In conversations with marketing and CX leaders I often hear the same statement - sometimes frustrated, sometimes resigned, sometimes simply honest.
We have all the data. But we can’t say what of it actually works.
This is not an isolated case. It is a pattern.
The numbers prove it
59 % of CMOs worldwide say their resources are not sufficient to deliver their strategies - that is what the Gartner CMO Spend Survey 2025/2026 shows. At the same time, the 2025 CMO study by Evergreen Media and Innofact, with more than 500 respondents from the DACH region, confirms: the pressure to prove growth is rising. Marketing is expected to deliver more, with less budget, and please make it measurable.
The paradox: never has so much been measured as today. Open rates, CTR, conversion, reach, impressions - the dashboards are full. And still the decisive question often remains unanswered.
The real problem lies one level deeper
In a recent project we developed a welcome journey for new customers - in an environment shaped by a very emotional relationship between the brand and its customers. It was precisely this emotionality that became the starting point for a different question:
Not: which KPIs do we measure? But: what is this journey actually meant to achieve?
That sounds obvious. But it isn’t. Because the first reflex is almost always the same - opening rate, CTR, cart. Classic performance KPIs. Quickly available, easy to report. But they don’t answer whether a relationship forms. Whether trust grows. Whether the customer comes back - not because they got a voucher, but because they feel understood.
Think impact before you measure
We built the model differently. Not from the available data. From the desired impact: what should the journey change in the first 90 to 150 days - in behaviour, in the relationship, in the business result?
From this, four impact levels emerged: from initial activation through engagement and behavioural change to measurable business impact. And only then were KPIs derived - among them CX scores that make visible whether trust is forming, whether content is really being used, whether purchasing behaviour changes lastingly.
The result was not a fuller dashboard. It was a clearer one.
What that means in practice
The question is not what you can measure - but what you must measure to know whether you are on the right track. Those who don’t clarify this upfront measure a lot. And still know little. That is exactly the starting point of our CX session at Chromedia: a structured exchange that helps to ask these questions - before you measure the wrong answers.