We should measure things where we can, but not throw away elements of the marketing mix just because they don’t provide nice clean ROI data.
In 2023, blogger Cory Doctorow wrote: “Here is how platforms die: first, they are good to their users; then they abuse their users to make things better for their business customers; finally, they abuse those business customers to claw back all the value for themselves. Then, they die. I call this enshittification.”
‘Enshittification’ became ‘Word of the Year’ in at least one dictionary. One of the reasons it struck such a chord was that there was so much truth in it. So many modern businesses have grown quickly, reached the inevitable slowing-off of growth, but pushed too hard to continue it …at the expense of users. Becoming a classically mature company is no longer seen as the ultimate goal – instead, the target is to continue growth at all costs.
In marketing, this growth mindset has pushed an increasing amount of ROI and KPI indicators on us. But we all know that while we can judge the success in reaching prospects at certain stages through these measurements, much of what we do is much less (and possibly not at all) quantifiable. Many tools which aim to improve our marketing actually just direct us to concentrate on those areas which provide a measurable result.
We should measure things where we can, but not throw away elements of the marketing mix just because they don’t provide nice clean ROI data.
Our goal should be to help customers achieve their own goals.