Despite of spending a lot of money on TV, print and digital advertisements, entrepreneurs do not get expected results. Here are some powerful tips that will help entrepreneurs calculate their marketing productivity ratio, find gaps in their marketing strategies and tools to fill those gaps. To find out gaps in your brand marketing, you have to understand below two ratios: ## **PURCHASE ACTION RATIO** Purchase action ratio refers to the number of people purchasing your brand out of total number of people aware about your brand. **Formula:**:- $Brand Awareness – Brand Purchase (Action of buying) = Purchase Action Ratio$ - It will tell you about actions around buying. - For example, _Baba Sehgal,_ Indian rapper, _has_ massive brand awareness, but his purchase action ratio is very low. Similarly, Indian dancer Rakhi Sawant also has very huge brand awareness, but action around buying is very low. ## **BRAND ADVOCACY RATIO** - t refers to the number of people purchased your product out of number of people who gave reference of your product. - They become advocate of your brand, which means that they become promoter of your brand. Formula: $Brand Advocate – Brand Purchase = Brand Advocacy Ratio$ ## **FIVE ‘A’S FRAMEWORK** To put these two ratios into framework and implement them in your business, you have to understand below mentioned 5 ‘A’s:- 1. **Aware:** how many people are aware about your product? 2. **Appeal:** How many people like your product and want to connect with you? 3. **Ask:** How many people make an inquiry about your product’s pricing via call, landing page or retail shop and want to purchase your product? 4. **Act:** How many people bought your product? 5. **Advocate:** How many people liked your brand and referred to more people? If people did not like your product, they will not become advocate of your brand. #### **CASE STUDY** Let us understand 5 ‘A’s with a case study of YouTube channel: - **Awareness:** Suppose there are 10 crore people aware of your YouTube channel and watch your videos. - **Appeal:** Out of 10 crore, you appealed to 1 crore people and they subscribed his YouTube channel. **Your Appealing Ratio Formula:** **Appeal ÷ Awareness X 100 = Appealing Ratio** 1 crore (Subscribers) **÷** 10 crore (Viewers) X 100 = 10% Appealing ratio tells about the brand’s awareness campaign quality. - **Ask:** out of 1 crore subscribers, 10 lakh people made an inquiry through call and landing page to you. Your Ask Ratio Formula: **Ask** **_÷_** **Appeal X 100 = Ask Ratio** 10 lakh (Ask) _÷_ 1 crore (Appeal) X 100 = 10% So, only 10% people i.e. 10 lakh people made purchase inquiry out of 1 crore who watched his videos. However, 90 lakh people are who are still watching his videos, but have not shown interest for purchase. - **Act:** Out of these 10 lakh people, 60,000 people actually purchased the product that stands at 6%. **Your Act Ratio or Purchase Action Ratio:** **Act** **_÷_** **Ask X 100 = Act Ratio** 60,000 (people purchased) _÷ 10 lakh (people enquired)_ X 100 = 6% So, out of 10 lakh people, only 60,000 people i.e. 6% people actually purchased the product. - **Advocate:** Out of these 60,000 people, 3000 people become channel partner (IBC) of Mr.X's brand who referred the product to others. **Your Advocacy Ratio:** **Advocate** **_÷_** **Act X 100 = Brand Advocacy Ratio** 3000 _÷_ 60000 X 100 = 5% So, out of 60,000 people who bought Mr.X’s product, 5% people became his advocate. ## **MISTAKES AND SOLUTIONS FOR 5 ‘A’S FRAMEWORK** Common mistake that most of the brands commit is – _“they spend their entire marketing budget on brand awareness, while undermining other steps of converting it into purchase and advocacy.”_ Following tips will help you find out gaps in implementing 5 ‘A’s, and solve them: 6. **Appeal** **_÷_** **Awareness:** **Problem:** If people are aware about your brand; but, they are not appealing or trying to connect with you, it means that your brand campaign is weak. People know about your product; but, it is not so appealing that they take any action. **Solution:** Bring improvement in your marketing communication. You can take the short term problem solving course on advertising, marketing communication, and presentation. 7. **Ask** **_÷_** **Appeal:** **Problem:** In this, people ask about your brand but they are not purchasing your brand. It means that people like you but they stop before final purchase. For example, customer keeps talking to you and says that he will tell you when he will purchase the product but he is not buying it. **Solution-** - Focus on content marketing by informing people about your brand through infographics, digital marketing, and free videos. - Give free solutions to attract more customers, it means you can give first service free of cost or give him a scheme so that he starts using your product or service 8. **Act** **_÷_** **Ask:** **Problem:** Even after free schemes, people are asking for your product but not buying it, then it means either your sales team, distribution network, or CRM is weak. **Solution:** Work on improving sales team performance through training programs and build robust distribution network. 9. **Advocate** **_÷_** **Act:** **Problem:** People have purchased your product, but they are not returning and not referring your product to others. This is because of any of the two reasons: - Your product quality is not so good - He wants to refer your product to others but do not have any loyalty or referral scheme. **Solution:** - Improve your product quality to make every customer your advocate. - Give them loyalty and referral programs to refer new customers. Out of the 5 A’s discussed above, you need to identify where your business is stucked and take steps accordingly. ## **KEY LEARNINGS:** - Access your brand’s marketing productivity ratio on the parameters of 5 ‘A’s. - Bring improvement in your marketing communication by training your sales team and distribution network. - Focus on excellent content marketing to inform people about your brand through infographics, digital marketing, and free videos. - Retarget the content marketing tools to help customer take buying decisions. - Given first time, free solutions to customers that make them come to you. - Give them free service, discount scheme etc to attract customers. - Train sales team training, and build robust distribution network to convert lead into sales. - Improve product quality to make every customer your advocate. - Give customers loyalty and referral programs to make new customers.