How the StoryBrand Framework Boosts Marketing ROI
We hear it all the time, “What ROI will I get if I hire you for marketing? Can you promise a 3x, 5x, or 10x return?”
I get it. You want to know if you are going to get a return on your investment (ROI) in your marketing efforts. No shame there. I understand the intent, yet this question isn’t necessarily the best question to ask. Marketing has a lot of variables. I’ll say it again, marketing has A LOT of variables. ROI is simple math. It is calculated by dividing the profit earned on an investment by the cost of that investment, but marketing ROI is not simple at all. Anyone who tells you otherwise is trying to sell you something without giving you the full story.
We use plenty of best practices and frameworks for our marketing services, but the one we stand behind the most is the StoryBrand Framework. It goes beyond one marketing campaign, and its benefits go far beyond a simple ROI analysis. Yet, we can hang with the ROI talk. So let’s start there.
What is marketing ROI?
Here is an ROI example in simple terms. If I invest $10,000 in marketing and I get a profit (or return) of $30,000 on that investment, then my ROI is 3 – or 300% (30,000/10,000 = 3). Pretty good considering that the stock market's annual return is 10%. This all sounds great, but how do we know exactly where that return came from? Do we know it directly had to do with marketing? How about a specific campaign? Don’t get me wrong – I’m 100% pro-marketing. A big part of Hoffbeck + Co is a marketing agency. We believe in what we do. Great marketing matters, but we also know that tying your profit back to a specific marketing effort is narrow-sighted. We wish it were that simple, but it just isn’t. Here is why…
Marketing ROI is more difficult to measure than people tell you.
Marketing ROI is difficult to measure. First off, there is no perfect laboratory environment in which your business marketing efforts take place. If you use a marketing mix of any sort, meaning you have more than just one marketing effort (ie: a website, social media, ads, etc.), then tracking your return on marketing back to one effort is never going to be completely accurate. This doesn’t mean quitting your marketing efforts. It just means when you hear someone say you should invest $500/mo with them and they promise you a return of 5x for $2,500/mo profit – well, I would be quite skeptical. Your whole marketing mix matters.
Here’s the deal. Marketing is an art, even though we want it to be simple math or science. Marketing just isn’t: “Give me a dollar, and I’ll give you five”. Why? Because if you have a legitimate marketing mix, then you won’t really know what the source of those five dollars is. Let’s say you have a website, active content marketing via a blog and email marketing, lead generators, social media marketing, digital marketing efforts, SEO, ad spend, directories, and word of mouth. Do you really know where the sale came from?
If you ask a paid ad specialist, they will tell you it came from their ads, especially if they can point to a conversion that came from their campaign. Even Google will tell you that on average a business can make 8x on their Google ad spend. Let’s pause here for one second though and do some marketing mix analysis.
Let’s say this target customer, that ended up “converting” through your ad, also had an earlier awareness of your brand. Maybe they saw an Instagram post or read one of your blogs or heard you on a podcast. Then maybe one day something made them remember you and say, “Oh yeah, I remember that company I was interested in. I want to look them up again and see what they are all about.” They then go to Google and search your company name. They see your Google Ad at the top of the list, click that link to your website and proceed to book or buy something from you.
To what marketing effort does their sale get attributed? This is the commonly named attribution error of marketing. The Google Ad ended up being the conversion pathway in this example, but did it actually do the converting? Here, the target customer would have found your organic search result without a Google Ad and ended up converting either way. I’m totally pro-Google Ads, and in fact, we help run Google Ad campaigns for our clients; my example here is just to show the complexity that comes with tying ROI back to a specific marketing effort or campaign.
On top of all this, marketing campaigns tend to have a lagging effect. It takes a while for marketing efforts to do their converting. This throws another wrench in the attribution challenge.
At the same time, I’m a numbers person. I love analysis and looking at the data. When Google Ads tells me the conversion rate of a particular ad, I eat. it. up. I simply know there is more to the story. This doesn’t undermine the validity of the ad, it just puts it in the context of the non-lab environment that marketing lives in. Marketing lives in the wild. Put it out there, and let it do its thing. There is no way to fully know what did what. But still do the stuff. It all makes a difference.
The full perspective on a marketing ROI.
I don’t say all this to make you doubt the value of your marketing efforts. If you work with us with your marketing, you will get a return. We believe that, and we’ve seen it. We just know there is no way to FULLY know how much of the return you are getting from a specific marketing campaign or effort. Instead of focusing on a specific effort, we like to shift the marketing ROI conversation towards the tactics, strategy, and framework that is being used for your marketing. Marketing is an all-or-nothing game. The marketing mix makes each and every aspect of your marketing efforts important.
Your marketing mix includes all of the marketing efforts that make up the “mix” of how you’re getting word out about your business services and products. This can include your: marketing message, branding, website, email marketing, digital marketing, content marketing, ads, SEO, lead generators, social media, publications, podcasts, videos, photos, etc. A vibrant mix is encouraged and beneficial so there are many different ways and places for people to find and learn about your business.
ROI on the StoryBrand Framework
Dr. JJ Peterson (@drjjpeterson) made my job easy here. He took it upon himself to prove the efficacy of the StoryBrand Framework in his dissertation. Here are some of the takeaways.
If you aren’t familiar with the StoryBrand Framework or BrandScript, see our blogs here, here and here.
Dr. JJ found that the level of implementation in all areas of marketing has a strong influence on the success of an organization. The more an organization implements the StoryBrand framework in their marketing, the more they will see a positive influence on profitability, confidence of employees in creating marketing collateral, and saving time and money in marketing collateral creation. Size of company and type of company had no significant influence on the positive result for an organization outside of implementation.
The key is to use the StoryBrand Framework and implement it in all areas of your marketing.
Clarify your message with the StoryBrand BrandScript and then implement it in your:
Advertising messaging and communications
Direct mail campaigns
Email marketing campaigns
Sales messaging and collateral
Social media marketing
Website
One-liner (elevator pitch)
Use it everywhere. The research shows that the more the framework is implemented, the more effective it is. With anything that is effective, this isn’t rocket science. The more you use it, the better results you get. The takeaway: don’t just clarify your message and stop there. Implement it in every facet of your marketing mix. Only then will you get the ROI on your marketing that you are looking for.
Control what you can control. Make an effort and be consistent.
The final thing I’d like to drive home here with your marketing efforts and ROI is this – I recently saw a tweet about marketing by Katelyn Bourgoin (@KateBour) that I loved. She says, “You can’t control the economy, algorithm changes, the real-life trigger events that move people into the buying journey. What you can control is showing up consistently and building trust with future buyers so when they’re ready to buy, they buy from you.”
Get after it. Control what you can control and leave the rest to what it is…Uncontrollable. Your return on investment will come. What you have to start doing is investing. Put your money in your marketing and start building your brand into what it is capable of becoming.
Want to chat more about how the StoryBrand framework can boost your marketing strategy and ROI? Schedule a Call with us today. ⚡️
More soon,
Lane
CONSULTANT + PARTNER
P.S.
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