SO Good · Performance Methodology
How We Calculate Estimated Marketing Value
A transparent, plain-language breakdown of the EMV number on your dashboard.
Every SO Good client dashboard shows a single headline figure: your Total Estimated Marketing Value, or EMV. It answers one simple question. If you had to pay for the visibility and customer engagement SO Good earned you, what would it have cost? This page explains exactly how that number is built, in plain language, with every input and every multiplier laid out. Nothing is hidden.
The structure
EMV has exactly two parts
We never invent value. EMV is the sum of two measurable parts, each grounded in real cost.
EMV = Part 1 + Part 2, calculated each month, then summed across your full engagement.
Part 1
Search Visibility Value
Search engines increasingly answer questions with AI Overviews, AI Mode responses, the People Also Asked box, and the Local Pack, rather than a plain list of blue links. When your brand is cited or surfaced in those answers, you capture attention a competitor would otherwise have to buy.
SEMrush calculates a Traffic Cost for that visibility: the equivalent monthly Google Ads spend needed to purchase the same clicks you are earning organically. We take that figure as it is. We do not mark it up.
One important point about scope. We count Traffic Cost from SERP features only, meaning the answer boxes and rich results such as AI Overviews, AI Mode, People Also Asked, and the Local Pack. We remove all traditional SEO traffic cost, because traditional SEO is not a service we provide. EMV reflects only the visibility we actually earn for you.
Search Visibility Value is the sum of that SERP feature Traffic Cost across every published month. No multipliers, no adjustments.
Part 2
GBP Engagement Value
Your Google Business Profile generates five kinds of customer action: phone calls, messages, direction requests, bookings, and website clicks. But not every action means the same thing for every business, and this is where most marketing value calculators get lazy. We do not. We weight each action by how that business actually wins customers.
Provenance
Where the weights come from
We did not invent these weights. OpenAI first suggested a set of weights, presented as industry and nationwide standards. We felt they were too high, because online benchmarks tend to inflate marketing numbers. So we leaned on our own years of hands-on experience and deliberately lowered them.
The goal was to match what real, honest, hard-working business owners can actually achieve with a solid process, not an inflated promise. Lower weights produce a smaller, more conservative EMV, and we would rather understate your value than overstate it.
Two models
Weighted by how the business wins
Service-area businesses go to the customer. Roofers, home services, and pest control win work when customers call or message to book a visit. Nobody drives to a roofer's office, so direction requests barely matter.
Brick-and-mortar businesses have customers come to them. Med spas and dispensaries need customers to find and drive to a location, so direction requests are valuable and a phone call matters a little less.
Weighting the same action differently by business type is what keeps EMV honest rather than inflated.
| GBP action | Service-area | Brick-and-mortar |
|---|---|---|
| Phone calls | 0.6 | 0.2 |
| Messages | 0.6 | 0.2 |
| Direction requests | 0.1 | 0.9 |
| Bookings | 1.0 | 1.0 |
| Website clicks | 0.4 | 0.4 |
A booking is the strongest, most intent-rich action, so it always counts at full value (1.0). A website click is a softer signal and counts at 0.4 for everyone. Note direction requests: for a service-area business they count at just 0.1, almost nothing, because nobody drives to a roofer. For a brick-and-mortar business they count at 0.9, because getting people through the door is the whole game.
Lead value
Industry lead value (national CPL)
The weighted action total is multiplied by your industry's lead value: our conservative estimate of what one qualified customer action is worth. These are national average Cost Per Lead, or CPL, figures, sourced from Google and OpenAI.
| Industry | Lead value (national CPL) | Type |
|---|---|---|
| Roofing | $175 | Service-area |
| Home Services (HVAC, Plumbing, Electrical) | $150 | Service-area |
| Pest Control | $125 | Service-area |
| Med Spas | $150 | Brick-and-mortar |
| Dispensaries | $100 | Brick-and-mortar |
| Other | Set per client | Custom |
The math
The complete formula
Both sums run over every published month from your engagement start date forward.
Scope
What is, and is not, counted
- Only published months. Months still in draft never contribute to EMV. The number only ever reflects finalized reporting.
- Only months since you started with SO Good. Any historical baseline we load for context is shown on charts but excluded from EMV. We never take credit for results that predate our work.
- No placeholders. The value reflects real, reported activity only.
Worked example
Every number, line by line
Roofing company, service-area
$175 lead value, direction requests weighted at 0.1, across three published months. Each raw count is shown next to its weighted value.
| Month | Calls ×0.6 | Msgs ×0.6 | Dir ×0.1 | Book ×1.0 | Clicks ×0.4 | Weighted |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 40 → 24 | 10 → 6 | 25 → 2.5 | 5 → 5 | 30 → 12 | 49.5 |
| 2 | 50 → 30 | 12 → 7.2 | 30 → 3 | 6 → 6 | 35 → 14 | 60.2 |
| 3 | 55 → 33 | 15 → 9 | 28 → 2.8 | 8 → 8 | 40 → 16 | 68.8 |
In this example the roofer invested $1,500 per month over 3 months ($4,500 total) against $35,337.50 of EMV, a return of about 7.9 times. On demo and prospect views we show only the multiple, never the underlying dollar amounts.
Principles
Why we built it this way
- Grounded in real cost. Both halves trace back to money a business would otherwise spend: ad budget (SEMrush Traffic Cost) and the value of a qualified lead.
- Conservative by design. Soft signals such as website clicks and low-intent directions are discounted, not inflated, and we lowered the starting weights on purpose.
- Tailored to your business model. A roofer and a med spa are valued differently because their customers behave differently.
- Honest about scope. Only finalized, post-engagement results count, and only the visibility we actually earn.
The full methodology
Read the whitepaper
The complete breakdown, formatted for print and easy to share with your team.
Estimated Marketing Value is a directional estimate of marketing impact, not a guarantee of revenue. Lead values and action weights are SO Good's conservative internal benchmarks and may be revised as our methodology improves. SEMrush Traffic Cost is a third-party estimate, counted on SERP features only. CPL figures are national averages from Google and OpenAI. Figures reflect published reporting only.