63-campaign-retrospective-global

# Campaign Retrospective (Global)

> A retrospective is not for assigning blame — it is how the team and the system get better after every campaign. The best insight comes from failure, but only if it is safe to speak honestly. A retro with no action is wasted time: every lesson must become one concrete change in the playbook, the Brand Hub, or the process.

## Information gathering

Ask up to 4 questions:

1. **Which campaign, and over what dates?** Name, start and end dates, original objective.
2. **Final data:** revenue, leads, CPA, ROAS, spend — final numbers versus target. (If a report already exists from `07-marketing-report-global`, use it as the input.)
3. **Who attends the retro?** Content, performance, design, sales, leader?
4. **How long ago did the campaign end?** Run the retro within 5 days of the end, while memory is fresh.

## Principles

1. **Mandatory after every major campaign.** No skipping because the team is busy. No retro means paying tuition without learning the lesson.
2. **Record only claims backed by data.** "Creative A felt strong" is not an insight; "creative A hit $18 CPA against a $28 account average" is.
3. **No individual blame.** Talk about systems and process. Everyone has the floor.
4. **Every lesson becomes one concrete change** — to the playbook, a template, the Brand Hub, or a process — with an owner and a deadline.
5. **Document so it still makes sense in 6 months** — and link the retro into the next campaign's brief.

## Workflow

### 1. Prepare (before the session)

- Pull final data: revenue, leads, CPA, ROAS, spend, timeline adherence, budget variance.
- Send the data to the team before the meeting — the meeting is for discussion, not for reading numbers.
- Book 60 minutes with a named facilitator (usually the leader). For distributed teams, pick a time that works across the relevant timezones and require written pre-reads from anyone who cannot attend live.

### 2. Campaign scorecard

| KPI | Target | Actual | % achieved | vs previous campaign |
|-----|--------|--------|------------|----------------------|
| Revenue | | | | |
| Leads | | | | |
| CPA | | | | |
| ROAS | | | | |
| Spend | | | | |
| Timeline (on schedule?) | | | | |
| Budget (within plan?) | | | | |

Overall verdict: **Success** (>90% of KPIs) / **Mixed** (60-90%) / **Miss** (<60%).

When comparing against category benchmarks, use the right region and industry row in `references/benchmarks-global.md` — and adjust for seasonality before declaring a CPA increase a failure, since Q4 media costs run materially above Q1.

### 3. What worked (repeat next time)

| # | What worked | Evidence (numbers) | Why it worked | How to apply next time |
|---|-------------|--------------------|---------------|------------------------|
| 1 | | | | |
| 2 | | | | |
| 3 | | | | |

Name the winning patterns explicitly:

- Content angle: which angle converted best
- Creative format: video / image / carousel — which performed
- Audience: which segment responded
- Timing: which day or hour performed best
- Channel: best CPA and ROAS

### 4. What did not work (avoid next time)

| # | What failed | Evidence | Root cause | Decision: stop / fix / retest |
|---|-------------|----------|------------|-------------------------------|
| 1 | | | | |
| 2 | | | | |

Root cause must go past the symptom. "The ads were bad" is not a root cause; "audience overlapped with the previous campaign > frequency rose above 4 > CTR fell below 1%" is.

### 5. Surprises

- **Positive surprises:** what beat expectations, by how much, why — what do you take from it?
- **Negative surprises:** what came in worse, by how much, why — how do you prevent it?

### 6. Process and execution review

| Item | Assessment | Problems hit | Improvement |
|------|------------|--------------|-------------|
| Brief quality | | | |
| Timeline adherence | | | |
| Team communication | | | |
| Review and approval process | | | |
| Launch-day execution | | | |
| Data and tracking setup | | | |

Biggest process bottleneck: the single thing most worth fixing next time.

### 7. Team callouts

Record specific contributions: [Name] — [the specific contribution and its positive impact on the result]. Recognize publicly, correct privately.

### 8. Playbook and Brand Hub updates plus action items

| Document to update | What changes | Owner | Deadline |
|--------------------|--------------|-------|----------|
| Launch playbook (`60-launch-playbook-global`) | Add or amend step: [X] | Leader | |
| Campaign brief template | Adjust section: [Y] | Leader | |
| Brand Hub — customer insight | Add new insight from this campaign: [Z] | | |
| Brand Hub — KPI framework / internal benchmarks | Update the benchmarks you actually achieved (CPA, CVR) | | |
| Winning creative library | Store the winners plus the reason they won | | |

Every action item needs an owner and a deadline — never "the whole team will handle it."

### 9. Input for the next campaign

- 3 things to definitely repeat: 1... 2... 3...
- 3 things to definitely do differently: 1... 2... 3...
- Hypothesis to test next campaign: [hypothesis + how it will be measured]

## Facilitation guide

- **Timing:** within 5 days of campaign end.
- **Format:** 60 minutes, full team, facilitator (leader): 10 min scorecard > 15 min what worked > 15 min what did not > 10 min process > 10 min action items and owners.
- **Ground rules:** no individual blame, systems and process only; everyone speaks; constructive, not a venting session.
- **After:** the leader publishes the document within 24 hours, shares it with the team and leadership, and links it into the next campaign brief.

## Output structure

File name: `campaign-retro-[campaign-name]-[YYYYMMDD].md` — the 9 sections above: scorecard > what worked > what did not > surprises > process review > team callouts > playbook and Brand Hub updates > input for the next campaign > action items with owners.

## Related skills

- `07-marketing-report-global`: the final report supplies