Following on from my post six months ago, the topic of content measurement is still top of mind within many organisations. The question around measuring content is how do we do this? What data should we use in relation to specific KPIs? What tools can we employ to demonstrate the effectiveness of our content?
Every business will require its own measures of success, be they quantitative, qualitative or tied to engagement metrics. Approaching this from a customer experience perspective with a targeted focus gives us some opportunities to think about the ROI and ‘measurability’ of content and how these factors can be aligned. A few examples are shown in the following table:
| Targets | KPIs | How? |
| Increase the number of site visitors | Greater volume of unique visitors | Analytics |
| Increase the number of registrations | Greater volume of participants signing-up | Business stats/data on sign-ups |
| Increase the number of targeted actions eg downloads | Specific increase in download volume | Conversion tracking |
| Improve business engagement | Improvement in NPS*/social media sharing | Score/number of shares |
| Improve content engagement | More time spent on page | Analytics |
| Improve natural search volume/findability | Percentage increase in SEO traffic | Organic SEO data |
| Improve clarity/usability | Measurable decrease in volume of calls to customer services | Call/customer support data |
*Net Promoter Score (NPS) measures the loyalty that exists between a provider and a consumer
There is also the slightly more nebulous goal of awareness which is dependent on customer participation in questionnaire surveys or feedback sessions, after an event for example, or as a result of comments shared with the customer services team.
Andrew Bredenkamp, CEO of Acrolinx, spoke on the topic of content measurement at a recent Content, Seriously meetup in the context of content quality. Quality is driven by data and ultimately, of course, “… there’s only one statistic that really matters – and with content it’s the conversion rate, the ultimate measure of the effectiveness and quality of your content.”
You have to understand both the needs and goals of your own organization to create a finite definition of quality. When you work out what these are you will be in a better position to recognize what you need to measure – and how.
Measuring content – an overview.
Read more detail about Measuring Your Return on Content from Hilary Marsh.