In creating messages, marketers who utilize analytics have a wealth of metrics and data to navigate. When asked which information marketers use to build upon messages, or create different message types, we found "tried and true" approaches were still commonly employed among respondents.

As such, we asked our surveyed marketers …

Q: Which of the following analytics do you routinely use to create different message types?

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Both keyword (45%) and website activity (45%) data proved popular among respondents, as did the use of comparative data from previous messaging (43%).

What is more notable is the performance of one of the lowest-ranking categories, "device usage," which was selected by just 14% of surveyed marketers.

As we learned in the MarketingSherpa 2012 Mobile Marketing Benchmark Report, relatively few marketers are currently tracking mobile adoption, with only a handful of respondents indicating they have detailed data on customer mobile behavior. However, in that same report, we also learned of the data marketers are collecting, device usage was the top metric tracked by respondents.

While this category wasn’t limited to mobile devices for the purposes of our analytics benchmark study, the ever-growing pantheon of smartphones, tablets and notebooks makes this noteworthy.

Points to Consider

Have you adjusted, or added to, your messaging based on device usage data? What changes did you make and what results entailed? Do you anticipate your organization will increase its use of these metrics as new devices become mainstreamed as marketing platforms?

For more information about marketing analytics, download the free excerpt from the 2013 Marketing Analytics Benchmark Report. Be sure to share your own analysis of this chart in the MarketingSherpa LinkedIn Group for a chance to be published in a future blog post.

Useful links related to this research

Marketing Research Chart: Marketers’ collection of analytics data

Marketing Data: Using predictive analytics to make sense of big data

The Data Vs Creativity Debate: Is successful marketing driven by analytics or art?

Marketing Analytics: Why you need to hire an analyst