How to Measure Brand Health with Content Marketing Engagement Metrics

How to Measure Brand Health with
Content Marketing Engagement Metrics

If you’re like most
brands, you probably
promote yourself too much.
BRAND AWARENESS BRAND HEALTH CONVERSIONS

(and we tune you out)

David Beebe
Vice President of Global Creative + Content Marketing, Marriott International
Content marketing is like a ﬁrst date.
If all you do is talk about yourself, there
won’t be a second date.
”
“

LET PEOPLE GET TO…
1  KNOW YOUR BRAND

2  LIKE YOUR BRAND

2  LIKE YOUR BRAND
3  TRUST YOUR BRAND ENOUGH TO BUY FROM YOU

Brand health measures how your
digital audience feels about you.

The percentage of
visitors who enter your
site and then leave,
rather than continuing
to view other pages.
WHAT TO MEASURE : ENGAGEMENT
TIME ON SITE BOUNCE RATE
The amount of time visitors
spend on your site.
REPEAT VISITORS SOCIAL LIKES SUBSCRIPTIONS
The number of times
someone engages with
your brand.
Which content is resonating
most with your audience.
People giving your
brand exclusive access
to their inbox, opening
the opportunity for you
to market to them.

HOW TO CALCULATE THE VALUE OF:
TIME ON SITE

NOT ALL TIME ON SITE IS EQUAL.
TIMEONSITE
PAGE VIEWS
AHIGH TIME ON SITE,
LOW NUMBER OF PAGE VIEWS
BHIGH TIME ON SITE,
HIGH NUMBER OF PAGE VIEWS
CLOW TIME ON SITE,
LOW NUMBER OF PAGE VIEWS
DLOW TIME ON SITE,
HIGH NUMBER OF PAGE VIEWS

A. HIGH TIME ON SITE, LOW NUMBER OF PAGE VIEWS
THE GOOD THE BAD
GOOD INDICATOR FOR POOR INDICATOR FOR
May indicate a reading behavior pattern Lower number of page impressions may be
negative for advertising related websites
Source: Panalysis, How to Interpret Time on Site, 2015
Sites that require a lot of time to read
and understand the contents of the site.
(ie: A professional services company)
Sites that sell advertising

B. HIGH TIME ON SITE, HIGH NUMBER OF PAGE VIEWS
THE GOOD THE BAD
May indicate high level of interest and
involvement with your site
Could indicate user frustration diﬃculties
navigating your site to ﬁnd what they’re
looking for
Where a high level of involvement is a key
performance indicator (ie: advertising based sites
selling banners based on page impressions)
Where a site is for supporting visitors who should
be able to readily access information or perform a
task in a short period of time. (ie: Government and
self service websites such as online banking)

C. LOW TIME ON SITE, LOW NUMBER OF PAGE VIEWS
THE GOOD THE BAD
For sites that only provide a simple response
or quick answers
Generally implies disinterest in the site
Sites where visitors are seeking answers
(ie: directories)
In this case, repeat visitor behavior is a
crucial contributing factor.
Most websites

D. LOW TIME ON SITE, HIGH NUMBER OF PAGE VIEWS
THE GOOD THE BAD
May indicate success for sites that require
visitors to complete tasks quickly
Could indicate that visitors are lost in the site
Sites that require high involvement in short bursts
(ie: banking sites, online applications)
Complex websites, such as government agencies

When determining your time on site goals,
it’s important to keep in mind why someone
is going to your site.

HOW TO CALCUALTE THE VALUE OF:
REPEAT VISITORS

96% of people visiting your site
aren’t actually ready to purchase from you.
Source: Social Media Today, 2014

So you need to think of other ways to bring
prospects back to your site so that when they are
ready to purchase, they choose you.

Source: Inc, 2 Web Metrics You Should be Watching All the Time, 2014
If your ultimate goal is to sell a product or
service, you're much more likely to sell to visitors
who come back time after time.

Repeat Visitor Ratio (RVR) measures the percentage of visitors who return
to your site after an initial visit during some speciﬁc time period.
Let’s say you got 4,000 visitors this month and 800 were repeat visitors.
800/4,000 = 20%

RVR is great way to determine whether you are successfully engaging your
site visitors.
New visitors are ﬁne, but repeat visitors are great since once you "have" a
new reader you don't have to spend time and money attracting that
reader--your content is suﬃcient. So the higher your RVR the better your
website must be at engaging the average new visitor.

To put a monetary value on RVR, we need to
look at the average amount you’re spending
in advertising to drive net new traﬃc.

For our example, let’s say you’re spending $5,000 per month on advertising to drive
new visitors.

new visitors.
If 80%, or 3,200 visitors are net new, you’re spending an average of $1.56 per visitor.
$5,000 / 3,200 = $1.56

new visitors.
$5,000 / 3,200 = $1.56
Taking that ﬁnding, we can then calculate the value of our 800 repeat visitors.

new visitors.
$5,000 / 3,200 = $1.56
Taking that ﬁnding, we can then calculate the value of our 800 repeat visitors.
800 * $1.56 = $1,250
Therefore, our repeat visitors are valued at $1,250 per month.

How do you improve your RVR?

1.  Better target your marketing
2.  Provide great content
3.  Ensure site navigation is streamlined and intuitive
4.  Constantly create new content to keep the site fresh and relevant.
How do you improve your RVR?

Don’t forget that while you want to increase the
percentage of repeat visitors, you also want to
increase the total number of visitors…

Don’t forget that while you want to increase the
percentage of repeat visitors, you also want to
increase the total number of visitors…
Otherwise you’ll be preaching to the same choir.

SOCIAL LIKES

Social “likes” are a light indicator
for whether or not your audience is
resonating with your content.

While many have tried, it is diﬃcult to assess
real value in a like. However, it is important to track
social shares over time to ensure your content is
reaching baseline or increasing
level of engagement.

SUBSCRIPTIONS

Source: AMEX Open Forum, What’s Your Email List Worth (In Actual Dollars)?, 2013
Your email list is an asset,
and should be valued as such.

Source: MarketingProfs, The Art and Science of Growing Your Email List, 2014
FIRST THING’S FIRST:

POSITIVE
RETURN
DIMINISHING
POSTIIVE
RETURN
MAXIMUM
ALLOWABLE
COST
You must know your maximum allowable
cost threshold for getting a new subscriber,
otherwise, you’re spending in the dark.

NEGATIVE
RETURNS!
You must know your maximum allowable
cost threshold for getting a new subscriber,
otherwise, you’re spending in the dark.
or, worse yet, to the point of negative returns.
POSITIVE
RETURN
DIMINISHING
POSTIIVE
RETURN
MAXIMUM
ALLOWABLE
COST

Knowing your cost to obtain a new list member is the only way to determine
how much you can actually afford to invest in growing your list sign-up…

Knowing your cost to obtain a new list member is the only way to determine
how much you can actually afford to invest in growing your list sign-up…
And what your maximum allowable cost to obtain a new subscriber should be.

As a rule of thumb, your list sign-up cost per acquisition (CPA)
should be well under your average sale amount from a new
customer and within range of what you pay to obtain other
valuable actions, such as webinar sign-ups, free content
downloads or even direct sales.

METHOD QUANTITY OF SUBSCRIBERS (QOS) COST PER ACQUISITION (CPA)
FACEBOOK AD 200 $2.30
TWITTER 400 $1.00
PAID SEARCH 300 $2.00
WEBINAR 100 $0.10
First, calculate what it actually costs you to get a new subscriber from each
list-building method.

Now we need to determine your maximum allowable CPA for acquiring a new list
member, and continue to invest in the methods that fall at or below your CPA.
First, calculate what it actually costs you to get a new subscriber from each
list-building method.
TWITTER 400 $1.00
WEBINAR 100 $0.10

Let’s say you’ve tested a few tactics and
decided that your maximum allowable
CPA for a new email address is $1.50.
MAXIMUM
ALLOWABLE
COST
$1.50

TWITTER 400 $1.00
WEBINAR 100 $0.10
Moving forward, you’ll want to continue pursuing all methods
costing $1.50 or less.

METHOD QUANTITY OF
SUBSCRIBERS (QOS)
COST PER
ACQUISITION (CPA)
UNSUBSCRIBE
RATE (UR)
AVERAGE
SALE VALUE (ASV)
FACEBOOK AD 200 $2.30 30% $100
TWITTER 400 $1.00 5% $100
PAID SEARCH 300 $2.00 15% $150
WEBINAR 100 $0.10 5% $200
Over time, we need to also measure the quality of the subscribers on your list
by monitoring things like average sale value and unsubscribe rate.

METHOD QUANTITY OF
SUBSCRIBERS (QOS)
COST PER
ACQUISITION (CPA)
UNSUBSCRIBE
RATE (UR)
AVERAGE
SALE VALUE (ASV)
FACEBOOK AD 200 $2.30 30% $100
TWITTER 400 $1.00 5% $100
PAID SEARCH 300 $2.00 15% $150
WEBINAR 100 $0.10 5% $200
When you analyze the data, you’ll easily be able to spot the methods that produce the
best quality and quantity of subscribers within your allowable CPA.

METHOD QUANTITY OF
SUBSCRIBERS (QOS)
COST PER
ACQUISITION (CPA)
UNSUBSCRIBE
RATE (UR)
AVERAGE
SALE VALUE (ASV)
FACEBOOK AD 200 $2.30 30% $100
TWITTER 400 $1.00 5% $100
PAID SEARCH 300 $2.00 15% $150
WEBINAR 100 $0.10 5% $200
When you analyze the data, you’ll easily be able to spot the methods that produce the
best quality and quantity of subscribers within your allowable CPA.
The higher the quality of subscribers you attract, the more likely they are to convert
to becoming not only customers but also your best customers-resulting in more
revenue from which to raise your CPA.

METHOD QUANTITY OF
SUBSCRIBERS (QOS)
COST PER
ACQUISITION (CPA)
UNSUBSCRIBE
RATE (UR)
AVERAGE
SALE VALUE (ASV)
FACEBOOK AD 200 $2.30 30% $100
TWITTER 400 $1.00 5% $100
PAID SEARCH 300 $2.00 15% $150
WEBINAR 100 $0.10 5% $200
To calculate the value per subscriber, we need ﬁnd the difference between
the sale value and cost per acquisition for the subscribers.
To do this, we use the formula below:
VALUE PER SUBSCRIBER = ( QOS * ASV * ( 1 – UR ) – QOS * CPA ) / QOS

BRAND AWARENESS BRAND HEALTH CONVERSIONSBRAND AWARENESS BRAND HEALTH CONVERSIONS
METHOD QUANTITY OF
SUBSCRIBERS
(QOS)
COST PER
ACQUISITION
(CPA)
UNSUBSCRIBE
RATE
(UR)
AVERAGE
SALE VALUE
(ASV)
TOTAL
VALUE
(TV)
VALUE PER
SUBSCRIBER
(VPS)
FACEBOOK AD 200 $2.30 30% $100 $13,540 $67.70
TWITTER 400 $1.00 5% $100 $37,600 $94
PAID SEARCH 300 $2.00 15% $150 $37,650 $125.50
WEBINAR 100 $0.10 5% $200 $18,990 $189.90
We’ll use Facebook Ads as an example:
VALUE PER SUBSCRIBER = ( QOS * ASV * ( 1 – UR ) – QOS * CPA ) / QOS
VALUE PER SUBSCRIBER = ( 200 * 100 * ( 1 – 0.30 ) – 200 * 2.30 ) / 200
Therefore, the value of each Facebook subscription is $67.70

METHOD QUANTITY OF
SUBSCRIBERS
(QOS)
COST PER
ACQUISITION
(CPA)
UNSUBSCRIBE
RATE
(UR)
AVERAGE
SALE VALUE
(ASV)
TOTAL
VALUE
(TV)
VALUE PER
SUBSCRIBER
(VPS)
FACEBOOK AD 200 $2.30 30% $100 $13,540 $67.70
TWITTER 400 $1.00 5% $100 $37,600 $94
PAID SEARCH 300 $2.00 15% $150 $37,650 $125.50
WEBINAR 100 $0.10 5% $200 $18,990 $189.90
Based on these calculations, we can see that paid search and webinar methods
return the most value per subscriber.

Based on these calculations, we can see that paid search and webinar methods
return the most value per subscriber.
However, since paid search’s CPA is more expensive than our maximum allowance of
$1.50, we should defer to webinar and Twitter tactics.
METHOD QUANTITY OF
SUBSCRIBERS
(QOS)
COST PER
ACQUISITION
(CPA)
UNSUBSCRIBE
RATE
(UR)
AVERAGE
SALE VALUE
(ASV)
TOTAL
VALUE
(TV)
VALUE PER
SUBSCRIBER
(VPS)
FACEBOOK AD 200 $2.30 30% $100 $13,540 $67.70
TWITTER 400 $1.00 5% $100 $37,600 $94
PAID SEARCH 300 $2.00 15% $150 $37,650 $125.50
WEBINAR 100 $0.10 5% $200 $18,990 $189.90

BOUNCE RATE

Your site’s bounce rate is a metric that
indicates the percentage of people who land on
one of your web pages and then leave without
clicking anywhere else on your site.

Source: Hubspot, How to Decrease Your Website’s Bounce Rate, 2014
A high bounce rate is a reason for concern since it indicates that your website visitors
aren’t looking for more content on your site, clicking on calls-to-action, or converting
into contacts.

A high bounce rate is a reason for concern since it indicates that your website visitors
aren’t looking for more content on your site, clicking on calls-to-action, or converting
into contacts.
Since attracting and converting visitors into qualiﬁed leads is the main objective for
content marketing, this is an important metric to measure and improve.

How should your site stack up? Here are some good bounce rate benchmarks:
CONTENT WEBSITES
10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90 %
LEAD GENERATION
10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90 %
BLOGS
10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90 %
RETAIL SITES
10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90 %
SERVICE SITES
10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90 %
LANDING PAGES
10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90 %
40% - 60%
30% - 50%
20% - 40%
10% - 30%
70% - 90%
70% - 98%

Why do visitors bounce? Two reasons:
1  They didn’t ﬁnd what they were looking for
2  The page wasn’t user-friendly

So what can you do to
improve your site’s bounce rate?

Attract the right visitors
•  Choose the right keywords to match your content
-- not just to attract the most number of visitors
•  Maintain top rankings for branded terms
•  Write attractive, useful meta descriptions for search
engine users
ATTRACT THE RIGHT VISITORS
Choose the right keywords to match your content,
not just attract any visitors
Create multiple
landing pages with
unique content and
keywords for diﬀerent
types of visitors
Write attractive, useful
meta-descriptions for
search engine users
Maintain top rankings for
branded terms.
Improve targeting of online advertising campaigns.
Source: Small biz trends, 2014 + Hubspot, How to Decrease Your Website’s Bounce Rate, 2014

Enhance usability
•  Make your text readable through sensible organization
and the use of larger fonts, bulleted lists, white space,
good color contrast, and large headlines
•  Use well-organized, responsive layouts that allow for
quick and easy navigation on all platforms and browsers
ENHANCE USABILITY
16
34
25
GOOD COLOR CONTRAST
LARGE HEADLINES
SENSIBLE ORGANIZATION
BULLETED LISTS
LARGER FONTSWHITE SPACE
MAKE TEXT
READABLE

Use a good layout
•  Quick navigation
•  Easy to ﬁnd search
•  Content in sections
•  Responsive layout for multiple platforms and browsers
USE GOOD LAYOUT
Responsive layout for multiple platforms and browsers
17.4% of views from mobile devices
EASY TO
FIND SEARCH
QUICK
NAVIGATION
CONTENT
IN SECTIONS

Speed up page load
•  Use little or no self-loading multimedia content.
•  Set external links to open in new browser windows/tabs.
•  Don’t let ads distract from your content: Place static ads to
sides, and avoid pop-ups and self-loading multimedia ads
SPEED UP PAGELOAD
USE LITTLE OR NO SELF-LOADING MULTIMEDIA CONTENT.
SET EXTERNAL LINKS TO
OPEN IN NEW WINDOWS
DON’T LET ADS DISTRACT
Place static ads to sides
Avoid pop-ups
Avoid self-loading multimedia ads

Provide good content
•  Have an obvious main message
•  Use clear headers and subheads
•  Tailor content to intended visitors
•  Use stylish copy and images
•  Make your content error-free
•  Include a clear call-to-action and obvious links to next steps
PROVIDE GOOD CONTENT
1
Obvious main message
2
Clear heads and
subheads
6
Clear call to action
3
Tailored to
intended visitors
4
Stylish copy and
images
5
Few errors
7
Obvious links to next steps

WANT TO LEARN MORE?
Our team of strategists can help your brand build a
marketing growth engine. From ongoing support and
program management, to customized strategy sessions
and workshops, we’ll set your brand up for success.

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Get in touch!
STRATEGY@NEWSCRED.COM

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