How to Build a Content Dashboard to Track Your Marketing Efforts

Building an effective content marketing strategy requires having the right data and insights to make informed decisions. A content dashboard gives you a centralized place to monitor key content performance metrics so you can optimize your efforts

In this comprehensive guide, we’ll walk through the entire process of creating a content dashboard from scratch. We’ll cover:

• Defining your content marketing goals
• Selecting the right KPIs to track
• Choosing the best dashboard creation tools
• Building interactive data visualizations
• Updating your dashboard regularly.

By the end, you’ll have a clear blueprint for building a tailored content dashboard that fits your unique needs. Let’s dive in!

Step 1: Define Your Content Marketing Goals

The first step is identifying your overall content marketing objectives Ask yourself

• What are we trying to achieve with our content efforts?
• How will we define and measure success?

Common content marketing goals include:

• Increasing website traffic
• Generating more leads
• Improving lead quality
• Growing brand awareness and reach
• Increasing conversions and sales

Clearly defining your goals is crucial because it informs which key performance indicators (KPIs) you’ll need to track in your dashboard.

For example, if your goal is to generate more leads, you’ll want to monitor metrics like visitors, form submissions, and downloads. If you’re focused on increasing engagement, you may look at time on page, scroll depth, and social shares.

Once you’ve aligned on your goals, document them so you can refer back when selecting metrics and building dashboard views later on.

Step 2: Choose the Right KPIs to Include

With your goals defined, it’s time to determine which metrics you need to track. Aim to identify around 5-10 high-level KPIs that will indicate how your content is performing.

Here are some of the most important content marketing metrics to consider:

Website Traffic

• Sessions
• Unique visitors
• Pageviews
• Bounce rate
• Pages per session

Engagement

• Time on page
• Scroll depth
• Social shares
• Comments

Conversions

• Form submissions
• Content downloads
• Email subscribers
• Trials started
• Purchases

SEO

• Organic traffic
• Keyword rankings
• Backlinks

Marketing Attribution

• Leads by source
• Revenue by campaign

Take the time to carefully select the metrics that will show how your content is moving the needle on your goals. Avoid “vanity metrics” like social media likes that don’t actually impact performance.

Pro Tip: Break metrics down by different variables like channel, campaign, and content type to surface more insights.

Step 3: Choose Your Dashboard Creation Tool(s)

Now that you know which KPIs to track, it’s time to determine how you’ll actually build your content dashboard. Here are three options to consider:

Option 1: Spreadsheets

Excel and Google Sheets are popular starting points for creating dashboards. You can manually input your metrics or use functions like GOOGLEFINANCE to pull data from external sources.

Pros: Free, easy to get started, flexible formatting

Cons: Manual data entry can be time-consuming, error prone, and lead to outdated info. Limited chart customization. Difficult to share with others.

Option 2: BI & Analytics Platforms

Dedicated business intelligence tools like Tableau, Looker, and Chartio make dashboarding much more powerful but have a steeper learning curve. These platforms connect to data sources like your CMS, web analytics, and CRM to build fully customized reports and charts.

Pros: Interactive drill-down dashboards. Automated data connections. Robust visualization options. Easy sharing and updates.

Cons: Steeper learning curve. Can require IT help to set up. More expensive paid plans.

Option 3: Marketing Analytics Tools

All-in-one marketing analytics platforms like Google Analytics, Adobe Analytics, and HubSpot integrate with your website, ads, emails, and more to give you pre-built content marketing dashboards.

Pros: Quick to implement pre-configured dashboards. Integrations with marketing channels. Often more affordable.

Cons: Less flexibility. Templated instead of fully custom. May lack connection to financial data.

Evaluate these options to determine the best approach based on your use case, budget, technical capabilities, and analytics maturity. Many teams use a combination like leveraging marketing analytics software while also building custom dashboards in Tableau or Looker.

Step 4: Connect Your Data Sources

Now it’s time to pull in your data! This step will vary based on the tool(s) you’re using, but here are some common sources for content marketing metrics:

• Web Analytics: Google Analytics, Adobe Analytics, Matomo, etc. Provide traffic stats, conversions, etc.

• Google Data Studio: Connector to pull data from GA into dashboards

• Keyword Rank Tracking: SEMrush, Ahrefs, Moz, etc. Provide keyword rankings and organic traffic data.

• Social Media: Facebook Analytics, Twitter Analytics, etc. For engagement metrics.

• Email Marketing: Mailchimp, Constant Contact, HubSpot. Integrate campaigns for subscriber data.

• CRM / Accounting: Salesforce, HubSpot, QuickBooks. For lead and financial data.

• Google Sheets: Can pull from Analytics APIs like Google Search Console.

The key is centralizing your metrics from each source into a single reporting tool. Automated connectors and integrations make this simpler for dedicated dashboarding platforms.

Put in the work up front to properly structure your data for easy reporting. Keep it clean, consistent, and organized.

Step 5: Build Your Dashboard Framework

Now comes the fun part – creating the actual dashboard! Lay out the basic framework first before visualizing your data:

• Choose your layout: Focus on either one master view or multiple tabs for drilldown detail.

• Pick intuitive names: Like “Website Traffic” or “Content Engagement.”

• Organize related charts together: Group content types, campaigns, etc.

• Allow custom filtering: By date, segment, content name, etc.

• Leave room to add to it: Your data needs will evolve so leave space to expand.

• Make it easy on the eyes: Use plenty of white space and keep it simple.

• Optimize viewing: Ensure it reflows responsibly on phones and tablets.

Taking the time to thoughtfully structure your dashboard will make it much easier to use and glean insights from on an ongoing basis.

Step 6: Visualize Your Data

Now comes the fun part – turning your metrics into impactful, interactive charts and graphs!

Aim to create visualizations that:

• Communicate insights quickly: At-a-glance indicators that jump out.

• Spark further exploration: Click into charts to investigate details.

• Reveal trends and outliers: Time-series line charts are great for this.

• Compare segments: Like content types or campaigns side-by-side.

• Align to your goals: Emphasize key conversion and ROI metrics.

Some best practices to keep in mind:

• Lead with text: Explain what the chart shows above each visualization.

• Label charts clearly: So anyone can interpret them.

• Limit clutter: Only show critical info needed to make decisions.

• Keep it simple: Resist overly complex charts.

• Make it meaningful: Charts should tie directly to your goals.

• Tell a story: Create a logical flow through the entire dashboard.

With the right mix of charts, your dashboard will become a powerful tool for uncovering transformative insights from your content efforts.

Step 7: Automate Updates and Alerts

The key to a sustainable, effective content dashboard is setting up regular automated updates. Otherwise, your data will quickly become stale and unreliable.

Here are some tips for automating your dashboard:

• Set recurring refresh schedules: Daily, weekly or monthly based on your needs.

• Integrate real-time data sources: For instant updates to web stats.

• Build data pipelines: To consolidate and process multiple sources on a schedule.

• Create alert thresholds: Receive notifications when KPIs exceed targets.

• Generate automated reports: Email PDF exports to stakeholders on a cadence.

By refreshing your dashboard data on routine intervals, you can trust that you’re always making decisions based on current, accurate information.

Step 8: Analyze and Take Action!

With your shiny new content dashboard built, it’s time to start digging in to surface those juicy insights!

Analyze your data with a critical eye to identify trends, quantify results, surface what’s working well, and determine where there are opportunities.

Then, actually take action based on what you learned! Turn those insights into concrete optimization activities like:

• Improving underperforming content
• Promoting high-conver