Most marketers have a tendency to only include lagging indicators

Shakhawat · Post by **Shakhawat** » Sun Jan 05, 2025 5:28 am

Lagging indicators are outputs, such as number of new customer acquisitions. Leading indicators instead measure inputs, things like conversion rates and opportunity age. These things can reveal what might happen in the future.

It's a lot easier, of course, to measure things that already band database happened. But as this HubSpot piece details, it's worth trying to include both types of indicators in your KPIs. That's because leading indicators act as business drivers "because they come before trends emerge, which can help you identify whether or not you are on track to reaching your goals. If you can identify which leading indicators will impact your future performance you will have a much better shot at success."

4. Map relevance to industry

Not every KPI makes sense for every industry. While you create yours, you'll need to think carefully about what's most relevant for your specific industry and for your business model. If you're a B2B SaaS company, you would choose KPIs very different from the ones a marketing VP at a retail company might choose, for example. Our advice? Go with the industry standard KPIs you already know make sense (from steps 1 and 2!), and then add a couple that are more relevant to your specified model and goals.

5. Create the right dashboards

Because KPIs are just no good at all unless you have the capability to measure and assess, having easy access to dashboards you created to view your KPIs is a must. We're fans of HubSpot and InsightSquared.

Creating dashboards won't necessarily help with establishing the right KPIs in your first go around, but it absolutely will help with measurement, and therefore, with getting a baseline (step 1) the next time you need to go through the process.

Using these tools, plus the steps and tips we've outlined, you'll be well on your way to overcoming this periodic challenge and establishing much better KPIs for your Inbound efforts. If you want to understand your goals in the meantime, take a stab at using our marketing goals calculator!