Know-How Exchange : Research/Metrics

IRI has a very good dashboard for standard marketing data in the consumer packaged goods world. Of course, any dashboard needs to be customized to meet the specific needs of the user.

My suggestion would be to interview the users in some depth, and then create the dashboard that is most meaningful to them. Some marketers are focused on share, others on sales dollars, others on spending, or on combinations of those -- and a few others. It really depends on the individual marketing manager.

You probably shouldn't be trying to decide what THEY need. Let them decide. You're not likely to retrain them if they already have a preconceived idea of what's important.

Excellent examples abound in 'Marketing and the Bottom Line' by Tim Ambler, who also distinguishes two ways to design a dashboard: either from a 'best practices' approach that applies to many firms (eg the one by IRI), or a customized one that builds from your own firm's objectives, as mgoodman suggests too.

Look into the balanced scorecard initiative. I think it is www.bscol.com. Or, google balanced scorecard. They have have some case histories online there.