If you’ve ever tried to figure out if your marketing campaign actually paid off, you know how messy it can get. Too many dashboards, too many “insights,” and somehow your boss is still asking, “But did it work?” If you’re using Convrt to run your campaigns, this guide will show you—step-by-step—how to use its reporting tools to measure ROI without getting lost in a sea of graphs.
This is for marketers, campaign managers, or anyone who wants real answers from their data (not just pretty charts). Let’s get into it.
Step 1: Know What “ROI” Actually Means (For You)
ROI—Return on Investment—sounds simple: profit divided by cost. But in marketing, it’s a little messier. What counts as a “return”? Is it sales, leads, sign-ups, or just more eyeballs on your site? If you don’t get this straight, you’ll waste hours chasing numbers that don’t matter.
Before you even open Convrt: - Decide what “success” looks like for this campaign. Is it revenue? Qualified leads? Something else? - Figure out what you’ll count as “cost.” Just ad spend? Or creative, tools, and time too? - Write it down. Seriously. If you don’t, you’ll forget when you’re staring at the dashboard.
Pro Tip:
Don’t let someone else’s definition of success hijack your campaign. If your boss cares about leads, focus there—even if Convrt is showing you a hundred other metrics.
Step 2: Set Up Conversion Tracking (Don’t Skip This)
You can’t measure ROI if you aren’t tracking the right stuff. Convrt offers a few ways to track conversions—form fills, purchases, custom events—but you need to set them up before your campaign goes live.
How to do it (the honest way):
- Go to Convrt’s Events/Conversions setup.
- Pick the conversion actions that actually matter (not just every button click).
- Use Convrt’s tracking script or integrations to set up conversion points on your site or app.
- Test it. Fake a conversion and make sure it shows up in Convrt. If it doesn’t, fix it now—waiting until after launch is a headache you don’t want.
What works:
Setting up conversion tracking before launch, double-checking with test data, and making sure everyone knows what’s being tracked.
What doesn’t:
Assuming “default” tracking will magically get what you need. It won’t. And don’t trust third-party integrations blindly—check your data.
Step 3: Tag Your Campaigns (So You Can Filter Later)
Convrt’s reports get a lot more useful if you tag your campaigns properly from the start. Tags are just simple labels (“Spring Sale,” “Retargeting,” etc.) that help you slice and dice your data later.
Quick tagging tips:
- Use clear, consistent names that you (and your future self) will understand.
- Tag by campaign type, target audience, or geography if it helps you compare performance.
- Don’t go overboard—too many tags just make things confusing.
Step 4: Dig Into the Right Report (Not All of Them)
Convrt gives you a buffet of reports. The trick is not to eat everything—just pick the ones that fill you up.
For ROI, focus on: - Campaign Performance: Shows conversions, cost, and calculated ROI. - Funnels: Tells you where people drop off, so you know if you’re wasting money on the wrong step. - Attribution: Helps you figure out what actually caused the conversion (not just what happened last).
What to ignore:
Vanity metrics. Don’t get distracted by “impressions” or “likes” if your goal is sales or leads—they rarely tie back to ROI in a meaningful way.
Step 5: Calculate Real ROI in Convrt
Convrt does a pretty good job of calculating ROI if you feed it the right data. Still, don’t take the number at face value. Here’s how to make sure it’s telling you the truth:
In Convrt:
- Go to the “Campaign Performance” report.
- Filter by the campaign and date range you care about.
- Look at the “ROI” or “Return” column—this should show you (Return - Cost) / Cost as a percentage.
What to double-check:
- Are all your costs in there? If you only counted ad spend, you’re probably overstating ROI.
- Are conversions mapped to revenue properly? If your “conversion” is a lead, and not every lead becomes a sale, you might want to use an average value per conversion.
- Are there weird spikes or drops? Sometimes data glitches or double-counted events can throw off your numbers.
If the built-in ROI isn’t telling the full story: - Export the raw data (CSV or Excel). - Run your own calculations. Sometimes you need to add in extra costs or adjust for refunds, returns, or unqualified leads.
Step 6: Compare Campaigns (Apples to Apples)
One campaign’s ROI doesn’t mean much unless you compare it to your other campaigns—or to what you did last quarter. Convrt makes this pretty easy if you’ve used tags and consistent naming.
- Use the “Compare Campaigns” view to stack campaigns side-by-side.
- Watch out for different campaign lengths or budgets—normalize per day or per dollar spent if you need to.
- Don’t cherry-pick best months or ignore campaigns that flopped. The duds teach you more than the winners.
Step 7: Share What Matters (And Skip the Rest)
When it’s time to report back, keep it simple. Most people just want to know: Did we make more than we spent? If you drown them in secondary metrics, nobody listens.
What to share: - Total spend - Total conversions (be clear on what a “conversion” is) - ROI (as a percentage and as a dollar amount)
What not to share: - Every single chart Convrt spits out - Metrics that don’t tie to your goal
Pro Tip:
Turn Convrt’s reports into a one-pager or a single slide. If you can’t explain your ROI in a sentence, you probably don’t understand it yet.
What Convrt Does Well—and Where It Falls Short
What works: - Real-time data updates (no waiting for “next day” numbers) - Custom conversion tracking if you set it up right - Easy exports for doing your own analysis
Where it’s weak: - If your campaigns run across multiple platforms/tools, Convrt’s attribution can get fuzzy. - Default ROI calculations don’t account for all costs (like creative hours, agency fees, or hidden expenses). - Too many metrics can overwhelm—resist the urge to look at everything.
Ignore the hype:
No reporting tool (Convrt included) can “prove” ROI perfectly. There’s always a bit of estimation. The goal is to be directionally right, not perfectly precise.
Keep It Simple (and Iterate)
You don’t need to be a data scientist to measure campaign ROI with Convrt. Focus on tracking what really matters, double-check your setup, and don’t overcomplicate things. If your first report is messy, fix it next time. The best marketing teams aren’t perfect—they just get a little better with every campaign.
Now get out there, run your numbers, and use what you find to make your next campaign smarter. That’s all ROI really is.