5 tips for writing marketing objectives

Writing marketing objectives can sometimes be a minefield, we all have a tendency to say to our marketing team “here’s the number, hit that” but in order to reach that revenue target setting some clear objectives helps to focus the team, ensure activity gets out the door on time and align marketing with other departments. Here’s our 5 tips for writing marketing objectives that’ll help you hit your targets…

1 | What type of objectives should you use?

There are lots of different types of objectives you can use and if your organisation isn’t set on one methodology it makes life hard for your team. However, there is no time like the present to put them in place. From OKRs to SMART - what should you use? 

We recommend using OKRs for marketing. Why you ask? Well, they focus on a few core elements that are vital for the success of your marketing team:

1. Results - they are results and deadline driven, this ensures that your team will achieve some of your business goals in a timely and data driven way
2. Collaborative - OKRs rely on other teams input and collaboration, building relationships and strong communication 
3. Stretch goals - OKRs also focus on realistically stretching goals that help to drive performance 
4. Execution - they are execution focused so every member of the team has key projects they’re responsible for executing on 

2 | Marketing objectives structure 

We hope we’ve sold you on OKRs as a methodology, now let’s focus on how marketing can use them. 

In an ideal world you’ll have a set of 2-4 business goals for the quarter, for example: “Hit £1 million closed revenue in Q4”, marketing would then take this OKR and filter it down to become about marketing activity and contribution to that revenue goal:

Objective: Marketing to contribute £1 million of pipeline in Q4 to support revenue goal 

Key result: BOFU Q4 marketing campaign 

Key result: Optimise product and solution pages on website increasing traffic to those pages through Google Ads by 2x 

Key result: Increase rankings by 10% across top 5 keywords 

Key result: Run a customer advocacy G2 campaign increasing reviews by 20% 

Collaborators: Customers success and sales 

Deadline: End of Q4 

This core marketing goal would then further break down into personal objectives for each team member, ensuring the overarching goal and key results are met, citing individual contributors across teams.  

That does mean the rest of your teams need to agree to these OKRs too!

3 | Realistic marketing objectives 

One trap it’s easy to fall into is to set too many OKRs. Ideally each team should have 2-4 OKRs per quarter and each team member should have 2-4 individual OKRs that allow them to stretch to hit the group goals. 

You’ve also got to be realistic and base your OKRs on previous performance, so if you’ve never hit £1 million pipeline in a quarter is it realistic to expect your marketing team to do that from a stand still? Probably not.  

4 | Make sure OKRs are clear

Your marketing OKRs should take into consideration the clear structure as Semrush suggest: 

1. Collaborative - fosters investment and ideation across teams. 
2. Limited - making sure OKRs have a time and scope limit ensuring people can go hell for leather on specific projects that are specific and relevant at the time.  
3. Emotional - making sure the team feels emotionally invested, means projects are more likely to complete on time and with better results. 
4. Appreciable - this means that goals are broken down into smaller goals, the OKR structure allows this to happen. 
5. Refinable - if things change there should be flex in your goals to refine and amend them if they are / aren’t working! Don’t die on a hill that isn’t working. 

5 | Build in retrospectives for OKRs 

At the start and end of each quarter you should allow time for reflection on your OKRs. Building in retrospectives for specific projects and also a chance to celebrate goals you’ve smashed and discuss those that you didn't reach. This is a vital part of understanding: team dynamics, performance and also allowing your marketing team a chance to improve and reflect for next time in a constructive way.