Before you spend too much of your valuable time or marketing budget on counting the clicks and charting the open rates, it’s important to review some of the basic principles of what’s really worth measuring and why.

Marketing projects are measured by impact on both profit and the customer. In her book The Green Banana Papers, Chris Coleman breaks it down to three basic rules: Measure one thing at a time Measure it long enough to know what’s really happening Make incremental, not massive, changes

Acknowledging the simplicity here, you then have to figure out what is working and what isn’t. Coleman says to pay attention to three main indicators:

• The length of your sales cycle
• Cost per sale
• The tactics in your marketing mix that yield the best return

Track these three indicators for one year to establish benchmarks. In year two, you’ll notice trends, and in the third year you’ll have enough data to identify the best opportunities.

Through consistent evaluation of the returns from each of your market segments, you will develop a system in which your marketing strategies are modified to take advantage of clearly identified opportunities.

Today, thanks to blogs, forums, wikis, podcasts and all the viral marketing tools of Web 2.0, we can find out from customers what we do well and how we stack up against our competitors. Obtaining some legitimate customer feedback and third-party (constructive) criticism can go a long way in determining the course of marketing campaigns.

Intrigued by The Green Banana Papers, we called author Chris Coleman to get some of her latest thoughts on tracking sales and marketing efforts. She’s working on a new book, as you’ll see, and here are her comments on today’s Customer Relationship Management.

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