A Guide To Ebusiness Performance Management (EBPM).

Visual Insights

The following guide aims to shed some light on the new challenges that face marketers and how they can use the Web to put themselves at the centre of business in the new economy.

What's the next level in analysis for marketers?

It's no longer enough to report hits and clicks when looking to justify additional e-business investments. The corporate Web site has become the fulfilment centre for everything from product information to customer service and information generated from Web sites is vital in acquiring new customers, maximising the value of existing customers and gaining return from once immeasurable promotional activities. The effectiveness of the Web site has become the responsibility of the marketing manager and he or she needs to measure Web activity and tie it to business objectives. Performance management unveils the customer centric knowledge that is core to e-business strategy, planning and execution.

Why now?

Many of today's marketing managers are dancing in the dark -- blinded by the growing complexities and costs of managing their company's Web site. Moreover, in today's economic climate, department budgets are coming under heavy scrutiny and, more often than not, marketing is first on the list. As a result it's becoming imperative for marketing managers to prove their worth to the board, particularly as Web-based initiatives are claiming a greater share of their budget. Marketers are now being held accountable to understand and maximise online investments and that's exactly what performance management provides.

How does it work?

EBPM enables marketers to use information from the Internet to make critical connections between Web-enabled sales, marketing and service functions and correlate them to business objectives. It gives marketers the visibility to make campaigns more effective and measure their success. Take, for example, an ad banner intended to direct qualified prospects to a company's Web site to complete a questionnaire. Performance management informs the marketer who is responding to which ads, the portals from which they are coming, how many complete the questionnaire, and how many abandon the site (and where) before completion.

What's wrong with traditional analysis?

Nothing, it's always useful to have traffic reports on peaks and flows but really these are expensive and time-consuming Web implementations that yield no return on investment. Poorly designed user interfaces, an inability to align reports with measurable business objectives and a lack of synergy between marketing sales and customer service are mining the best laid e-business marketing plans. Without being able to drill down into the real detail, however, how can it be known whether what's happening is good or bad?

At any given time the marketing department could be asked to produce an ROI report by the board or explain the drop in leads to the sales department. Could an explanation be given as to why Web site traffic has increased but fewer visitors are completing conversions? Giving evidence to the board as to why the company needs to invest in the development of the site would be impossible with older solutions however performance management allows the user to understand how Web activity affects each department and make changes benefit the bottom line.

What information does EBPM give me that was not available before?

EBPM provides a single view of how customer behaviour effects all areas of a site from lead generation and support to call centre and customer service delivery. A marketer needs to know the answer to questions such as; which portals are directing visitors and which pages do they visit? How many visits does a single campaign attract? How long is each visit and do these visitors meet selected goals (e.g. buy, register, complete questionnaire)? What hour of the day are ads most effective and what types are they? Can visitor behaviour be tracked for each department and provide quantitative feedback? Which online product pricing strategies are most effective and how do they compare with offline? Today's marketer must be able to answer all these questions through the monitoring and measurement of the Web's impact on customers across every department. Only then can browsers be turned to buyers.

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