At MashMetrics, it is our job to deliver data. Sometimes we get to be uber creative when we deliver a custom analysis or use visual best practices if building a Google Data Studio Marketing Dashboard.  Neither of these takes the place of anomaly reporting and alerts which is getting more and more sophisticated of course with Machine Learning and AI.  All these can be considered "reports", and we deliver A LOT of them.  Yet, we do not feel like report monkies.How do we pull this off? When a client asks "can you build us a report" we first define exactly what that is.

"A rose by any other name would smell as sweet" is a popular reference to Romeo and Juliet

This post will define the difference between your Corporate Dashboard, the output of a data analysis project or Custom Report, and more streamlined but ever so important KPI Performance Monitoring.

• Dashboards - a consistently delivered high-level review of the key business drivers
• Custom Reports - The data outcomes of an ad-hoc high-impact analysis
• Performance Monitoring - consistently delivered results of how the business stands against quality and quantity targets

For discussion sake let's assume the following requirements:

• you are connecting more than one data source (Google Analytics + Facebook Ads + HubSpot Contacts)
• each report needs to be shown to management, senior and C- level leadership
• the report must aim to be easily accessible and understandable by all members of the organization both visually and contextually to their business - use the PICA protocol!

Marketing Dashboards, Corporate Dashboards, Weekly Reports

Pros and Cons

Pros

Cons

• Manages the delivery of roll-up reporting to assist in the measurement of corporate KPIs
• Consistent, corporate-wide delivery
• Visual, branded and built with "speed of thought" in mind
• Can combine Marketing Analytics, eCommerce Sales, and other otherwise disparate data into a single view
• Data and graphs are (ideally) automated for consistent and automatic delivery on a weekly or monthly basis

• Depending upon building time, the most crucial and time-sensitive initiatives happening NOW may not be included
• Changes may become a "project" if it is too difficult to change core metrics, look and feel, etc.
• Can be costly to assure executive, management, and operational needs are met
• Impact leans heavily on maintaining consistency vs growth or improvement

In My Honest Opinion (IMHO)

The most effective sales and marketing dashboards have the best impact for larger multi-department \ brand organizations where consistency is emphasized more than consistent growth or improvement. For smaller teams, in our experience (learned from a few mistakes) spending the time assuring everyone agrees on the implementation steps below takes time away from executing on the few metrics that matter (Growth and Profit), when they matter, acting upon them, and doing it over and over.

Steps to Success

• Spend a good amount of time (maybe even more than developing the dashboard) deciding what metrics each page should contain.
  • audiences: executive, management, operational
  • intent: awareness, engagement, conversion, loyalty
• Determine what the "single source of truth" will be for metrics that may be collected in more than one tool.
• Assure a scalable architecture and at least briefly document the setup of the tool being used (Google Data Studio, Tableau, Databox).
• Budget for making visual tweaks (looks matter).
• automate data extraction through SuperMetrics, Databox, Funnel, Stitch and other data integration tools (deliver should take 2hr or less delivery time each cycle)

MashMetrics Sales and Marketing Dashboard Examples

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Click here to schedule a 30-min demo of our pre-configured (but completely customizable) Google Data Studio templates and dashboards.

Custom Reports, Marketing Analysis or Recommendations and Insights

Pros and Cons

Pros

Cons

• Personalized and built with insights and recommendations and opportunities in mind
• Measurement is based upon current initiatives or immediate opportunities
• Deep analysis can be performed along with a carefully curated presentation of findings

• Can be inconsistent with corporate measurements, trends or KPI's
• Can be a team \ individual learning curve or you may need short-term help from experts to extract, transform, analyze, and present data
• Delivery of report can be impacted by available resources (vacations, priorities, etc.)

IMHO

For teams and organizations of all sizes, we find that customized reporting providing opportunities and recommendations is the best way to maximize resources (this also starts to define what key metrics to include within your performance monitoring). No matter what kind of consistently delivered reporting you may be receiving, a curated analysis of the metrics that matter is a priceless key step.  The timing of this reporting should be determined by the rate at which impactful changes can be made.

Steps to Success

• Use questions and answers and not titles
• Remember that time at band camp ... use storytelling, a good report has a great start, middle, and end.
• Allow a consistent pattern to emerge after several cycles or examples.  What does the company like most?
• Remember your audience and deliver appropriately (top level to those responsible, what can be done to those accountable and metrics to change for everyone else).
• Pay for your time - show the yield the insight will result in. ROI - or negative impact on bottom-line
• Consistently improve on all delivered reports quality and value by continuously incorporating feedback.

Let's schedule some time to discuss some of your custom analysis needs.

MashMetrics Custom Analysis Examples

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SEO and Content Presentation and ongoing report[/caption][caption id="attachment_1310" align="alignleft" width="150"]

Multi-Step form performance presented (and then automated) in Google Data Studio.[/caption][spacer height="20px"]

Metric Monitoring, Performance Alerts

Pros and Cons

Pros

Cons

• Measurement is based upon Quantity and Quality metrics of the Objectives and Key Results (OKRs, KPIs, Goals) of the most important and immediate initiatives
• Consistently and automatically delivered daily, weekly, or upon various thresholds
• Quick to setup and metrics with context are delivered first screen (Databox or Tableau Alerts)

• Analysis of overarching corporate objectives may get lost
• Care must be taken not to lose sight on mid and long-term metrics  (don't create tunnel vision)
• Without accommodating for outside factors (campaign spend, content reach, earned channel changes, the weather) incorrect decisions may be made.

IMHO

Ever since Big Data has been coined, metrics have been mashed.  Due to the ease of data collection and the need for large sets of training data for Machine Learning and Artificial Intelligence initiatives, the question is no longer "if" you can get a data point, it is simply a matter of how long it takes to get it.  If you are already collecting the data within a data warehouse, chances are everyone can find what they are looking for ... eventually.  While dashboards may deliver consistency, and custom reports deliver curated insights, performance alerts provide a quick means to understand where we stand.  For smaller and medium-sized teams we feel this is the best start.

Steps to Success

• Always deliver a quality metric that shows the value of any growth metric (Bounce Rate and Page Views, CPA vs CPC, Customer Service Inquires vs Customer Satisfaction).
• Can be quickly spun up and automatically delivered daily (operations), weekly (management), or only when it really matters (exec).
• Monitoring can then be phased towards Machine Learning to quickly find anomalies or leveraged along with AI to lead to unknown discoveries.

Performance Monitoring Examples from Databox

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In Summary:

Ever since Big Data has been coined, metrics have been mashed.  The question is no longer "if" you can get a data point, it is simply a matter of how long it takes to get it or more importantly when to use it.  If you are already collecting the data within a data warehouse, chances are everyone can find what they are looking for ... eventually.  The point of any of these reports is to decrease the time to insight for all users.I hate to kill the romantic in all of you, but only in love stories such as Romeo and Juliet does a name not matter.  To assure your corporate or agency reporting gets adopted, when asked to "show a report on my digital marketing" ask many questions.  Be precise on what exactly you are expecting to be delivered.  Unsure what to ask?  Start with:

• Do you want something that will be fairly "static" for a while and that a bunch of people will be seeing?
• Do you need more insights and understanding of what the data means?
• Do you want to deliver consistent reporting on a particular initiative or team effort?

Otherwise, you may fall madly in love with your new super visual Monthly Cross-Channel Dashboard only for it to be archived, glanced at, questioned, or worse acted upon wrongly.Schedule a 30-minute call today to see how we can build you a Custom Dashboard, deliver a data story with a Custom Insight Report or utilize Databox and Google Data Studio for Performance Monitoring.What functionality do you put in your dashboards to make them more accessible?  Please leave a comment here and follow us on Linkedin and Twitter!