2 Detailed objectives

Structuring the detailed objectives

The detailed objectives are concrete shorter timescale objectives. They should be written according to the SMART criteria. SMART is a methodology to check objectives for validity. It will help to avoid an objective is formulated in an ambiguous way. 

For more reading about this: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SMART_criteria

 

Smart stands for Specific, Measurable, Acceptable, Realistic and Time-bound. (Depending on the author, sometimes different words are used for the "A" and "R". We will stick to this definition)
 

Let's build and example:

This objective is not a SMART one: An objective of 1000 customers buying from our webshop

And this one is already much more "SMART": An objective of 1000 unique customers a month buying from our webshop by Q1 2016

In the first example, it was not specific as the 1000 was not linked to any time period. This made the objective useless as it was likely to be misunderstood. Also the definition of "customer" was not clear. Adding "a month" makes the time period clear. What if one person did buy every day a couple of times. Should that count for 1 customers or many that month ? Adding "unique" helps here. 

 

Let's now structure our objectives according to the customer race cycle. This works especially well with the detailed objectives:

Mapping objectives on RACE

 

Many of above measurements can be output of tools such as Google Analytics. In objectives, you can set target values (goals) for those measurements. With analytical tools, you will be once your webshop is up an running be able to verify the goals are met. 
 
An examples of detailed objectives written out based upon above drawing:
 
  • (Reach) We have an objective of having 1000 unitique visitors a day to our website within one year of going life. 
 
Above is indeed SMART: Let's check: 
  • it is Specific (e.g. by adding the word "Unique" we have removed any doubt about excluding returning ones that day. 
  • It is Measurable, this is one of the typical measurements you can get out of Google Analytics. 
  • It is Acceptable (no issue with that there).
  • If it is Realistic depends on the business you have, the niche your are in. This can be realistic if your shop has the right potential.
  • Time-bound: We mention it needs to be within a year after starting the webshop
 
Some other valid ones:
 
  • 1000 unique customers a month  buy a product in the brick and mortar shop being reffered from the webshop in 2015
  • 5% of visitors to the webshop convert to buyers Q1 2015 (conversion rate)