Welcome to the new era of consumer engagement: Thanks to new advances in technology, shoppers can now access and consume more information, and from a broader range of mobile devices, more easily than ever before. And with more than 6.1 billion smartphones now in circulation globally, and most growth in digital media time now coming from mobile usage, implications are clear. Going forward, mobile devices will only become more important to consumers and a larger part of the cultural landscape, making customer usage habits and patterns vitally important to understand for tomorrow’s enterprise. Thankfully, just by considering a few of many sample factors and metrics, as outlined below, you can more effectively understand how successfully products, services, and solutions are connecting – and design or retool them to match.
Daily, Weekly, or Monthly Active Users (DAU, WAU, and MAU) – One of the simplest metrics for measuring consumer engagement, these basic stats show how many users are actively engaging with your solutions. Note that many organizations define “active” differently, however – this designator may refer to frequency of login, how many users have taken specific actions (e.g. shared status updates or posts), which have spent a certain minimum amount of time going hands-on with your company’s offerings, etc.
Customer Acquisition Cost – How much your business is spending to acquire customers – e.g. by totaling the costs of all or individual marketing activities, and dividing it by the number of new customers gained during the period these promotional activities took place. Finding ways to lower these costs, and lower business expenses, especially with regards to attraction and retention, is key. Happily, a growing range of analytics tools and solutions can help.
Revenue Per Customer – A measurement of how much your business makes per customer – and which customer segments are most lucrative, as well as general buying habits. Insights from these statistics can help you to better allocate resources, and determine how to market and promote your offerings, as well as more effectively manage your enterprise overall.
Customer Lifetime Value – How much any given customer’s business is worth to your enterprise over the life of your relationship. Understanding these numbers can help you right-size efforts and expenditures, and gain deeper insight into where it may make sense to offer specific discounts, specials, and value trade-offs.
Social Media, Marketing, and Advertising Campaign Metrics – Wondering how well your communications efforts are connecting, and consumer engagement efforts are impacting the bottom line? The amount of clicks, shares, conversions, web traffic, and leads that you’re able to generate from them can help you tell what’s resonating, to what extent, and with which audiences. Note that effective use of these insights can help you update and refine campaigns to perform better over time.
Customer Satisfaction – Equally important as purchases or conversions is understanding how happy customers are with your business or brand, and the solutions you provide. A key element of successful mobile consumer engagement, insights gained here can help inform you as to what features or needs customers prioritize – and how these needs change over time. The most successful businesses use ongoing sources of feedback, and measurements of customer satisfaction, to create and continually update their strategic roadmap and solutions in turn, to be better attuned to market demand.
Conversion Rates – How many leads are converting to paid customers? How are even simple changes in messaging, visuals, pricing, or content impacting how many consumers choose to do business with you? Using these metrics, you can see how well end-users are responding to everything from ad copy to website design – and adapt solutions to be more effective in time.
Churn – In addition to acquiring customers, it’s also vital to inspire their loyalty and retain them as well. Understanding your churn rate – a.k.a. that of consumer loss or attrition – as well as when they drop out of orbit, and how much time they spend with your solutions, is critical.
Clearly, the number of data points your business can now collect and monitor, and the amount of insights it can track in terms of customer behavior and purchasing patterns, have increased exponentially. Enterprises looking to play in the digital and mobile spaces would do well to take these and other key metrics into account as they move forward. Armed with these pieces of information, you can not only creative an effective business strategy – you can update, refine, and increase its odds of success with each passing day.
