IT Channel Marketers Need to Monitor These Blog Metrics

Most getting started with blogging struggle initially to build traction. This is normal. There are definitely some natural tipping points that kick in once you start blogging more regularly. That said, what are the key blog metrics that IT channel marketers need to regularly monitor?

1. Which persona a particular blog post is intended for - No one has unlimited budget. So it’s critical to make sure that you know which of your ideal buyer personas that each and every blog post is intended for.

2. Where in the sales cycle this post fits into - While most blog posts tend to be top of funnel content, where prospects are looking for solutions to fairly broad problems, it’s important to make this distinction of whether a particular blog post is intended for readers that are in the top, the middle, or the bottom of the sales funnel. This distinction helps you decide how to use posts in lead nurturing workflows to accelerate your sales cycle. It also helps you decide which CTAs (for premium content lead generation offers) to select that are most relevant with greater likelihood for conversion.

3. Number of blog subscribers - Track this over time to make sure your blog reach is net increasing.

4. Number of page views - Monitor how many of your blog posts are indexed in search engines, as well as the total monthly page views across all of your blog posts.

5. Which blog posts are most popular - Track your top 20 blog posts by views each month. This can be hugely helpful in deciding what else to blog about. It also can shine a spotlight on high performing assets that can most rapidly impact lead generation volume when a high-relevant call to action (CTA) is selected. In other words, if you have some blog posts that get a lot of views, but not many conversions, spend serious time creating premium content offers and CTAs that leverage your existing website traffic to generate leads. 

6. Number of inbound links - While Google will likely never reveal the exact factors that drive rankings and how inbound links fit into its overall search engine algorithms, it’s very widely assumed by inbound marketing pros that websites with a large quantity of high quality, relevant inbound links do better than those without those links. So it pays to monitor this blog metric over time. These inbound links can also open your eyes to additional cross-promotional opportunities with websites that you may not have been aware of.

7. What percentage of viewers click on a CTA - Again, if a particular blog post has a lot of views, but a very low CTA click through rate, this an opportunity for IT channel marketers to drive more conversions pretty quickly by simply optimizing the relevancy and placement of the CTA.

8. Number of keywords a blog post ranks for - Generally, the more keyword phrase that a particular blog post ranks for, the more opportunities there are to attract highly-qualified website visitors. 

Blogs can be very powerful tools for attracting highly-qualified decision makers to your website. However to really move the needle on blogging, you’ll need to make a significant time commitment.

So with this investment, you really need to get good at figuring out what’s working and what’s not working with your blog metrics.

Which blog metrics have you found to be most important for IT channel marketing managers to pay attention to? Let us know your views in the Comments section below.

And to figure out where your blog metrics fit into your big picture content marketing plans, make sure that you download your free copy of the IT Channel Inbound Marketing Planning Guide.

Creative Commons Image Source: flickr Kristina B