CMO Q&A: How Do You Measure Marketing Results and Effectiveness?

In each issue of Franchise Update magazine, we profile franchise CMOs and marketing leaders, asking each the same set of questions. Throughout the year, we'll be selecting one of those questions and providing answers from those profiles. If you want to learn more about these franchise marketing leaders and their thoughts on other topics, we've provided links to their full profile.

This week we asked them, How do you measure marketing results and effectiveness?

Lisa Zoellner, Chief Strategy and Marketing Officer, Neighborly
We have a wealth of data coming from multiple sources such as our point-of-sale systems, various digital platforms, voice of the customer program, consumer research, and more. Over the last couple of years, we've partnered with our IT team to develop a scorecard for each brand and Neighborly as a whole. The scorecard synthesizes our data down to what we've determined are the most important and measurable KPIs. We review the scorecard every quarter and refine our strategies and plans as needed. Our goal is to optimize impact at the brand level and to help our individual franchise owners grow. Read the full profile here.

Michael Barrette, Chief Marketing & Sales Officer, Dippin' Dots & Doc Popcorn
We look at KPIs in the context of offtake data from franchisees, repeat sales, traffic, and engagement on our website and social media. It's also important to understand the longer-view impact on profit margin from current marketing activities. Not all initiatives yield an immediate payoff. We ask ourselves the question: Are we playing a game of checkers or chess? Are we looking for short-term results or a long-term payoff? In our case, it is an artful blend of both. Read the full profile here.

Michelle Spohnholz, Vice President of Marketing, Newk's Eatery
At the end of the day, we are looking for profitable sales-driving initiatives that motivate our guests to visit us more frequently. We have to measure guest traffic as the end-all-be-all measuring stick. As we test initiatives, our best practice is to hold a control market and measure the net results on the pre-period, post-period and net out the control market results. We hope these tests get us to initiatives we can scale to the system. Read the full profile here.

Katherine LeBlanc, Chief Marketing Officer, Painting with a Twist
The number-one measurement is sales. Depending on the tactics or the leading measures you choose, you can predict whether your plan will have the results (sales increase) you want. But at the end of the day you are successful when sales go up! Read the full profile here.