRs (Objectives and Key Results). There are a few ways to design these goals depending on the needs of your team - “top-down” for team alignment and “bottom-up” for individual motivation and creativity.
Marketing goals should work to contribute to those company goals and bring the company closer to its vision.
EXAMPLE:
Company Objective: Become a preferred supplier in the hospitality industry
Key Result 1: Increase the volume of clients by 30% by the end of the quarter
Key Result 2: Secure 2 tier-one clients per month and leverage their brand across owned media
Key Result 3: Write at least 10 case studies a month
The marketing goals can then be set by choosing relevant Key Results. Note, other departments can still choose the same Key Results and contribute in different ways.
Marketing Objective: Increase volume of clients by 30% by the end of the quarter
Key Result 1: Design and implement a lead generation campaign to target 100 leads by the end of the quarter
Key Result 2: Simplify the sign-up process to reduce friction
Key Result 3: Optimise call-to-action and joining offer across newsletters and social posts
Key Result 4: Share at least 2 posts a week about client success stories
Structuring it this way and putting in frequent checkpoints (quarterly) to assess progress will ensure that your goals are meaningful and moving your team forward.
tme tip
All the metrics that you use to evaluate how well you’ve progressed should be linked to the company’s goals.
You can report on things like follower count, likes, signups etc., just consider what it means for the business at the end of the day. Is it a numbers game based on a conversion rate that will lead to more sales or have you been chasing the wrong metric?
