measuring marketing success

Watching David Dunne of Edelman PR present at the Marketing to Online Communities 2007 audience and he noted that the pent up desire for people to communicate is finally getting matched by the capabilities of technology and we're seeing the resultant explosive growth.

However, technology is now giving consumers the opportunity to avoid marketers' messages as never before.

So, what should marketers do to reach their audience?

• watch, listen and engage
• become great storytellers
• become great story gatherers
• activate the evangelists (your biggest fans)
  

And, an innovative digital strategy requires an innovative approach to measurement:

Traditional measurements:

• impressions
• awareness
• video views
• media impressions

Today's measurements:

• site traffic
• time spent,
• pages viewed,
• repeat visits,
• open rates (email),
• click through rates,
• registrations,
• search engine visibility,
• downloads

Future measurements:

• share of conversations, 
• frequency of mentions, 
• participation of brand in forums,
• ratings and reviews of products,
• sentiment,
• return on involvement