The Anatomy of a Perfect Marketing Dashboard

Dashboards are perhaps the best way to visualize and understand the effectiveness of your efforts acOSs your marketing campaigns. Dashboards produce data that guide decision making and track progress. However, dashboards can also be overwhelming when they aren't designed effectively. To assist you in creating the best dashboards for your organization, we have prepared this guide. THE ANATOMY OF A PERFECT MARKETING DASHBOARD The Two Types of Dashboards There are two different kinds of marketing dashboards that serve distinct functions: Internal Dashboard External Dashboard Intended for use by your marketing department, they are data rich and feature For summarization of meaningful data, they feature only the most important findings and are used for presentations to senior management. metrics that can be interpreted and explained by those trained to read them. Choose Your Metrics Before you set up your dashboard, you must identify the metrics that are most important to the goals of your organization. Metrics to Consider Most dashboards contain metrics from three basic categories: FINANCIAL • Marketing's aggregate impact on revenue. • Incremental contribution of individual marketing programs to revenue. TIME • Past: How did we do? • Present: How are we doing? Future: How will we do? SET GOALS Always set goals for each of your key metrics. Goals put performance into context, and help fellow executives see how your results are faring. If you don't choose these carefully, your dashboard will produce so much data that it will become impossible to separate the important stuff from the clutter. The Perfect Marketing Dashboard VISUAL APPEARANCE An attractive dashboard adds credibility to your findings Speedometers track goals Line charts for trends These graphics are excellent ways to track progress toward specific goals. These help you keep track of trends in your data and spot kinks before they become serious issues. Few numbers There should be no overcrowding of numbers. Only feature the key financial metrics. Arrow alerts These give you quick insight into upward, downward, or negligible progress performance. Using Your Dashboard Effectively It isn't enough to just have a well-designed dashboard; you must also use it to drive progress. Decide on your destination: Tracking your progress is most effective when your entire team agrees on the end goal. When you reach it, take note of what worked and set a new goal. Make numbers meaningful: When presenting the data, it is important to shed light on what the figures mean to your organization. Data can be dry, but if you give the right insight, it becomes empowering. Act on data: Use your data to guide your decision-making. With meaningful data at hand, there is never a need to wonder about the right moves to make. Want to get the full scoop on marketing dashboards? Check out Marketo's Definitive Guide To Marketing Metrics! Source: Marketo.com Marketo