How to Measure Marketing ROI (and Why Half-Baked EffortS Won’t Rise)
Everyone wants results. “What’s the ROI on this?” is probably the most common question I hear from small business owners trying to make sense of their marketing. But here’s the thing: you can’t measure return on investment if you never actually invest properly.
Think of marketing like baking bread. (Yes, I am that sourdough gal.) You can have the perfect dough, but if you don’t let it rise, put it in the right oven temperature, and bake it for the right amount of time, you’re not getting bread, you’re getting disappointment.
It’s the same with your marketing. You can have the right tools, the right audience, and even the right strategy, but if you don’t give it consistency, timing, and attention, you’ll tank your own results.
First Things First: What ROI Really Means
ROI stands for Return on Investment, but in marketing, it’s more than just dollars in versus dollars out. It’s about tracking the full journey, awareness, engagement, leads, and conversions, and understanding where your efforts are paying off.
You can’t expect your marketing to magically perform if you only post once a month, send an email twice a year, or run ads for a week and call it done. Marketing needs care, nurturing, and time to rise before you can slice into the results.
The 3 Metrics That Actually Matter
There are hundreds of metrics you could track, but only a few truly tell the story of what’s working. Here are my top three:
1. Lead Flow (Not Just Traffic)
Website visitors are nice, but leads are better. Track how many people actually contact you, download something, or sign up for your emails. These are your “pre-bread” moments, signs your dough is rising.2. Conversion Rate (The Bake Time)
How many of those leads become customers? That’s your conversion rate, and it tells you if your message, offer, and follow-up are working. If your conversions are low, it might not be the dough, it’s probably the oven.3. Lifetime Value (The Whole Loaf)
Don’t stop tracking at the first sale. Your most profitable marketing happens when you retain customers and keep them coming back. One loaf of bread is great, but a customer who buys every week? That’s ROI gold.
Common Mistakes That Burn Your Results
Even the best strategies can flop if you rush the process. Here’s where most businesses go wrong:
Starting and stopping — Marketing isn’t a faucet you turn on and off. It’s a system that needs to stay “warmed up” to keep producing.
Ignoring data — If you never look at your analytics, you’re baking blind. Watch what’s rising and what’s falling. Stop putting effort into the lowest performing areas and increase effort on the ones that perform the best. If you aren’t consistent, you can’t track. 1-3 months of consistent data is required to make a solid marketing decision.
Expecting instant results — Just like bread, good marketing takes time. Consistency and patience turn effort into outcomes.
How to Get It Right
Use your tools properly. Show up consistently. Give your marketing the time, attention, and testing it needs to perform. Tools like SendFox for email and SmarterQueue for social scheduling can help automate consistency so you can focus on the bigger picture.
Because when you treat your marketing like a recipe, you’ll finally start to see results that last.
The Bottom Line
Marketing ROI isn’t magic, it’s about time and resource management. You get out what you put in.
So before you judge your marketing as “not working,” ask yourself: Did you give it the right environment, tools, and time to rise?
If you’re not sure where your marketing is falling flat, let’s figure it out together.
👉 Book a FREE Clarity Call
We’ll discuss what’s performing (and what’s not), and chat about creating a system for you that finally makes sense. Great marketing isn’t about luck, but it is about making the right moves toward clarity and consistency.
