Content Marketing Measurement Strategies
Measuring the results of your content marketing efforts is essential to understand what works and what doesn’t — and optimize for better results over time.
by Matt Schur
Sure, measuring your content proves your strategy is working. (And let’s be honest — who doesn’t love to be right?)
But a good content marketing measurement framework does much more than that:
- It helps you make data-driven decisions about what content to pursue next.
- It gives you a rich picture of your target audience and how to attract them.
- It secures buy-in from your organization’s senior leaders.
- Above all else, it ensures your marketing efforts are matching your business’s big tentpole goals.
An added bonus? With the right measurements in place, your day-to-day efforts get streamlined and focused, too. Not a bad win-win. Or…win-win-win-win-win.
Why You Should Measure Content Performance
Let’s cut to the chase: If your content marketing strategy content marketing strategy doesn’t include a plan for consistently measuring and adjusting your content efforts, it’s just not complete.
Too often, teams embark on content marketing without a plan for consistent measurement:
- Maybe the technology isn’t in place to allow for the right measurement.
- Maybe a different team has ownership over data — and won’t share.
- Maybe you just wanted to get started quickly and figured you’d “get to measurement later.”
No matter the reason, skipping measurement puts your content (and budget) at risk.
Consider these common scenarios:
- A new leader comes in and wants to make their own mark in marketing/communications. Without results to show, you have no argument to make when they decide to eliminate your content program and replace it with something else.
- Your organization did not hit its numbers this fiscal year, and big budget cuts have to be made. Work that doesn’t demonstrate measurable ROI will be on the chopping block first.
Consistent content measurement should be a non-negotiable. Your guiding light here? A content measurement framework that highlights what metrics to care about and the next steps to take to ensure your work aligns with broader business goals.
What Are Content Marketing Metrics?
You’re probably already familiar with a lot of the subsets of data out there: search engine optimization (SEO) ranks, page views, social media shares, and so forth. Broadly speaking, what these specific metrics represent — and what this whole measurement framework is about — is simply making your marketing efforts quantifiable. You put in great work; you need to know how you’re doing.
Content success metrics are specific key performance indicators (KPIs) that highlight whether content efforts are meeting pre-established goals. These metrics help businesses assess content effectiveness and guide future content decisions.
Some metrics signify growing brand awareness, while others show increasing affinity for or trustworthiness of your brand. Still others demonstrate actual conversions like sales.
The goal is to distinctly define your own success metrics, which will be specific to each organization. After all, an international restaurant chain will likely focus on different marketing priorities than a regional association.
How to Measure Content Marketing Performance
Before you get lost in a sea of content marketing metrics, take a deep breath. The good news: It’s not worth your time to track every KPI under the sun.
How do you prioritize which content KPIs to measure?
First, choose a framework:
- Content measurement by business goal
- Content measurement by user intent
- Content measurement by channel
Content Measurement by Business Goal
When establishing a content marketing measurement framework, one great starting point is to document the primary business goals that you want to achieve with your content, and selecting appropriate KPIs that will demonstrate each.
For example:
Content Measurement by User Intent
Content measurement by user intent — also referred to as content measurement by buyer journey phase — is another way to organize and define appropriate content KPIs. With this model, we take into account the goals of each piece of content or each content channel as it relates to the buyer journey and the user intent that content addresses, so we measure the right KPIs.
For example:
Content Measurement by Channel
A third way to position content measurement is by channel — print, website, social media, email, etc. This method is helpful when you’re deploying a multi-channel content strategy spanning different platforms.
For example:
An Aside: Content Measurement in a Zero-click World
Content marketers have long lived in a world of constant change: changing platforms, changing algorithms, and changing audience and market trends. The latest? The zero–click threat on search and social media.
Zero–click refers to the shift where search engines and social media platforms limit the need for users to click away and visit external websites. What does that look like?
- Google is delivering instant answers to questions via featured snippets and AI-generated search results.
- Social platforms like Facebook and LinkedIn are emphasizing in-platform content that keeps users engaged without clicking away.
So when we can’t expect as much referral traffic from organic search and social, how the heck do we measure our content efforts in those channels?
“Brands can still find good value in social media efforts when they consider and measure the actual impact they’re having on brand awareness and engagement,” says Michelle Jackson, Chief Strategy Officer, BackPocket Agency. “Impressions, follower growth, and engagement KPIs all tell a story of increased thought leadership and trustworthiness.”
For organic search, it’s important to remember that some searches still result in clicks. That’s why it’s critical to ensure user intent is the bedrock of your content SEO strategy. Rather than focus blogging efforts around awareness-stage topics (the kind that Google can provide a very quick and easy answer for without a click), prioritize consideration-stage topics that need more context and explanation.
What Are the Best Tools for Content Marketing Measurement?
Measuring content marketing performance requires a variety of tools to track and analyze data. These tools fall into a few categories:
Website Data Tools
Google Analytics and Google Search Console
Google Analytics is a platform that collects data from your website to create reports and provide insights. The tool creates reports that can include top pages, referral sources, engagement metrics, and more. It also allows you to set specific conversion goals and track activity against those goals.
Where Google Analytics tracks user behavior on your website, Google Search Console focuses on how your site performs in Google search results. "Google Search Console metrics — like impressions, clicks, and click-through rate (CTR) — are my go-to KPIs because they tell a fascinating story about how audiences are actually discovering your content,” says Janet Celosia, Vice President, Marketing Strategy, BackPocket Agency. “Sometimes, the keywords you think should drive traffic aren’t the ones bringing people to your site. Google Search Console helps bridge that gap between expectation and reality, offering insight into how users are searching and where you may need to refine your content strategy. By tracking these metrics, you can adapt your SEO approach in real time, ensuring your content aligns with how your audience naturally engages with search.”
Google Tag Manager
Google Tag Manager allows you to set up and manage tags on your site. By using this tool, content marketers can track user interactions. They can also gain deeper insight on engagement metrics to see which content campaigns or efforts are driving the most activity.
SEO Data Tools
SEMrush
This tool lets you research keywords, track your ranking for important keywords, analyze a competitor’s SEO strategy, conduct link building, and more. It offers a free version, but most of the value comes with paid accounts.
Moz
Very similar to SEMrush, Moz offers keyword research, competitive research, backlink analysis, reporting, and site tracking. It offers a free trial but not a free version.
Customer Relationship Management (CRM) Tools
Salesforce
Salesforce is a CRM tool that helps you manage sales, customer interactions, and analytics. It provides customizable dashboards and reports, and advanced lead tracking. A tool like Salesforce can help tie content marketing campaigns to lead generation and eventually sales.
HubSpot
This CRM is similar to Salesforce, but HubSpot includes built-in email automation, in addition to lead tracking. Just like Salesforce, HubSpot can help content marketers tie lead generation and sales to content efforts.
Marketing Automation
Marketo
Marketo is a marketing automation platform for lead management, email marketing, and multi-channel campaigns. It also provides account-based marketing, advanced segmentation, and AI-driven personalization.
Mailchimp
Mailchimp focuses on email marketing and automation. It’s a simple and inexpensive tool for managing email campaigns, including email builders, audience segmentation, automated workflows, A/B testing, and basic CRM and audience insights.
Which Measurement Tool Is Right for Me?
When choosing a tool for your organization to measure content effectiveness, consider these questions to guide you in the right direction:
- Will this tool integrate with our existing systems, technologies, and tools (CRM, website)?
- Can this tool fit into our existing workflows?
- Is the tool easy to use — and easy to learn to use?
- Does the tool offer cross-device tracking to measure user behavior across platforms?
- Can this tool scale with us as we grow?
- Does this tool fit my budget needs?
- Does the tool offer ongoing customer support?
- Can I get a free trial or demo before committing?
Analyzing Your Content Performance
Data and reporting is just the first part of content measurement. The second half involved analysis and optimization.
Your content data can tell you:
- Which content formats (blogs, videos, infographics) perform best?
- Are users consuming my content all the way through?
- What topics generate the most interest?
- Which CTAs are the most effective at driving conversions?
- Which distribution channels drive the most traffic, engagement, and conversions?
Armed with this data, you can begin optimizing and planning your future content. You can start looking for content-related trends in what performs well with your audience and double down. For example:
- Blog posts with visuals to support the text outperform text-only posts, so you reallocate your efforts to create more visual content.
- CTAs with text under 100 words outperform longer CTAs, so you revise your strategy to create brief, to-the-point directives.
- Blog posts with client examples outperform other topics, so you prioritize capturing more client testimonials and case studies.
Conversely, it’s a great time to try and improve underperforming content:
- Maybe one blog post didn’t receive the same paid push as better-performing content.
- Perhaps it was posted at a time when your users weren’t engaged.
- Maybe the headline and general angle need to be improved.
- Perhaps other people in your industry have already covered that topic, so new customers aren’t searching that out.
You can also begin to test new formats, perhaps tweaking an article into a podcast or creating a complementary video.
A/B Testing in Content Marketing
A/B testing on various content elements can identify the highest-performing components and iterate accordingly. For example:
- Email subject lines: You might compare the subject line, “Master Content Measurement: 5 Key Tips for Better Insights” against “The Ultimate Content Measurement Framework (+ Free Download!)”
- CTA language: You might compare how “Sign up for our e-newsletter” performs against “Get weekly tips delivered to your inbox.”
- Content elements on landing pages: For a campaign landing page, you might test an embedded video beneath your main header against a form.
Content Marketing Reporting Cadence
The cadence you choose to evaluate will depend on your organization’s size and goals, but a general rule of thumb is to check your metrics monthly. You can adjust this cadence as you go on while also introducing some larger reviews as necessary (perhaps on a quarterly or biannual basis — or if your organization has launched a major initiative or brand redesign).
It’s helpful to delineate the specific cadence for reporting, what you will look at, and who will be involved. For example:
- Monthly: The marketing team reviews the month’s latest KPIs and provides high-level analysis for “quick-win” optimizations.
- Quarterly: The marketing team pulls together the last 3 months’ data with detailed recommendations and an action plan for longer-term content optimizations. This report is shared with leadership and sales.
- Annually: The marketing team provides an annual analysis of the year’s reporting and revises the content strategy accordingly for the upcoming year. Leadership is informed of this work.
Ready to Supercharge Your Content Marketing Measurement?
At BackPocket Agency, we’re more than just content creators — we’re strategic partners committed to helping you achieve your marketing goals. With our comprehensive content strategy services, we’ll guide you through every step of the process, ensuring that your content doesn’t just exist but thrives. Your content should work as hard as you do. Let’s build a measurement strategy that actually proves its impact. Ready? Reach out to BackPocket to start strategizing today.
Matt Schur
Senior Content Manager
With more than 15 years of writing and editing experience, Matt has launched magazines from scratch, led the production of multiple magazines, spearheaded digital and distribution strategies, overseen podcasts, and orchestrated various social media efforts. He’s won several journalism awards, including for feature writing and overall editorial work. Matt majored in magazine journalism at Mizzou and has since worked for several consumer, trade, and association magazines, covering healthcare, business, politics, sports, culture, music, and more.