Marketing Data: September Monthly Reporting

Jessica Thiefels on Tuesday, October 9, 2018

September Marketing Data Reporting

This month’s reporting reminds me of something that’s easy to brush off: being a business owner is HARD. Especially as a solopreneur, when you’re doing marketing, branding, selling and then managing to get all the work done—everything is on your shoulders. Even as a marketer, I can’t do my best work because I just don’t have the time of a full-time marketing employee that’s needed to make that impact that I’d like to.

If you’re feeling the same after looking at your numbers, know that you’re not alone. I talk to so many business owners who are frustrated with the results of their marketing efforts. It takes time, it takes a plan and most of all, it requires patience.

Need some help getting your ducks in a row? Let’s talk. Ready to dive into the data with me? Keep reading!

Marketing Data Overview

I found some interesting stuff in the data this month. Let’s start with the high-level overview below:

marketing data_september1

I was definitely bummed to see both sessions and page views down, since I’ve been doing more promotion for blog posts. However, being in growth mode with only myself to facilitate everything, I know there will be dips and that’s okay in my book. It has to be, or you’ll drive yourself crazy. As a reminder, you can see last month’s data in August’s Monthly Report. Now, let’s see what worked and what didn’t.

Things That Worked

#1: Promotion is working.

As I started looking at the data, I noticed an obvious pattern: the pages I’ve been promoting have seen an increase in traffic, while those that don’t get pushed out via marketing were down. Check out the data below:

marketing data_september2

The one exception here is my social media coaching page, which I have been trying to share regularly. I started posting less in September on Twitter and LinkedIn has also fallen to the wayside, so, I know I haven’t done as well as I could. I know I should ultimately be promoting this page more than that, and you should be doing the same with your priority pages.

Plan to promote the most important pages on your website at least once each week on every platform. That means, for me, I should really be promoting my social media coaching page three times each week: Twitter, Instagram and LinkedIn.

#2: Stories are fun! And driving some traction.

I made a point of digging into stories via Instagram this month. I personally love watching other people’s stories (I LOVE Olivia Ward – always inspirational and funny; super authentic!). Not only is it important to test all the new features made available to us, but Stories is something we can’t ignore. More than 400 million people use Instagram stories each day and many experts have suggested that we’ll see a transition from the standard feed to one that’s more video-focused (like Stories) in the near future.

I’ve definitely had fun testing it this month and trying new ideas. Here are a few things that have been successful:

  • Engaging by tagging other people in my story because that person often re-posts it when they get the notification. That’s why it’s crucial to be relevant and engage authentically. With one particular repost via Stories, I woke up to 35 new followers!
  • Pointing followers to my new post a few days each week. I just use one of the cute “new post” stickers to cover that particular square and then write something enticing to get them to click to my profile.
  • Sharing ME. Right now, it’s not authentic for me to post photos of myself with seemingly unrelated captions on my Instagram feed. I’m finding that I love using Stories for this instead. Someone recently complimented me on my stories saying that they do in fact feel very authentic, which is my goal. What do I share? The work I’m doing, insights into my day and personal life, tips about social media marketing or content marketing, networking events, etc.

Not sure how to find new features or fun things to post with your Instagram stories? Watch other people’s stories! I’m always discovering new tricks and ideas from other boss babes in my network. Also, check out this awesome guide from Hootsuite with really simple, yet helpful tips.

#3: My free Instagram guide is getting traction.

I’m currently offering a free Instagram guide and I created a pop-up and email flow for it at the end of last month. I’m using both Hello Bar and Convert Kit to facilitate this process and with the set-up I have right now, that freebie has attracted 13 new subscribers, via LinkTree and a website pop-up.

Unfortunately, I’m still working out the kinks on the email flow and software, so I haven’t been pushing it as much as I could be. As I nail down the automation flow, find the best tool to facilitate, and get some other freebies flowing, I’m hoping to see a major uptick here.

#4: My Instagram following is continuing to engage and grow.

I really enjoy managing my business Instagram account (@JessicaThiefels), so I’ve been putting a lot of time into it. I’m stoked to see that pay off as I look at the data, from total likes and comments to my engagement rate. This feels especially rewarding because I’m doing things differently. I’m not posting pretty photos of myself or clients—which isn’t authentic to me or my business; this definitely makes it harder to grow.

P.S. Learn more about how I use Instagram and why in my blog post, Owner to Owner: How to Bring More Authenticity to Your Instagram Strategy.

In either case, things are working. Check out September’s marketing data for Instagram:

marketing data_september3

Things That Didn’t Work

#1: More blog publishing = more traffic.

This one falls into the “isn’t working yet” category. The sample size is too small, but I was hoping to see an uptick in traffic as I started publishing more regularly on the blog. I’ve been doing that now for the last two months. I published five blog posts in September, the most I’ve done to date, yet there was a 10 percent drop in PVs MOM.

This is always a good time to remind myself of what I tell my clients: it takes at least 3 to 6 months to really see traction with publishing at such a slow rate (and with a small audience).

#2: Driving traffic to my site from social.

I wasn’t doing anything different or special this month, so I wasn’t expecting to see a huge increase in traffic from my social media platforms. However, I am in growth mode, and have seem small increases each month—up until September. See the screenshot below:

marketing data_september4

I’m interested to do reporting next month, after bringing on a new intern this week, the second week of October. My main goal is to post a lot more and engage a lot more. These things are crucial to seeing improvements in this space. Stay tuned for more updates!

What I Need in October

As I dig through the data, these are the things I need to be more successful:

  • Intern onboarded ASAP to start promoting and engaging more regularly.
  • Nail down new services/freebies and get those ready before November.
  • Better flow for freebie downloads. Thinking of investing in a different paid tool as I build this out. – Still from August.
  • Changing the wording on some of the landing pages and in my promotion of lead-driving pages.- Still from August.

What is your data telling you? I’d love to help you make sense of it all and get you on track for success moving forward.

Let me help you!

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