The importance of tracking your numbers

When you send your leaflets off with a leaflet delivery company to be distributed, that’s not the end of the story. In fact, it’s sort of the beginning.

There are many different metrics that you should be tracking in order to measure the effectiveness of your leaflet campaign. These numbers allow you to see how much you have spent on a campaign and the amount of revenue that it brings back to your company. This is called tracking your ‘Return on Investment’ (ROI).

Metrics and numbers to track

There are several different metrics that you should be tracking when you send your leaflet campaigns:

Conversion rate to lead

What is this?
How many leaflets does it take to get one lead? If you send out 1,000 leaflets and get 20 leads, your conversion rate would be 2%.

Why is it important?
You can compare this statistic to other marketing campaigns such as online advertising or cold calling to see how the numbers compare. This is useful in identifying which marketing methods are most effective.

Cost per lead

What is this?
If the cost of your leaflet campaign is £40 per 1000 leaflets and you get 2 leads per 1000 then the cost per lead is £20.

Why is it important?
Use the cost per lead in conjunction with the average customer value metric detailed below. Compare the two numbers to check you aren’t spending more on obtaining the lead than they actually bring in to your business.

Conversion rate from lead to sale

What is this?
Not every lead that you get from your campaign will turn in to a sale. The conversion rate from lead to sale is the percentage of leads that go on to be customers. For example, if it takes 5 leads per sale, your conversion rate is 20%.

Why is it important?
If you know how many leads on average it takes to get one sale, you can plan your marketing campaigns effectively to target those leads.

Average customer value

What is this?
The average customer value is the average amount a customer spends with you. Work it out by calculating the average value of an order and multiply it by the amount of orders a customer places with you on average (e.g. one a year).

Why is it important?
It allows you to check that you aren’t spending more on your campaign than you are getting back.

Optimising your ad spend

Once you know the ROI of your leaflet campaigns and other marketing efforts it will help you to decide on how to spend your marketing budget for optimum profit.

For example, if a leaflet campaign consistently brings you more sales than an online advertising campaign, and the cost per acquisition for those leaflet customers is less than the online acquisition cost, it might make sense to scrap the online campaign and run a wider leaflet campaign instead.

Similarly, if you know that for every £40 you spend on leaflets you get £100 back, how many lots of £40 would you be prepared to spend to maximise your return?

How to improve the ROI of your leaflet campaign

There are many different factors that can affect the ROI of your leaflet campaign. Examples include the area it is being delivered to and the effectiveness of the leaflet design (including your call-to-action).

Check out our previous blog articles for hints and tips on getting the most ROI from your leaflet campaigns:

• The importance of repetition in leaflet delivery marketing campaignps
• 5 tricks for writing effective headlines
• The most important design elements of your leaflet

There is also lots more information about optimising your leaflet campaign in our FREE whitepaper: “101 Killer Headlines”.