This checklist accompanies a longer post on important questions to ask of your content metrics, based on what you know of client behavior in the marketing and business development funnel.
For the larger context and background thinking, please visit that piece here. For those looking for an easy-to-read list of the questions only, see:
Awareness
- How many people have we reached during this period? The answer is a number: the total count of reads of your work. (Another way of phrasing this: how many people know what we are good at, what we offer?)
- In which industries are we generating the most visibility?
- In which companies do we see the most engagement with our work?
- Which content (and subjects) generated the most attention?
- Are we being read by people in the industries and companies we serve?
- Does this represent a growth opportunity we hadn't seen before?
- What else can we learn about these companies and/or sectors where we appear to be gaining traction?
- How might we alter our content to reach the people we want to reach (is it a question of framing/titles? Or finding the subjects they actually care about?)
- Are we being read by our clients? By prospects? By companies we have pitched? (Watch this video tip on reader data and RFP teams)
- Did we earn any media attention or blog mentions with our work? How did that extend our reach into particular sectors or industries? Often the answer here might be in the form of mainstream, regional, or niche media visibility.
- Who shared our work (on LinkedIn, Twitter, etc)? Clients? Prospective clients? Referral sources? Others?
Interest
- Did readers from a specific company return to a particular post again and again?
- Are our clients reading about matters for which we do not serve them?
- How many people jumped from an article to view our firm profile, or the individual profiles of authors?
- How many people followed our firm and authors during this period?
- How many invitations did I/we receive to: speak on webinars; write follow-up posts in industry news outlets; grant re-print permissions; and so on?
- What might we learn about those key people who shared our work on social platforms?
Engagement
- How many contacts/questions did we receive via our content during this period?
- Which posts/topics generated the most outreach by our audience?
- What engagement can we create based on what we've learned about interests among individuals, within companies, and in specific sectors/industries? (Read longer post to see significance of this key question.)
Retention
- Did our clients read our work?
As you know, all of these questions can be answered within your JD Supra analytics. Questions about how to do this? Reach out to me using the contact form on this page.
For background on these questions, see: Always Ask These Marketing & BD Questions of Your Analytics