Marketing objectives – definition and examples

Marketing objectives are specific, measurable, time-bound and achievable goals that bring profit to our business. They are essential for creating a good plan and strategy – they play a key role in marketing. They enable us to plan activities and campaigns properly and optimise them later.

Corporate objectives can be divided into non-marketing objectives and marketing objectives. The former describe the overall value system adopted by the company, while the latter relate to sales, profit and buyers. They should be defined for each market or segment using full knowledge of the relationship between market share and price, distribution and product awareness.

Examples of marketing objectives:

Below are some general marketing objectives that should always be refined in the context of your business.

Building brand awareness

This is one of the first objectives set by businesses, as the stronger and more recognisable the brand, the greater the chance of consumers associating it with a specific need and the greater the number of customers and the increasing likelihood of referrals from them.

How do you measure brand awareness?

• The number of searches for the brand name and closely related keywords: it indicates that the user is already familiar with the brand or has heard about it and is interested in it. Thanks to SEO tools, Keyword Planner or Google Trends, you can find out how many times your brand name has been searched for in a given period, which country the users searching for it come from and which devices they are using.
• New social media followers: a higher number of observers undoubtedly indicates that the brand is becoming more recognisable. Additionally, a strong community is being built, which can be used to increase engagement, generate traffic and gain new customers.
• Rejection rate: a drop in instant rejections means that users are spending more time on your site, which can mean that awareness of your brand has increased.

Increase visibility in organic search results

Optimising your website for search engines contributes to better visibility in search results. As a result of SEO efforts, the site becomes more popular and the number of page views increases. Websites displaying themselves in top positions are also characterised by greater customer trust. Brand awareness is therefore also built up.

There are many factors involved in improving search engine rankings. In simple terms, the process consists of three steps: technical optimisation of the website, content optimisation and link building. At the very beginning of the process , however , anSEO auditshould be carried out ,i.e. a professional analysis of the extent to which a page is adapted to the requirements of a search engine .

How do you measure the increase in visibility?

• Number of keywords: with the aim of improving visibility in the organic results, it is crucial to constantly monitor the number of words for which a page appears in a search engine;
• The average position of key phrases;
• The number of clicks/impressions in the organic results.

Increased customer engagement

There are many benefits associated with having an engaged customer community. Using proven tools and best practices, your business can develop a strategy and implement a plan to activate customers that will improve customer relationships and increase loyalty and retention.

How do you measure an increase in customer engagement?

• Shares, likes and comments on social media platforms: by keeping an eye on this area, we can analyse how engagement among users with our brand is growing. In addition, tracking which posts are performing best is helpful in prioritising and preparing further content.
• Improving the quality of website traffic: Improving the quality of website traffic will be indicated by the number of pages visited on the website or by users performing desired actions on the website. This action could be, for example, signing up for a newsletter or downloading a file we have prepared.
• Rejection rate: is the number of sessions limited to one page, divided by the number of total sessions. This ratio can help you understand whether your content is in line with users’ intentions. A high rejection rate may mean that visitors did not find what they were looking for on the site. If this is the case, it is worth leaning into this aspect to make sure your traffic is valuable.
• Average session duration: is the duration of all sessions, divided by the total number of sessions. More time spent on a page can mean that users are engaged in a positive way with the content we create. However, you should be careful and analyse this as well as other factors in detail, as this aspect can also mean that the use of the website is not intuitive enough, which can reflect negatively on your company’s image and you will lose a potential customer.

Customer satisfaction

This is also undoubtedly one of the most important objectives when conducting marketing activities. A product that users are happy to use, buy and recommend to others will enhance all marketing activities.

Satisfaction levels are influenced by many different factors. It could be, for example, a well-designed website, short delivery times or even access to a chat bot to answer customer queries.

How do you measure customer satisfaction?

• Comments and feedback: It is important not to leave comments unanswered on our part. It is worth responding not only to the positive ones, but also to the negative ones, and explaining why the situation occurred and how it was resolved. In this way, the company is able to continue to build a positive image and potential customers see that, in the event of any problem, the company will always find an optimal solution.
• Surveys and polls: is one of the most popular ways of measuring user satisfaction on the internet. Surveys can be sent to users after a site visit, sent in the form of emails or posted on a website. For example, a 10-point NPS, or Net Promoter Score, survey contains only one question, so the customer does not have to spend a lot of time filling it out and is more likely to decide to give us their feedback.

Goal formulation and the SMART method

According to Philip Kotler – honorary professor of the Department of International Marketing at the Kellogg School of Management at Northwestern University, also known as the ‘father of marketing’ – the formulation of goals and objectives should take place as soon as the external environment and internal environment have been examined, and the business unit has defined its message. It is important that the objectives are structured in a specific way: from the main one to further, intermediate ones.

Knowing what our priorities are, it is useful to focus on the most important one using the 80/20 rule.

The SMART method (an acronym for five English words), is a helpful concept for formulating and planning objectives, indicating the characteristics that a properly formulated objective should have.

S – Specific. This is important because people often set themselves too general a goal, which is difficult to achieve without being more specific, due to the difficulty of defining a path to achieve it

M – Measurable. This means that we should be able to monitor our progress towards the goal and set out the method by which we will measure it. This could be, for example, a given percentage, an indicator or a planned date. This way we will know at what point it will be achieved.

A – Achievable. We need to be able to determine whether we have the resources and ability to achieve the target set, even the most ambitious one.

R – Realistic/Relevant. As well as being potentially achievable, the goal must also be realistic to avoid frustration and discouragement. It is therefore important to consider whether we can realistically change or improve processes that affect performance.

T – Time-bound. A goal needs to be time-bound so that sufficient time and resources can be allocated to achieve it. By setting a specific target date, tasks will not continue to be postponed and employees will become more motivated to act.

Benefits of goal setting

When we know exactly where we are going, we are much more motivated to act. Focusing on a set goal makes us able to put more energy into our work and it becomes more efficient. We also find it easier to make difficult decisions during the course of a project. Only when we have set the main goal for our business can we identify areas for improvement – for example, whether our marketing efforts are bringing users to the site, whether they are effective, and what the user path looks like and whether it is optimal.

Even if we fail to achieve the set target within the specified timeframe, we still have the opportunity to carefully analyse the mistakes made, identify weaknesses and strengths and draw key lessons for later implementation of
changes andimprovements.

KPIS

KPIs (Key Performance Indicators)are individually selected numerical indicators used to monitor the progress of a particular area within a company.

It is important that they are measured over a defined period of time and evaluated in a uniform manner. On the other hand, employees in individual departments must have a real impact on them. They should also not be overly complicated – everyone in the company must interpret them in the same way.

https://www.simplekpi.com/Blog/KPI-Reports-Explained-A-complete-guide

Examples of KPIs

Marketing:

• Number of requests for quotations
• Number of leads
• Cost per lead
• Number of newsletter subscriptions
• Cost per conversion
• Click-through rate
• Rejection rate

E-commerce:

• Conversion rate
• Time spent on the website
• Website traffic
• Average basket value
• Basket abandonment rate
• Customer acquisition cost by channel
• Sales on a weekly/monthly/quarterly basis
• Return on advertising spend (ROAS)
• Return on investment (ROI)

Customer service:

• Number of telephone calls made
• Call duration
• Quality of call assessment
• Number of complaints
• Customer satisfaction rate

The most important business success indicator is influenced in practice by many different factors. It is therefore important for the company to understand what they are and how they interact with the main objective. In this way, we can define measures of success at different levels of the organisation. We then know exactly who is responsible for what. It also becomes clear what our strengths and weaknesses are and what needs to be improved.

https://www.quora.com/What-are-the-types-of-Facebook-ads-like-CPM-or-CPC

Summary

A good formulation of the goal is the first step towards achieving it. It enables us to better control our actions and those of the whole team. Setting priorities is an extremely difficult task due to the complexity of the world around us and the endless possibilities. Sometimes there are too many main or specific objectives, and as a result the organisation is not as effective as it could be if they were specified in detail at every level.

The problem with setting and achieving goals is also a lack of belief in their achievement. If we do not believe that we are capable of achieving something, we will never be able to realise our full potential. However, it is worth focusing on what is most important to us and learning valuable lessons from failures for the future.