5 Marketing Metrics to Review Before 2026

What marketing metrics should you review before planning your 2026 strategy? If you’ve run campaigns this year but aren’t sure what worked, now is the time to review your performance. 

In this blog, we’ll break down the five most essential marketing metrics to track, why they matter, and how they’ll help you make better decisions in the new year. Whether you’re managing marketing in-house or working with a digital agency, knowing your numbers is non-negotiable.

Why Marketing Metrics Matter

Every dollar you spend on marketing should be working for you, not just making noise. But many businesses jump from platform to platform, campaign to campaign, without stopping to assess what’s actually delivering results.

Tracking the right marketing metrics helps you:

• Cut spend that isn’t converting
• Double down on what is working
• Set realistic, data-backed goals for the year ahead
• Report performance clearly, whether to a team, a board, or just yourself
  

And if you’re planning next year’s campaigns without reviewing these key indicators, you’re essentially guessing your way into 2026.

1. Conversion Rate

Let’s start with the obvious, but often misunderstood, one. Conversion rate measures how many people took the action you wanted, whether that’s filling out a form, booking a call, or making a purchase.

It’s not just about traffic, it’s about what your traffic is doing.

Track it across:

• Landing pages
• Website forms
• Ad campaigns
• Email campaigns
  

If your traffic is high but conversions are low, the problem isn’t your ads it’s likely your messaging, offer, or user experience.

2. Cost Per Lead (CPL)

How much are you spending to get a qualified lead? This marketing metric is crucial for businesses investing in paid advertising. You should be tracking CPL across:

• Google Ads
• Meta Ads (Facebook/Instagram)
• LinkedIn Ads
• Any other paid channel
  

A high CPL doesn’t always mean the campaign failed, it could still be profitable if the leads are high quality. But consistently tracking this figure helps you optimise spend and scale what’s working.

3. Return on Ad Spend (ROAS)

If you’re running paid campaigns and not tracking ROAS, you’re flying blind. ROAS tells you how much revenue you’re generating for every dollar spent on advertising. This marketing metric helps you understand true performance beyond vanity metrics like impressions or clicks.

You might mention ROAS when reviewing your campaigns but if you want to go deeper into how attribution affects that number, this article from HubSpot is a great place to start.

4. Email Engagement Metrics

Still think email marketing is dead? It’s not. It’s just often done badly. Some of the most important marketing metrics to track in email include:

• Open rate
• Click-through rate
• Unsubscribe rate
• Conversions from emails
  

This helps you understand how well your content is connecting and whether your database is actually engaged or just bloated.

5. Website Performance

Your website is often your most valuable marketing asset but only if it performs. Here’s what to measure:

• Traffic volume (and where it’s coming from)
• Bounce rate
• Average time on page
• Top-performing pages
• Conversion actions (downloads, enquiries, sales)
  

Tools like Google Analytics (GA4) and Hotjar can give you insight into what’s working and what’s turning users away.

Marketing Analytics vs Marketing Metrics

You might have come across terms like marketing analytics or marketing management analytics, especially in tools and reports. 

So what’s the difference?

• Marketing metrics are the individual numbers: clicks, conversions, ROI, etc.
• Marketing analytics is the bigger picture → interpreting those numbers to understand performance and trends.
  

Both matter. But without the metrics, you can’t analyse anything. And without analysis, you’re just collecting numbers without purpose.

How This All Ties Into Your 2026 Marketing Planning

It’s tempting to roll into January with a fresh campaign idea and a new content calendar but if you don’t look at the marketing metrics from the past year, you’re not learning, you’re guessing.

Your 2026 strategy should be shaped by:

• What generated leads
• What didn’t
• What gave you a return
• What wasted time and money
  

That’s where proper marketing planning starts, not with a “marketing plan example” copied from a template, but with real data from your own business.

Want Help Making Sense of the Numbers?

At Marketing Together, we work with businesses of all sizes to help turn messy data into meaningful insights and build strategies that actually convert. We’re based on the Gold Coast but work with businesses across Australia who are ready to grow with confidence. Whether you’re a marketing team looking for support or a business owner wearing one too many hats, we can help.

• We help you track the right marketing metrics
• We build custom dashboards and reports
• We turn your 2025 results into a smarter 2026 strategy

👉 Book a free strategy call and let’s review your year properly and start next year with a plan, not a guess. Contact us today for your free strategy consult  →