It’s time to stop prioritizing short-term metrics over a long-term success strategy.

How to Measure Your Marketing Success by Focusing on the Invisible ROI

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As an entrepreneur you’re told to understand your numbers. This is good advice, until you realize how many numbers there are to consider: financial numbers, sales conversations, how many people are on your landing page, how many people show up for your webinar, your Facebook ad conversions …

There are a lot of metrics, and it’s hard to know which ones to focus on.

After building multiple seven-figure businesses, I’ve realized how unimportant many of these numbers are — and just how important some of the immeasurable things in your business are.

I call this your “invisible return on investment,” and it focuses on the long game — which puts a lot of people off because the long game isn’t sexy. Entrepreneurs love the short game. They love to know how much money they have made in the last 30 days.

It’s easy and quick, and it provides you with dopamine spikes that trick you into thinking you’re successful. The problem is, you get so bogged down in these short-term metrics that you slip into short-term thinking.

But business success isn’t built on short-term thinking. It’s built over time, which means you need to think about the long game. This is where the “invisible ROI” comes in.

By focusing your time, money and resources into these three areas, you escape the short-term thinking that traps so many entrepreneurs, and instead turns your attention toward the long game that allows you to grow and scale a business that changes the world.

1. Your relationships

The biggest problem entrepreneurs have when it comes to their relationships is that they don’t think about the long term. Whether these relationships center around your business or personal life, too many people focus on what their relationships can bring them right now.

You go to an event in the hope of meeting someone, because you see that “someone” as a person who can help you get in certain media publications, introduce you to her audience, connect you with another influencer or whatever else.

You start your relationship with an end game in mind, but this is no way to treat anyone in your network.

Why? Because we’re talking about people here.

When it comes to people, success centers around trust, which takes time to build. If you connect with someone in the…