Presenting Online Marketing Campaign Results: 6 Best Practices that Lead to Repeat Business
Tim knew that this assignment waited for him when he came in on Monday, but that didn’t make it any less painful when he opened the folder with all the campaign reports. He’s working for a relatively new publisher, and things are heating up; they keep getting more and more clients. Tim was glad of course, but he didn’t look forward to working on a final results presentation for one of the advertisers who’s first campaign just ended. The campaign had a lot of layers, with standard and custom executions, video, social promotions, blog… Not having a template for this kind of report made things much harder for Tim. He just didn’t have the experience with this type of deliverable!
Remembering that he saw something about wrap up reports in the capabilities deck of the publisher supporting agency that they hired, he dug up the file. He read through a couple of slides explaining how they usually handle this type of requests and thought that everything sounded reasonable. However, as he opened the PowerPoint and the folder with all the data, ready to tackle the task ahead, he had an idea that he’d rather send this one to the team and then work on whatever they were able to come up with. He zipped all the data files, benchmarks, screenshot deck, media plan, and the client’s RFP and sent them over to the support team, thinking that some base to work off of is better than nothing at all.
When Tim got in the next morning, a long email along with an attached presentation waited for him. The due date for the report was that day, so he hoped and prayed that the team did well.
Template Design and Visuals
He opened the attachment and ran through the first couple of slides. He really appreciated the subtle design details that took both publisher’s and client’s identity into consideration. The email read that the support team didn’t leave anything to chance; they made sure that all the visuals are relevant and that the slides are highly editable, which made the report a template for all other similar presentations. Tim was already delighted that he could use this buttoned-up report with his other clients as well! He also noticed that other than metrics, screenshots, and highlights, each slide also contained relevant fast facts at the bottom that showed exactly why a particular activation was a good choice per latest industry best practices.
Aligning All the Numbers
It was time to get right to it. Having multiple data sources meant that he had to open all the different reports and check which numbers should have been used. This was something I should have done beforehand, Tim thought to himself. But then he noticed the other attachment that was marked as data alignment. It was an excel sheet that pulled together all the other ones and aligned the numbers. Additionally, when he took a look at the slides, he could see that the team clearly marked which data they were using, and they explained all of their choices in the email. They noted: we made sure that all the numbers in the wrap-up report are the ones that were used for billing. This way there are no surprises – the client sees what he paid for! They went one step further and, having the reporting access, were able to pull additional insights regarding video performance, as well as the blog and social results. At this point, Tim was certain that he wouldn’t have been able to do such a marvelous job.
Overview and Overall Performance
The report was clearly divided into several sections. The campaign overview showed exactly what the goal and KPIs were, as well as how the chosen tactics aligned with the goal. Overall performance proved that the campaign was a success with some powerful high-end metrics. The email explained that this slide took everything into consideration: standard and custom activations, social and video results, all with the goal of highlighting the ROI with fancy numbers.
Comparing the Results
The following slides tackled individual performance of all activations. The team explained how important it was to compare the results to the benchmarks or what’s expected. As there were no benchmarks for some of the custom items, they did some research and put together metrics relevant to those activations and the client’s industry. This way they were able to show how the campaign performed when compared to what’s usually seen with that type of custom activations.
Transparency
As he was going over the slides, Tim was surprised that even the activations that didn’t do too well were included in the report. He was doubting whether this was a good idea, but the explanation that the team provided reassured him: transparency in results should always be a top priority. We’re striving to build a long-lasting relationship with the client and letting them know what did well and what needs improving is the way to go!
Future Recommendations
If Tim was happy with what he saw so far, now he was elated! The team very diligently put together custom recommendations that took into consideration the client’s creative, offer, landing page, targeting, and activations that were used. They also suggested what other activations could be beneficial for this particular advertiser in the future.
While typing a thank you email to the team, Tim picked up the phone and scheduled a meeting with the client. No way was he going to present this masterpiece of a report over the phone!
