I thought reporting impressions was enough until a client asked me for 'real ROI numbers'

Last month, one of my biggest clients forwarded me an email from their CFO asking where the actual revenue was tied to our campaigns. That's when it hit me - I had been showing vanity metrics for over a year and never thought to connect the dots to sales data. Has anyone else gotten caught flat-footed when a client dug deeper than surface level?

3 comments

3 Comments

susanb341mo ago

That's when it hit me" is exactly how I felt last year when a client asked me to trace a Facebook campaign all the way to actual credit card swipes. I had been reporting clicks and impressions like they mattered, but the CFO just wanted to know if the campaign paid for itself. Turns out I had to get our CRM hooked up with Google Analytics to show which leads actually bought something. Blew my mind how few of my "engaged" users ever turned into real customers. Now I always ask clients what revenue number they actually care about before I even start a campaign.

vera_lewis21mo ago

Jeez, only 5 seconds before bouncing? That's brutal. I thought my numbers were bad but half your traffic gone in the time it takes to sneeze is something else. It makes you wonder what people are even expecting when they click through. Maybe they think it's a different page or the ad was misleading somehow. Either way, that's a hard number to ignore.

seth_shah1mo ago

@susanb34 that line about "how few of my engaged users ever turned into real customers" really hit home for me. I had a similar moment when I realized half my Facebook traffic was bouncing after 5 seconds and barely anyone actually bought. Now I focus way more on what happens after the click than the click itself.