Choosing the right metrics for digital marketing

Executive overview

Too many metrics without alignment creates confusion and poor decision-making. The solution is scrutinising which metrics genuinely connect to business objectives — not just marketing goals — and matching them to the right audience and funnel stage.

Track fewer metrics, aligned to business objectives, tailored to audience and funnel stage.

Common measurement problems to avoid

• Too many metrics without a shared playbook overwhelms teams and stalls decisions
• Tracking without identified KPIs makes it hard to prioritise resources
• Campaign-level overload leads to unfocused strategies and diluted effort

Vanity metrics

• Look good on paper but don't move the business needle
• Usually lack context — the issue isn't the metric itself, but what it's missing
• Example: top-of-funnel traffic from blog posts often doesn't qualify or convert

Shallow metrics

• Too zoomed out to surface actionable insight
• Segmentation and audience breakdowns are the fix
• Example: site-wide conversion rate masks the fact that most pages aren't built to convert — landing page CR is the meaningful signal

Irrelevant metrics

• No single piece of marketing is meant to do everything
• Metrics must match the primary objective of the specific activity
• Awareness campaigns → awareness metrics; checkout optimisation → purchase metrics and friction
• Match the metric to the funnel stage, not to what's easy to report