The Importance of Performing a Regular Campaign Audit 

If you want to ensure that your marketing efforts are performing at the highest level, conducting a campaign audit is crucial. Devoting time to assess your current performance is just as important as the marketing strategy itself. You don’t want to allow your website, social efforts, email workflows, and advertising to get stuck in the past and miss out on new lead opportunities. 

Your campaigns need continuous improvements and the campaign audit allows you to do just that. With the data and other valuable insights you gather in the audit, you can look back and pinpoint exactly what has worked and what you may need to reevaluate. 

How Often Do You Need to Perform a Campaign Audit?

Each type of campaign will be slightly different, so we recommend that at least every quarter, you and your team take the time to look at each of your marketing campaigns and determine how they are performing. 

A great marketing audit will cover every touchpoint that your business uses to communicate with your customers. Take a look below at the six campaign audit types when you’re looking at your strategy and what you should be looking for.

1. UX (User Experience) Campaign Audit 

First impressions are important and your website will likely be the first place your audience will visit. If you don’t have a site that is user-friendly, it could be detrimental to your overall success.  

The time that it takes your website to load is an easy way to improve your user experience. In such a busy world, who wants to sit around and wait for a slow website? If it takes too long, or if certain elements of your site don’t load at all, users may go elsewhere to find answers. Not to mention the toll it takes on your SEO ranking. 

With mobile devices being where most people engage on the web, it is vital to create a responsive website that works with both iOS and Android devices. On desktops, be sure to audit your website on all major internet browsers for both design and functionality. After all, this is a huge part of the user experience. 

Another key part of the user experience is navigation. Is it clear where users should click to find the information they are looking for? Look for places where users could get lost. One of the most effective ways to improve your user experience is by using heat maps to track a user’s movements on your site. These tools record exactly where someone visiting your site clicks, how far down a page they scroll, and how long they spend on each page. It can provide your team with the data they need to know how to improve the website.

Lastly, make sure to create a website that is engaging and captures their attention from the second they come to it. Give them buttons to click, videos to watch, or even use interactive infographics to convey your message. Anything that can keep them on your site and make their experience exceptional. 

2. SEO (Search Engine Optimization) Campaign Audit

The first step to successful Search Engine Optimization is to think like your customers. What would someone interested in your business search on Google? 

As a part of your campaign audit, search that query on Google. Check to see what your rank is. Does your business’ website appear on the first page? For SEO this should be your goal, as results found on the first page are more likely to be clicked on.

When checking your website be sure to optimize for a specific keyword on every page. This should be the purpose of the page itself. Use this keyword in title tags, meta descriptions, and throughout the content. This helps Google’s crawlers identify the purpose of your webpage and deem it as a valuable resource to those searching for that term. Also, be sure to include images as they improve both a user’s experience and SEO, but be sure to tag them with the correct alt-tags which provides a brief description of what the image is about.

Want to learn more about how to improve your SEO?

3. Content Campaign Audit

When conducting a content campaign audit, the first thing to consider is each and every one of your buyer personas. These fictional representations of your target audience will help your team strategize what type of content is most appropriate for your potential customers. 

Put yourself in their shoes and ask yourself, “what would I need to solve this issue?”. Then, come up with valuable resources that can provide them with the solution to their problem. Keep in mind that you want to prove that you are an expert in your field. Your content should encompass all of the issues your target audience might be faced with so that they can find all of the relevant information they are looking for right on your website. 

Go through your website’s copy and check to make sure the message you want to send is being expressed in a clear way. Also, your tone should be consistent throughout. Use calls-to-action with proper verbiage to keep your users interacting on site and performing the next-steps you want them to take. 

A blog on your website is a perfect place to provide your audience with information. Today, one of the most efficient ways to generate blog content while improving your SEO is to use topic clusters. These groups of similar topics make it easy to improve your internal linking opportunities throughout your posts. Be sure to optimize your blogs for a specific keyword and come up with creative and engaging titles for your blog posts to entice users to read them. 

Pro Tip: Keep your content updated. If you have blogs written from a couple of years ago, refresh the content to provide your audience with up-to-date information, as well as ensuring your blogs incorporate all of the current blogging best practices.

With content, consistency is key across all your interaction channels, both in tone and in cadence. Be sure to come up with a schedule to regularly post on all social media accounts, add blogs to your website, send automated emails, and anything else you do to get your message across!

4. Social Media Campaign Audit

Social media has taken the world by storm. If you want your business to compete, you need to have a good presence on social media. In order to determine if your strategy is doing well, it’s best to get to know your audience. Learning about their demographics and how they prefer to engage on the internet are both very helpful in determining the marketing channel and tone to use.

When performing your campaign audit, take a look at how often you post. It is important to have good cadence when posting on social media as it can help you stay on top of trends and trending topics, allowing for new lead opportunities. Determine what time and day is best for you to post. This can be done through testing and tracking interactions with posts, as well as looking at industry trends.

Also, keep in mind that each platform has a distinct voice. For example, LinkedIn is more professional, while Twitter is more conversational. Look at your copy and determine any inconsistencies in your voice or messaging. 

Pro Tip: It is not necessary to be on all social media platforms to be successful on social media. Being active on a few strategically-chosen platforms that are used by your target audience is much more beneficial. If users see a neglected social media account, it will negatively affect their perception of your brand and business.    

Today, customers want to feel like they can trust the business and brands that they support. One way to build that trust is to balance your posts with valuable information your audience needs with posts that show your brand’s personality. Social media is the perfect place to create a brand story that builds a personal connection with your target audience. Just remember to keep a consistent tone that represents your company. 

5. Email Campaign Audit

In your email campaign audit, check your emails for a high bounce rate and/or low click-through rate. If so, it could mean that the content may not be appropriate for these leads at this stage in their buyer’s journey. Use this information as an opportunity to test out different types of content and find what resonates with your audience. Be sure to check for consistency in your messaging and tone to continue to build your brand’s image and trust with your audience.

Because the majority of users use smartphones to interact with brands and companies, it is also vital to use mobile-friendly email templates that work with both iOS and Android devices. View your emails prior to sending them using different devices and internet browsers to ensure a positive user experience when viewing your content.

Additionally, monitor the open rates of your emails. A low open rate indicates your subject line isn’t grabbing their attention. Try to make the copy more enticing. 

One way to determine what works best for your business is to send your emails at different times of the day. Typically, emails sent during the week have a higher open rate than those sent on the weekend. Test out various days and times and see what has the best result.

Pro Tip: Use the data you collect in the campaign audit to determine SMART goals for your email marketing strategy. 

Do your emails include links to your social media accounts? You should include a way for your audience to connect with your business on social media as it continues to build a personal relationship with them. As always, be sure to check for spelling and grammatical errors, as they can easily lower your credibility in the eyes of the reader. 

6. Paid Search Campaign Audit

Paid Search, also known as PPC, audits are fundamentally more data-driven than some of the other campaign audits mentioned above. It is vital to audit these campaigns much more frequently to remain on budget throughout the month.

A good PPC campaign is only as good as the keywords you choose to target, and not target for that matter. Audit your keyword lists to make sure you are targeting the right people. Perform keyword research to use words with a high search volume. One tool we love at Pinckney is SEMrush’s Keyword Magic Tool. 

Also, audit the search terms people typed into Google to click on your ad. This can provide you with a list of words you want to avoid. Add them as negative keywords so that your ads aren’t being shown to people who aren’t interested in your product or service and are actually wasting your budget.

Google Ads and Google Analytics both provide valuable insights into how well your advertisements are doing. Some important metrics to look at when performing your PPC campaign audit are: 

• Clicks
• Click-through-rate (CTR)
• Conversion rate (CVR)
• Cost-per-click (CPC)
• Cost-per-conversion/acquisition (CPA)

If certain ads have a low clicks or click-through rate, it may be a good idea to take a look at the ad copy and see if there are any adjustments you can make that improve your message to make it more enticing to your audience. Increasing the length of the ad and including your keywords will make it more likely that your ad gets clicked on, thus driving traffic to your site. 

Pro Tip: When writing your ads, use the maximum number of characters allowed in your Google ads. If you’re paying for the real estate on Google, use it!  

A campaign audit can also help you identify what types of ads to use. Whether this be general search ads or visual display ads, perform multiple campaigns and compare them to see what works best for your industry. 

The Pinckney Campaign Audit Strategy

You’ll be surprised to see the impact a campaign audit can have on the long term success of your marketing efforts. After you adjust accordingly, you will see it in the numbers! 

At Pinckney Marketing, we know that a successful inbound marketing campaign can consist of many moving parts. It can be a challenge to keep these distinct areas working together smoothly without the involvement of trained professionals –– and that’s where we come in! 

Our team has years of experience working with clients in various industries, each requiring a personalized strategy to ensure marketing success. We begin by conducting an audit of your current efforts to see where there are any gaps. Our experts then use this information to create a strategy centered around your business goals.

Interested in having our team conduct a free SEO Audit?

 

This post was originally written on October 10th, 2017 and updated on May 15th, 2023.