The Advertising Metrics That Matter Most in B2B Marketing

What’s the difference between this picture of Pluto, taken in 1996…

And this one, taken in 2015?

You could say the second picture has more detail, is easier to see, is color instead of black and white — but the underlying difference is data. Both pictures are of the same celestial body. The difference is simply how well we are able to see it. 

Marketers should find this story familiar. We have gone from fuzzy, half-speculation assessments of our marketing to incredibly granular data on a host of specific metrics. Our new challenge is to use that data to sharpen our focus, and not be overwhelmed by the sheer volume of it. 

When you look to analyze your marketing performance, using the right metrics for the right goals is essential.

Here are the advertising metrics that matter most in B2B marketing, and how you can squeeze extra insights out of them.

Advertising Metrics that Matter Most in B2B Marketing

This list starts at the most top-of-funnel level and works down from there. While the later entries may be more directly linked to revenue, they’re all important indicators of what’s working and what could stand some optimization.

1. Impressions

Impressions are the first and lightest touch you get when earning a person’s attention. A single impression means that a person viewed your ad, website or campaign. It follows that your total impressions represent all of the people who have viewed your asset, and all of the times they viewed it. 

Since we’re at the top of the funnel here, impressions will have the largest numbers of all your metrics. In fact, paid ads tend to charge by thousand impressions (known as CPM). 

The trouble with impressions as a standalone metric is they don’t tell you whether the impression made an actual impression on the viewer. It simply means the creative was in front of a pair of eyeballs. For more actionable insight, you need the next two metrics.

2. Clicks

A click is the smallest unit of measurement for viewer engagement. It means someone saw your ad and interacted with it, whether they clicked a mouse or tapped a touchscreen. Digital ads often charge by click (cost per click, or CPC). Compare that with the price per thousand impressions and it’s easy to see that clicks are scarcer but more valuable.

If you measure clicks by themselves, they’re essentially a vanity metric. Say 1,000 people clicked your ad. That seems like a big number, but how much advertising did it take to get those 1,000 clicks? How many people saw the ad and passed it by? That’s why clicks should always be looked at as part of….

3. Click-through ratio (CTR)

The number of clicks divided by the number of impressions (times 100) tells you what percentage of the people who saw your ad felt compelled to take action. If you had 1,000 clicks out of 10,000 impressions, that’s a 10% CTR — and a CTR most marketers would be thrilled to get.

CTR represents your first chance to optimize your campaign. If your ratio is low, that means one of two things:

1. The audience you’re targeting isn’t the most relevant to your offer
2. Your creative isn’t compelling enough to spark action 

Some judicious A/B testing can help determine which of the two is the culprit and enable you to optimize for more clicks.

4. Leads

Leads are the next level of customer engagement after a click through. A lead has taken a significant action to indicate interest in doing business with you. That could be filling out a form online, scanning their badge at your booth at an event, or even subscribing to your blog.

Leads are further broken down into sales leads and marketing leads. The former has expressed strong and immediate interest, and are directed to sales. The latter is directed to marketing for further nurturing.

When evaluating your lead performance, look at how many people who click are taking the next step and filling out that form on your landing page. If the click-to-lead ratio is off, viewers are saying that your landing page is not delivering on your ad’s promise.

5. Cost per lead

The cost per lead, or CPL, is how much of an investment it took to bring a prospect to the point of becoming a lead. This number, like raw clicks, isn’t very useful in a vacuum. Instead, it’s important to know what the average lead is ultimately worth to the business. 

For example: imagine that your CPL is $1500. But you know only 10% of leads convert to customers, and that each customer has a lifetime value of $5,000. That means you need 10 leads (at $1,500 apiece, so $15,000) to get one customer ($5,000). Not the most sustainable business model. 

If your CPL is too high, look at optimizing your audience targeting for maximum relevance, and make sure your landing page delivers on the promise of your ad campaign.

6. Conversions

This is a term that’s used for many different parts of a buyer’s journey. In broad terms, it can mean any measurable, valuable action that your marketing gets someone to take. However, in terms of advertising metrics, we can use engagement (more on that later) as the more general term. For conversions, the narrow definition is a prospect becoming a paying customer.

Measuring conversions is a critical part of determining whether your CPL is good or not-so-great. Tracking the conversion journey (from the top to the bottom of the list so far) is essential to continue optimizing. Here’s how to track conversions on LinkedIn.

7. ROI

Measuring return on investment (ROI) is where all of these other metrics are leading us. There’s no better way for marketers to prove their worth to the organization than by putting monetary value on the work they do. Marketing is a complex machine, but we should be able to track the money that goes into it and the value it creates. 

Three Next-Level Metrics for Marketing on LinkedIn

All of the metrics we talked about above—at least, for your LinkedIn campaigns—can be tracked in Campaign Manager. In addition, however, LinkedIn’s wealth of demographic and engagement data can provide even more detail to help you optimize campaigns. 

1. Engagements

What is a click worth compared to a like, a smiley-face, a virtual round of applause, or a comment? Engagements can show whether your content is resonating with people beyond a quick impression. As you seek to build awareness and start relationships, engagement can be a powerful metric for evaluating success. Especially when you bring in even more detail:

2. Engagement With Most Valued Audience

Many marketers practice account-based marketing (ABM) on LinkedIn. That means targeting specific companies or organizations that are most likely to be valued customers. On LinkedIn, you can measure engagement specifically with these highly specific audiences. Learn more about how to measure engagement from your key companies.

3. Demographics

Sure, you may have thousands of people interacting with your campaign. But are they the people who are most likely to need and purchase your solution? LinkedIn uses its first-party data to provide demographic information like job title, company, industry, seniority, and more.

Use High-Definition Metrics for Highly-Informed Advertising

In astronomy, data is the difference between a blurry blob of pixels and a breathtaking alien vista. In marketing, data can be the difference between a campaign that flops and one that soars. It starts with collecting the right data, analyzing it in context, and using it to guide the next phase of your campaign.

Ready to get started? Check out our LinkedIn Ads Guide.