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How HubSpot Measures Its Marketing Content
Shannon Johnson
Content Strategist, HubSpot
Pamela Vaughan
Manager of Optimization & Growth, HubSpot Content
Fun fact: If you’re a HubSpot customer, you can spot me in the stock photos pre-loaded into your software. I may even be the face of one of your personas.
@pamelump
PAMELAVAUGHAN
Fun fact: I’ve never broken a bone.
@shannopop
SHANNONJOHNSON
1 How the HubSpot Content Machine Works
2 About the Blogging and Offers Teams & Our Goals
3 The KPIs We Track: What, Why & How
4 Final Thoughts About Content Reporting
AGENDA
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1 HOW THE HUBSPOT CONTENT MACHINE WORKS
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Ebooks, Whitepapers & Guides
Blog Posts
WebinarsContent
Creation Assets
ChecklistsTemplates
HUBSPOT’S
CONTENT MACHINE
• 11,000+ customers in over 70
countries
• 1.5M visits / mo.
• 250 articles / mo.
• 4-6 long form pieces of
content / mo.
• Thousands of downloads / mo.
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BLOG CONTENT:
• What: Short-form, ungated content
housed on HubSpot’s blog
• Purpose: Fill the top of the funnel and
convert traffic into new leads
• Measurement Focus: Quantity of traffic,
subscribers, and leads
OFFERS CONTENT:
• What: Long-form, gated content housed
on HubSpot’s landing pages
• Purpose: Qualify and nurture existing
leads
• Measurement Focus: Quality of Leads
and quality of content
BLOG CONTENT VS. OFFERS CONTENT
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WHERE CONTENT LIVES IN HUBSPOT MARKETING
CONTENT TEAM
(CONTENT) FUNNEL TEAM
(DISTRIBUTION
CHANNELS)
Offers
(Long-Form
Content)
Blog
(Short-Form
Content)
Paid Marketing
Landing Pages
SEO
EmailSocial Media
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BLOG = CONTENT + DISTRIBUTION
+
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OFFERS = CONTENT
Paid Marketing
(Funnel Team) Landing Pages
(Funnel Team)
(Relies on Other Teams for Distribution)
Blog
(Blogging Team)
SEO
(Funnel Team)
Social Media
(Funnel Team)
(Funnel Team)
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Where do our content goals come from?
Marketing’s Service-Level Agreement (SLA) With Sales:
Quantity of Leads + Quality of Leads
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Why do we do reporting?
For two reasons …
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to track progress toward our goals
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to be prescriptive, actionable,
and optimization-driven
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1 ABOUT THE BLOGGING TEAM & OUR GOALS
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• 6 Full-Time Employees + Network of Contributors
• 3 Main Blogs: Marketing, Sales, The Agency Post
• 250 Blog Posts Per Month
• Primary Goals: Traffic, Subscribers & New Leads
(Measured by Quantity)
BLOGGING TEAM
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specific goals depend on each blog’s maturity
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INFANT BLOGS
Primary Goals =
Traffic + Subscribers
Why? To build up a critical mass of dedicated readers who will share and evangelize our content to new visitors
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~70%of the initial traffic to a new post on HubSpot’s Marketing Blog comes from email subscribers.
Internal HubSpot Data
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Over time, that initial surge of traffic leads to views & social sharing that translates into organic search traffic growth.
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In other words,
subscribers are critical
to a blog’s long-term
traffic growth.
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MATURE BLOGS
Primary Goals =
Traffic + Leads
Why? To convert visitors into leads while continuing to grow the top of the funnel
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3 BLOGGING TEAM KPIs: THE WHAT, WHY & HOW
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What are our monthly blog goals based on?
1) Total New Leads Goal From SLA
2) Historical Blog Lead Contributions
3) Blog Growth
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How often do we do blog reporting?
How often do we do blog reporting?
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three frequencies …
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monthly report on all key blog metrics
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daily/weekly progress check-ins for primary goals
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documentation of one-off analytical projects
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• Blog Topic Analysis: “I wonder which topics generate the most view/leads …”
• Blog Type Analysis: “I wonder if infographic posts generate more views/leads than
SlideShare posts …”
• Subscriber Email Analysis: “I wonder which email frequency option (instant, daily,
weekly) has the best clickthrough rate …”
• Blog Traffic Analysis: “I wonder how much traffic we get to new posts vs. old posts …”
• Blog Leads Analysis: “I wonder how many leads we get from new posts vs. old posts …”
EXAMPLES …
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Which metrics do we track?
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Progress- and goal-based metrics …
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METRIC:
TOTAL VISITS &
THEIR TRAFFIC
SOURCES
Why: To track blog traffic growth & analyze strengths/weaknesses in traffic sources month over month
How: HubSpot Sources Report
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METRIC:
SUBSCRIBERS
Why: To track
audience growth
and blog stickiness,
particularly for
infant blogs
How: HubSpot Blog
Dashboard
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METRIC:
NEW LEADS
Why: To track how the blog is contributing to the overall marketing SLA and growing leads month over month
How: HubSpot Contacts Report
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prescriptive/actionable metrics …
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METRIC:
TOP POSTS BY
VIEWS
Why: To analyze themes from high-performing posts and identify opportunities for conversion optimization
How: HubSpot Pages Report
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Old posts with high traffic become targets/opportunities for conversion optimization.
WHAT NEXT?
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I wonder how big that opportunity is …
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OVER 75%of our monthly blog post views are of old posts (i.e. posts published prior to that month).
Internal HubSpot Data
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That’s seems like a pretty big opportunity, if you ask me.
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But I wonder how well all those old posts are converting …
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METRIC:
TOP POSTS BY LEADS
(VIA LAST INTERACTION)
Why: To identify top lead-generating
posts, spot themes that can inform
future content creation, and pinpoint
poorly converting posts
How: HubSpot’s New Attribution Report
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OVER 90%of the leads we generate in a given month are also from old posts (i.e. posts published prior to that month).
Internal HubSpot Data
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I wonder where all that traffic
to old posts is coming from …
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The majority of traffic to old, high-trafficked posts on HubSpot’s blog comes from organic search.
How: HubSpot Pages Report
METRIC:
BLOG POST
SOURCES
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WHAT NEXT?
Expand that list of high-converting old posts by getting more posts to rank in search. Put more effort into SEO.
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4 ABOUT THE OFFERS TEAM
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We don’t have offers
measurement completely
figured out.
BELIEVE IT OR
NOT …
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LIKE EVERYONE
ELSE …
We are challenged with
determining the value of
what we create.
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• How much did people read?
• Did they like it?
• What didn’t they like?
• Did they share it?
• Was it helpful to the business?
• Should we have packaged it differently?
QUESTIONS WE SEEK ANSWERS TO
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• We have to wait a sales cycle to see how many customers our offers generated.
• The success of an individual offer relies heavily on the promotional effort around it.
• You could technically say our offers are the source of all HubSpot lead generation.
• Unlike blogging, email, or social media, long-form content doesn’t have a built-in
promotional channel.
• Company metrics and priorities shift regularly.
• Quality is harder to measure than quantity.
• Content benefits the company in ways that are nearly impossible to quantify.
CHALLENGES: MEASURING LONG-FORM CONTENT
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5 OFFERS TEAM KPIs: THE WHAT, WHY & HOW
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1. Percent of Leads Transferred to Sales Every Month
2. Offer Performance by Lead and Customer Generation
3. Net Promoter Score (NPS) by Offer Title, Author, and Type
THE 3 PRIMARY OFFERS TEAM KPIs
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% OF LEADS
TRANSFERRED TO
SALES
Measures the offers team’s contribution to our marketing team’s monthly leads-transferred-to-sales goal.
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% OF LEADS TRANSFERRED TO SALES
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TOP-PERFORMING
OFFERS
Measures which offers
excel at generating leads
and customers.
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The longer an offer exists,
the more leads and
customers it generates.
WE TRACK YTD
AND QUARTERLY
PERFORMANCE
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TOP-PERFORMING OFFERS: Q2 2014
Offer Publish Date Author Customers
Leads (Total
Submits)* Recognized MRR*
Quality
Score*
Lead Generation Workbook May-14 Erik 60 35,000 $300,000 71
Content Creation Ebook May-14 Erik 50 20,000 $200,000 70
Facebook 101 Guide Jun-14 Shannon 40 15,000 $100,000 63
Website Redesign Workbook Jun-14 Erik 30 10,000 $90,000 69
Email Marketing Template May-14 Funnel 20 8,000 $80,000 67
*Not Actual HubSpot Data
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NET PROMOTER
SCORE
Measures our
audience’s perception of
our content quality.
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NET PROMOTER SCORE (NPS)
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6 WHAT’S NEXT FOR OFFERS MEASUREMENT?
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To allow us to understand
if an offer is a hit without
having to wait 3-6
months.
BETTER PREDICT
AN OFFER’S
SUCCESS
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7 FINAL THOUGHTS ABOUT CONTENT REPORTING
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1 Don’t waste time on reporting just for the sake of reporting.
2 Prioritize metrics that enable you to be prescriptive.
3 It’s okay to change your metrics over time.
4 Keep asking questions – make time for one-off analytical
projects.
FINAL THOUGHTS
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QUESTIONS ?
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