Ever wonder how all the cool creatives on the block seem to just effortlessly make money and continuously grow their business?? Spoiler alert: it’s not grasping at #allthemarketingthings but rather the RIGHT marketing things. And all those cool creative kids are using one thing that most entrepreneurs aren’t to know how to figure out which ones are the “right” ones: numbers. And today I’m giving you 5 basic numbers you need to know to grow your business too!

These 5 numbers are going to help you:

• stop wasting time on marketing things that don’t matter
• get clear direction for next steps in your biz, and prioritize all the rest
• use all the tools you already have (instead of buying new ones or learning something new)
• finally scale your business!

5 basic numbers you need to know to grow your creative business:

1. Engagement Rate

   1. On social media, calculate your engagement rate by dividing the sum of all of your likes and comments and saves by the total number of followers you have. This number lets you know if your audience is enjoying your content and will help you determine if you should post similarly or try something new and also spark new ideas for future blog posts. The higher the engagement rate, the higher the algorithm ranks your visibility, and thus new eyeballs = more potential for dollar bills. #winning
   2. In your email service provider (Like Convertkit or Mailchimp), be mindful of your open rates and click-through rates. If no one opens your emails then what’s the point of trying to collect them? And if no one is clicking on anything, how are you actually getting them to pay you for anything?? Pay close attention to these numbers to make sure “the money is in the list”.

2. Conversion Rate

   1. So you’ve got a lead magnet landing page and popped that puppy on social media? Don’t go high fiving yourself just yet– we gotta make sure it’s actually CONVERTING! If we’re talking about a lead magnet and/or landing page, you calculate your conversion rate by how many people signed up divided by how many people landed on your page. Use this number to set benchmarks/standards for yourself to strive to increase. Try adjusting the copy, imagery, or even button copy to boost conversion rates and get more people to smack that button.
   2. Same goes for your actual website! Use the above logic to apply to your website. For example, check the conversion rate for your services page. Have a bunch of visitors to your page but no one is clicking the contact button?? Um, Houston: That’s a problem! But you won’t know until you check it and track it in the future, so make sure you do that for me, ok??

3. New Visitors

   1. Using my all time favorite “numbers” tool, Google Analytics, check the number of new visitors. This number lets you know how many NEW eyeballs are landing on your pages. I LOVE a good die-hard fan and all because hey, a community is super important right?? Right! But getting new site visitors is an indicator of growth and increases your chances of sales.

4. Follower Growth Rate

   1. I use Iconosquare to have this number auto-magically calculate for me and so I can refer to it frequently, but your follower growth rate can be calculated manually by referring to the below formula. Then you can track month-over-month or week-over-week progress to see what strategy you should replicate (or course-correct). My FAVORITE part about this particular number in Iconosquare is that they give me a pretty graph so I can easily see when my growth spikes, and go back to Instagram to see what I did so I can keep doing more of that! More followers and fans= more selling and impact opportunity!

5. Sale Per Email Address

   1. Need to light a fire for you to actually care about that email list?? (TRUST ME, THE ANSWER IS YES!) Calculate your “sale per email address” in less than 60 seconds. Divide the total number of net sales revenue by the total number of email addresses you sent to during that same time frame and voila. If I can see that I make $100 per email address collected as opposed to $20 per Instagram fan, guess which strategy I’m going to prioritize next?

So what’s a good conversion rate? What’s a good Engagement rate? Good anything rate?

You’ll dislike me for this, but it really does depend. It truly depends on your offering, the market your in, and the marketing format. I like to find my rates and aim for better! Here are some industry-wide rates or “rules of thumb” I try to go by though:

• Email open rates: 20-30% open rate/2-5% click-through rate according to Convertkit.
• Instagram engagement rate: 3% according to Influencer Marketing Hub.
• Landing page conversion rate: 12% according to Unbounce.

The point is, the more you know, the more you can grow! Establishing these benchmarks early on will allow you to have a reference point so you can strive for more and optimize what you already have instead of going to buy the next social media course or investing a zillion dollars into some new get rich quick scheme.

Keep up with these numbers in a basic Google Sheet or Excel doc and I promise you’ll be on your way to marketing like a pro. And yes, if you get stuck anywhere…you can holler at me so I can get you “unstuck” in a jiffy–It’s kinda my thing. 😉

Cheers to basic numbers (and the weekend!) boo.