Step-by-Step Guide to Building Marketing Dashboards That Drive ROI

Why Every Marketer Needs a Real Dashboard

You can’t improve what you can’t measure — and for most marketing teams, that means one thing: a real-time dashboard that connects all channels in one place.

When built correctly, marketing dashboards do more than report numbers — they reveal insights that drive ROI, optimize spend, and align teams around what’s working.

🔗 See how we help teams with Data Visualization & Reporting.

Step 1: Define the Purpose of Your Dashboard

Before building anything, ask: Who will use this dashboard, and for what decision?
Examples:

• Executives: High-level KPIs (revenue, RoAS, CAC)

• Media teams: Channel performance and spend efficiency

• Analytics teams: Funnel and attribution breakdowns

Step 2: Choose the Right KPIs

Good dashboards focus on metrics that move the business, not vanity stats.

Suggested KPIs:

• Customer Acquisition Cost (CAC)

• Return on Ad Spend (RoAS)

• Conversion Rate (CVR)

• Lifetime Value (LTV)

• Channel ROI

🔗 Align with our Business Challenge: Maximize ROI.

Step 3: Connect and Clean Your Data

A dashboard is only as accurate as its inputs.

• Integrate Google Ads, Meta, TikTok, and Analytics (GA4)

• Pull spend, conversions, and events into a warehouse (e.g., BigQuery)

• Clean data (consistent naming, currency, and attribution)

Step 4: Pick Your Visualization Tool

Your tool depends on audience and tech stack:

• Looker Studio: Fast, flexible, free

• Power BI / Tableau: Deep enterprise reporting

• Looker (Google Cloud): Scalable and governed

🔗 Learn more about our Technology partnerships.

Step 5: Build Your Dashboard Structure

Organize by funnel stage or channel grouping.
Example layout:

Top Section: KPIs (CAC, RoAS, LTV)
Middle Section: Paid Channels (Google, Meta, Display)
Bottom Section: Organic & Retention Metrics

Step 6: Automate & Refresh Data

Use scheduled queries or API connectors so your dashboards update daily.

• GA4 + BigQuery auto-export

• Funnel.io, Supermetrics, or native API integrations

Step 7: Turn Insight Into Action

A dashboard’s real purpose isn’t pretty charts — it’s smarter decisions.

• Reallocate budget from low-RoAS to high-RoAS campaigns

• Identify underperforming channels

• Correlate ad spend with downstream sales

Real-World Example

A subscription brand unified its Google, Meta, and CRM data into a Looker dashboard. Within a month, they identified wasted spend in two underperforming ad sets — reallocating 18% of budget to top-performers and increasing total RoAS by 22%.

Final Thoughts

Great dashboards simplify complexity, unify teams, and make data actionable. With the right structure and KPIs, marketers can turn insights into measurable ROI.

👉 Build your own with help from Red Beryl Group’s Data Visualization & Reporting services.