Calculating the actual return of marketing is now possible thanks to the ROI Marketing methodology. Learn how this model work, what is it good for, and how to get started with this brie document.

1. ROI MARKETING THE NEW PERFORMANCE STANDARD
ROI
Marketing
The new
performance
standard
MAKING MARKETING ACCOUNTABLE www.roimarketinginstitute.org
For many years, measuring the real
economic return of marketing initiatives (like
events, trade shows, social media, webs,
POS campaigns, etc.) has been like the Holy
Grail, everybody wanted to have it but most
considered that it did not exist. This has
changed since ROI Marketing Institute
created the ROI Marketing Matrix ©, a
robust, simple, yet feasible methodology
that helps organizations of all sorts to
measure the actual return of marketing and
commercial initiatives, its ROI.
Why is it needed?
Marketing as a discipline, cannot afford to
keep being pushed to a tactical level due to
its inability to show its direct contribution to
the bottom line. Not anymore. There is an
increasing need to show the economic
impact of all variables in all organizations,
and marketing cannot stay aside. Budgets
are finite and increasingly volatile as
consumer changed behaviors rapidly and
technology places changing and evolution
stress in a perennial way. CEOs, General
Managers, Board members, shareholders,
investors, etc. demand that every variable
within their businesses becomes
accountable… in hard cash. If you want
marketing to become strategic for your
organization or the ones of your clients, you
need to prove its contribution to the bottom
line in real economic terms.
What is it good for?
ROI Marketing, as any marketing
management model should, and the ROI
Marketing Matrix © methodology does,
serve four different functionalities that will
help marketers and decision makers to better
manage projects and campaigns in a
business-related fashion. Those
functionalities are:
Validation: it responds to the
question “Will the company make
money with this project if we reached
our objectives?” It establishes also the
break-even point of any given initiative
and the influence needed in sales to be
able to achieve it.
Prediction: here, we answer to
the question “What would it happen
if…”. Changing variables under control,
allows you to generate potential
outcomes to be validated
commercially.
Evaluation: it is the
measurement of the actual return (ROI)
of the project under evaluation.
Planning: knowing the actual
economic return is not the only benefit
you will be able to obtain from ROI
Marketing. After each cycle of
evaluation, marketers will be able to
define a set of indicators, ratios, and
criteria that could be used in the future
for better and more profitable,
marketing management.
The first two functionalities serve pre-
investment purposes by helping managers
on the go-no-go decision making process,
providing objective criteria and key
information that can change the economic
outcome of the project from negative to
positive, minimizing risks.
The third functionality (evaluation) is a
diagnosis tool that will serve to define the
real economic performance of the project or
campaign.
The forth one contributes to make marketing
strategical to the organization. It is the one
that extracts business intelligence that
should drive sales growth and profit
maximization when planning future projects
and campaigns.
Towards profitable
marketing
by ROI Marketing Institute

2. ROI MARKETING THE NEW PERFORMANCE STANDARD | www.roimarketinginstitute.org
WHAT CHALLENGES DOES IT SOLVE?
ROI MARKETING offers a solution and responds
to some of the most excruciating challenges in
marketing management:
BUDGET CUTS
CLIENTS DECISION TO INVEST
PROJECTS OBJECTIVE EVALUATION
PLANNING FOR BUSINESS RESULTS
MAINTAINING LEVELS OF INVESTMENT
GAINING SUPPORT FROM THE REST OF THE
ORGANIZATION
How do I start?
ROI Marketing should never be a revolution but
an evolution for any organization. Hence the
ROI Marketing Matrix © should be deployed
gradually.
The ROI MARKETING MATRIX © has a clear
and defined journey that will make the whole
process of incorporating ROI Marketing as a
marketing management model smooth and
stress free. The organization will go through
an evolution of systems and procedures that
will minimize risks and resistance to change.
The transition is gradual and comprehensive,
from acquiring the capacity at organizational
level, to evaluating a particular project, all
the way to deploying it in a holistic way. The
first step in the ROI Marketing Roadmap is
granting the acquisition of an operational
capacity, this process is done in two phases:
training and piloting. Once the capacity is
acquired and the model tested, it will expand
and become a standard procedure. All these
phases are supported by ROI Marketing
Institute to guarantee that ROI Marketing
becomes not only an operational standard
but that it also brings economic results to the
business.
Training is the first step that will
help the organization to
incorporate the ROI
marketing management
model. Through
education material and
workshops, participants
will obtain the ROI
Marketing Professional
Certification.
Participating companies will
also obtain the ROI Marketing Corporate
Certification, giving a clear message to
investors and stakeholders about how
marketing budgets are managed for profits.
Professional Certification is good for life,
while Corporate Certification is valid for two
years and can be renewed with a simple
check and marketing audit. ROI Marketing
Institute’s knowledge center is regularly
producing contents that increase people’s
capacity to manage marketing for profits.
In order to minimize risks, it is advisable to
run a pilot project. Usually a project of low
exposure and minimal risk, helps to gauge
the system and how the methodology is
deployed. It is a real project in a real situation
(fictitious ones are run during the training
phase) that helps to verify that criteria are
met, relating factors work properly, a ROI
figure is robustly reached, and that business
intelligence is gathered. During the piloting
phase, not only the project is under scrutiny
but the way ROI Marketing generates value
for the organization as well.
The deployment phase consists in
standardizing processes and procedures that
comply with the ROI Marketing milestones. It
becomes part of the day to day operations
management and it counts with the ongoing
support of ROI Marketing Institute that helps
to make ROI Marketing sustainable as a
management model.
UN PILOTO DE IMPLANTACIÓN
ACQUIRING CAPABILITIES
PILOTING
DEPLOYMENT
WANT TO KNOW MORE?
www.roimarketinginstitute.org
Roadmap to
ROI Marketing
by Pablo Turletti