AMA: Observable Head of Growth Marketing, Erika Barbosa on Demand Generation KPI's

Here are a few valuable examples of OKRs for demand generation that I encourage you to consider. I’m going to approach this question from a SaaS product-led growth (PLG) perspective. Objective: Increase brand awareness Increase lift of branded search by X% in X timeframe. Increase direct traffic as a source by X% in X timeframe. Objective: Increase quality sign-ups Increase total volume of new leads by X% in X timeframe. Improve the conversion rate of visits to sign-up by X% in X timeframe. Incr ...Read More

Here are a few valuable examples of OKRs for demand generation that I encourage you to consider. I’m going to approach this question from a SaaS product-led growth (PLG) perspective. Objective: Increase brand awareness Increase lift of branded search by X% in X timeframe. Increase direct traffic as a source by X% in X timeframe. Objective: Increase quality sign-ups Increase total volume of new leads by X% in X timeframe. Improve the conversion rate of visits to sign-up by X% in X timeframe. Incr ...Read More

Setting targets for demand generation KPIs all starts with understanding the goals. All of the departmental and individual goals should roll up in support of the overall company objectives. This allows day-to-day work to stay focused, impactful and meaningful. Here are a few ways to get started: Define the objectives. What are the overarching company objectives? Once this has been defined, you can start to think about how to best support these objectives. Identify your ideal customer profile (IC ...Read More

From a product-led growth (PLG) perspective, I don’t see enough emphasis put on identifying and tracking toward an activation or “aha moment” KPI. What is the one action a user or team needs to take to make your program exponentially more successful? Is it adding members to a team account? Is it performing a certain action? Demand gen teams can no longer solely focus on the acquisition side. While it can be debated whether metrics such as retention fall under demand gen, I urge you to go one ste ...Read More

From a product-led growth (PLG) perspective, I don’t see enough emphasis put on identifying and tracking toward an activation or “aha moment” KPI. What is the one action a user or team needs to take to make your program exponentially more successful? Is it adding members to a team account? Is it performing a certain action? Demand gen teams can no longer solely focus on the acquisition side. While it can be debated whether metrics such as retention fall under demand gen, I urge you to go one ste ...Read More

This is going to be dependent on your business objectives and goals, the stage of the start-up and your go-to-market motion. Generally speaking, here are a few examples of KPIs you should and should not own. You should own: MQLs or sign-ups A quality metric to measure MQLs and sign-ups against CPA by source or channel Conversion rate by source or channel You should not own (you should be a partner in this, not an owner): Retention Revenue This list contains a few examples and is not comprehensiv ...Read More

This is going to be dependent on your business objectives and goals, the stage of the start-up and your go-to-market motion. Generally speaking, here are a few examples of KPIs you should and should not own. You should own: MQLs or sign-ups A quality metric to measure MQLs and sign-ups against CPA by source or channel Conversion rate by source or channel You should not own (you should be a partner in this, not an owner): Retention Revenue This list contains a few examples and is not comprehensiv ...Read More

OKRs or Objectives and Key Results are important business tools. They help forge alignment cross-functionally and give purpose to day-to-day work. For goal setting, my preference is to work backward from the goal. What are your overarching company goals or desired outcomes? Armed with this information, you can then develop quarterly and annual demand gen OKRs. Based on the company goals, what does this look like for demand gen for the year? For example, this could look like an attributed pipelin ...Read More

OKRs or Objectives and Key Results are important business tools. They help forge alignment cross-functionally and give purpose to day-to-day work. For goal setting, my preference is to work backward from the goal. What are your overarching company goals or desired outcomes? Armed with this information, you can then develop quarterly and annual demand gen OKRs. Based on the company goals, what does this look like for demand gen for the year? For example, this could look like an attributed pipelin ...Read More

I hear you. Depending on your business and how you implement and follow through on goals, it could feel arbitrary. However, even if that were the case, see the goal-setting process as a north star for your day-to-day work. It helps give your work additional meaning when you have a better understanding of the impact you are driving. Focus on what is in your control and how you will measure it. When possible, segment it into milestones so it feels more accessible and realistic. When you think abou ...Read More

I hear you. Depending on your business and how you implement and follow through on goals, it could feel arbitrary. However, even if that were the case, see the goal-setting process as a north star for your day-to-day work. It helps give your work additional meaning when you have a better understanding of the impact you are driving. Focus on what is in your control and how you will measure it. When possible, segment it into milestones so it feels more accessible and realistic. When you think abou ...Read More

I’m going to give you two specific KPIs that I recommend against committing to if not paired with a quality metric. Why? These two metrics in isolation are not meaningful. They are solely quantity metrics with no quality indicators.  Sign-ups or MQLs. Why? Similar to what I noted above if you exceed your target for this KPI, but it doesn’t translate to quality or an impact on the business, does it matter?  Website traffic. Why? While important when paired with quality metrics, this KPI by itself ...Read More

Before the work starts: Identify your stakeholders using a decision-making framework that is clear (there are many, and some favor DACI). Identify KPIs that will define success and learnings and reach an agreement with your stakeholders on these KPIs. Communicate your KPIs and goals with the broader team. Set up a dashboard to show pacing towards KPIs to ensure visibility. When it’s done: Perform a retrospective which consists of a summary of the program, data from the dashboard you created in t ...Read More

I’m going to approach this question from a product-led growth (PLG) perspective. My process for identifying the appropriate metrics consists of mapping out the user journey along with its associated metrics. For example, a user will sign up, experience value, engage, stay retained and hopefully refer others and expand. Then I would identify the metrics that align with this flow. This would consist of metrics such as: Count of sign-ups Sign-up rate A quality metric based on your goals Activation ...Read More