How do you plan for and set channel specific goals?

Planning for and setting channel-specific goals in B2B is complex due to most channels being used at multiple stages of the funnel, creating a complexity in planning how to invest and evaluate performance. I’ve found these things to be most helpful when setting channel-specific goals across different types of teams, funnel stages and business models:

• Only set goals that align teams cross-functionally and tie to the true key business objectives - Before setting channel-specific goals, it's essential to align on revenue generating outcomes in terms of pipeline and recurring revenue. These could be to increase the overall pipeline by 30% or drive growth of $1MM ARR a new industry or international market you might be entering. Ensuring your goals are aligned means you’re all working towards the right outcome and there are no gaps in the overall plan. Now, your job is to create the right mix of marketing channels to contribute directly to these broader goals in a measured way. 

• Define channel role in your full-funnel media mix: Next, identify the role each channel plays in your marketing strategy. For example, paid social may be more focused on specific account list awareness and engagement, while email marketing might be a key driver of growth marketing metrics like pipeline and inbound lead flow. Every company is very different for what actually works most effectively. This is to be expected and as you learn more about what works you have to adjust quickly. I’ve found it extremely helpful to whiteboard all of your marketing programs and identify where your next investment priorities might be. 

• Use attribution to support analysis of marketing programs at different stages of the funnel - Now that you know exactly what your full-funnel investments strategy looks like, you can use attribution to analyze performance. One powerful approach here is to use different models at each stage of the funnel to understand the true impact. Almost all B2B marketing teams are too caught up in what channel and campaign is driving a fractional part of growth that they miss the big picture. Set attribution goals of first touch (FT) for brand awareness efforts, lead creation (LC) for engagement focused campaigns and opportunity creation (OC) across your marketing investments. Each channel can function in multiple ways and this full-funnel view of performance helps identify big areas for improvement. 

• Adjust your marketing strategy to reflect the goals of each stage and commit to measure that way - Now that you’ve allocated your marketing programs in those three areas, you can focus on the actual goals of your marketing -- building awareness, driving engagement or creating pipeline. You should work to build a bottoms-up plan with your team that creates a data-driven model for contribution from each marketing program and stage of the funnel to hit your overall goal. Your channel marketing and campaign leaders should tell you that they should be able to hit the goal and how. If not, they’ll need to be adjusted and accounted for quickly until all of the “math” works.

• Set specific KPIs and channel goals as part of employee compensation: Your revenue, demand gen or performance marketing team’s KPIs should be linked directly to a revenue outcome, ideally qualified pipeline / product signups, that overlaps with other areas of the business that are supported by those metrics. Your team’s compensation should involve being aligned directly to the goals set “top-down” from the executive leaders/board within your organization. 

• Benchmark your performance with internal and external sources: Use historical data to define your internal benchmarks and 3rd-party sources like industry studies, other marketers you network with and a benchmarking tool to inform your goal-setting process. A marketing benchmark product like Varos can also be helpful for reviewing industry-specific acquisition metrics to ensure your funnel is performing comparable to the market. 

• Constantly measure and optimize channel performance to drive growth: Be prepared to adjust your goals as you start executing your strategy and collecting data on your performance. Use revenue analytics tools (Adobe Measure, Google Analytics, HockeyStack, etc) to regularly track and measure your performance against the goals you've set for each channel and your overall marketing program. If a channel is underperforming, analyze why that might be and adjust your strategy accordingly. On the other hand, if a channel is performing particularly well, consider whether there are ways to further optimize your efforts or whether similar strategies could be applied to your other channels. 

• Analyze investments by marketing program and not channel-level -- When looking at investment in each area, you should adjust expectations for the time frame to get accurate data (brand awareness efforts can take 6 to 12 months to really show up in your data) to support your decision making. Try to avoid getting too caught up in the details of marketing attribution as B2B buyers often interact with many different channels during the buying cycle -- in fact, this means your marketing is working. Tuning your overall marketing program is like balancing an investment portfolio -- it’s really the sum of all parts and you need to focus on net-gain over specific periods of time. Your channels help guide the way, but are not the way to measure growth. 

Remember, each channel is part of the larger demand gen program and all of the associated goals. It's important not just to set and achieve goals for individual channels, but also to have these channels work together to achieve your overall revenue target. No one will be happy that your digital marketing team hit it's goal, but marketing missed it's broader goals. 

To plan for and set channel-specific goals, it starts with the 'why.' What is the business outcome you are trying to achieve?

Here are the types of questions you should consider when setting this type of strategy:

• What do you know about your target audience? How do you meet them where they like to consume their information?

• What has worked in the past, and what has not worked?

• How will you measure the impact?

• What budget and resources are available to you?

• How will you communicate impact and the business outcomes?

The mistake I often see is not taking each channel into consideration when planning your campaign. Each channel will drive a different impact. Setting goals based on the questions above will set you up for success as you are fleshing out your plan.