Start Here

I casually started ZoomMetrix in 2007 and over the course, I have learned a lot. Initially, it was a way to document my thought and just put out what I learned in my work through digital marketing analytics.

In this ‘Start Here’ section of ZoomMetrix, I’d like to start by sharing this simple framework to have some structure in my content or what I have to share.

I have put this Get Ready, Aim, Fire, and Debrief (RAFD) framework in place because it is a process that I learned that works to improve digital marketing performance.

Through this process with structure, I have performed and made significant performance impact in major brands that I have worked with.  Just like you, as a marketer and analytics practitioner, I have played a critical part as a data person and helped marketing achieve their objectives and goals.

Some of the proud results that I have contributed with awesome team members are, but not limited to:

• Reduced bounce rate of a major brand’s site by over 40% and helped save millions of ad dollars by improving the funnel economics
• Improving customer satisfaction on website taking NPS score and C-Sat score to an all-time high for a brand that is already a leader in their space
• Triple digit percentage growth in e-commerce sales driving the sales performance supporting the team with data.  Started by implementing analytics capabilities and all the way through setting up A/B test to improve the marketing funnel.

What I have learned over my career is many businesses and marketers are practicing marketing while measuring performance without a goal or target and spent a good deal of money driving wasted traffic.

I am pretty sure many marketers aren’t doing that, and if you’re marketing with a good process in place, then I’m very happy for you.

Regardless of you having a similar framework in place or not, it is still a good way for me to structure the conversation and content so it is clear where my topic situates in the marketing analytics topic.

Briefly, here is what I mean for each of the stages within the RAFD process.

Ready

Before you start to measure, analyze, and put out reports, make sure you understand what the business question we’re trying to answer with the data. What would be even better, is make sure that your team and business is aligned to the goal that you’re trying to accomplish.

 

Aim

Once you know your goal, or what to target. The first thing you do is not to fire or shoot the target. I know, it is tempting to do so. In business, you’ll need to plan your strategies and tactics to help you achieve hitting your target.

Every stage is super critical, and it should not come to a surprise that the meat of the discussion with digital analytics will revolve around this topic a lot. That is because this is where many marketers like to spend time on.

It covers topics ranging from:

• Marketing Technology Tools to use
• Identify area of issues to fix and optimize your marketing performance
• Tracking setup and considerations to measuring success

Fire

This is the fun part, and it is where marketers love to dive right into. Keep in mind, significant things need to happen before executing your strategies and tactics.

It is fun to execute stuff and pretend things are getting done.

Let’s not kid ourselves, many marketers and data analysts have come to an experience where we’re looking at analytics reports and weren’t happy with the results, and worse case, not sure what metrics to look that defines success.

Either way, I think it’ll be fun to talk about the use cases, marketing actions taken where typical topics would cover:

• Conversion Rate Optimize or Landing Page Optimization. Testing what would cause driving your business outcomes
• Use cases that are interesting to apply to your business
• Data-driven marketing execution. Translating actionable insights to execution.

Debrief

This is the Aim part of the RAFD process, but the focus is on measurement and post modem analytics activities after you executed your marketing programs and campaigns.

In this stage, it is less about selecting the tools to measure success, because you likely got a tool already in place to measure the success of your marketing efforts.

This stage is about focusing on things around analyzing and digesting the learnings. The topic could be:

• How to digest data and analyze to find actionable insights
• Communication and relationships
• Reporting tools and application of it to analyze results.