{"id":2278,"date":"2024-11-22T16:14:35","date_gmt":"2024-11-22T16:14:35","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.digitalposition.com\/resources\/blog\/?p=2278"},"modified":"2025-01-03T19:06:06","modified_gmt":"2025-01-03T19:06:06","slug":"free-digital-marketing-reporting-tool-how-datapulse-transformed-our-reporting-strategy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.digitalposition.com\/resources\/blog\/ppc\/free-digital-marketing-reporting-tool-how-datapulse-transformed-our-reporting-strategy\/","title":{"rendered":"Free Digital Marketing Reporting Tool: How DataPulse Transformed Our Reporting Strategy"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

You just finished your first month running PPC ads<\/a> for a client and you wake up to an email like this:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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\u201cHey Marketing Guy,<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

I\u2019d like to get an update on the status of our ads – pronto. <\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

How much $$$ are we making?<\/em>\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n<\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n

<\/p>\n\n\n\n

So you log into Google Ads<\/a>, click over to the campaign view and snap a screenshot. You immediately draft an email, attach the screenshot and hit send.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

If only it was ever that simple.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Problem<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n

You send the screenshot, but that\u2019s just the beginning. Next they want to know how Google Ads is performing relative to Meta Ads, next to an aggregated view combining both datasets, for the whole year.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Fair enough\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Then they request that you throw in some year over year comparisons so they can see if they are up or down. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

And finally\u2026 they ask you to update the dashboard every day so they can have the freshest data.<\/p>\n\n\n

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<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Now you\u2019re starting every morning neck-deep in spreadsheets, custom formulas, and endless copy-pasting.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Slowly your spreadsheets start having issues, requests to customize the dashboards keep piling up, and before you know it you are committed to a system that can\u2019t scale with your clients\u2019 needs and causes more questions than answers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Reporting in Digital Marketing is A Complex Beast<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n

For years, I was that <\/em>person at Digital Position\u2014the \u201creporting guy\u201d\u2014chained to spreadsheets, wrestling with conversion tracking, and endlessly tweaking performance dashboards for clients. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

As Digital Position grew, our reporting challenges grew too. What worked for 20 clients became chaotic for 50. It was clear we needed something more efficient and scalable.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This realization eventually led us to eventually create our own free reporting solution: DataPulse<\/strong><\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But we didn\u2019t start there\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Our Reporting Journey: From Google Sheets to DataPulse<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Initially we went the route of templated dashboards in Google Sheets. We used a 3rd party data pulling tool called Supermetrics<\/a> to pull data broken out by date. Then we manipulated the data to show metrics grouped by month with year over year comparisons.<\/p>\n\n\n

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What our dashboards used to look like<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n

This was pretty effective – Supermetrics lets you schedule daily data pulls so whenever we checked the dashboards they would be fresh. Breaking out the metrics the way we did gave us the answers to most of the performance related questions that clients threw at us, plus we could share the dashboards with them so everyone was tracking the data in real time.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Then we leveled up and started feeding the data into Looker Studio<\/a> (formerly Google Data Studio). That gave us the opportunity to introduce well designed dashboards that aligned with our brand and drew attention to specific KPIs.<\/p>\n\n\n

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Google Sheets + Supermetrics + Looker Studio<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n

Everything was templated, so as soon as we signed a new client, we would build out their dashboards in a matter of minutes, set up the queries and then boom – fully automated performance dashboards. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

But then – ultimate betrayal. Supermetrics – the very wave we rode to greatness became the iceberg that plunged us into darkness. All of a sudden, they released these new pricing plans that were designed to squeeze as much profit as possible out of agencies. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Supermetrics Demanded a Price We Couldn\u2019t Pay<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Supermetrics had always been expensive, even back in the day. But for the price you got 99% consistent accuracy and full automation which just didn\u2019t exist anywhere else.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But when they switched to the new pricing plans, they restricted the number of data sources that each tier could access. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

For example, The Core plan for $159 \/ month only lets you access 14 data sources (out of 150). <\/p>\n\n\n\n

So you wouldn\u2019t be able to access over 90% of the platforms unless you move up to the Enterprise plan (which conveniently doesn\u2019t have a price listed on the website).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

If you’re on the Core plan for example and want to integrate Amazon Ads data into a client’s reporting, you will need to upgrade your whole account to an Enterprise plan or else pay $30 more per month per data source. They limit you to 5 \u201cadd-ons\u201d, so everything is geared towards getting their users onto a custom Enterprise plan where they can charge exorbitant prices for the same level of service.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Supermetrics isn\u2019t alone here, several other tools have come to the fore like PowerMyAnalytics<\/a> for example, and it is using the exact same strategy of restricting specific data sources behind higher priced plans.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

We really tried to make it work with these data connectors, we\u2019d built our whole system around them. But the costs continued to rise and it became impossible for us to justify them as a small agency. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

We were NOT going back to downloading CSVs and manually copy pasting data.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

So what other options did we have?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

There was only one way we could solve our reporting problems once and for all and achieve all of our goals.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

We had to build a tool from scratch.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Why We Built DataPulse: Simplifying Reporting for Agencies and Businesses<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n

The existing tools on the market were powerful, but everything came with limitations:<\/p>\n\n\n\n