Average Americans aren't the only ones fretting over healthcare issues. Brand health is becoming one of the hottest topics in the CMO community. Two forces are driving the sudden interest in metrics and "brand dashboards." Managers are growing more metrics-focused because of the rising use of online media in the total marketing mix. Online media allows managers to see a direct cause-and-effect relationship between a demand generation initiative and sales. It's only natural that the same managers would start to ask, "How much is my brand driving sales?"

The other factor is money, or more precisely, the scarcity of money. Marketing budgets are usually the last to recover when an economy rises from the ashes of a recession. Every expense is scrutinized. Before investing money on a brand, it's helpful to assess your brand's overall health. Think about it: Would you be willing to let a doctor perform a procedure on your body without first doing an examination? Probably not.

When funds are scarce and investments are heavily scrutinized, you owe it to your shareholders to assess your state of wellness, or lack thereof. Unfortunately, many managers think that measuring brand health is a massive endeavor that requires quant jocks running loose with expensive studies, time-consuming audits, and complex statistical analyses. They fear that in the end they'll be sitting around a table scratching their heads trying to make sense of all the data sets, still clueless where to invest. It doesn't have to be this way. Here are four time-tested diagnostic areas to consider when assessing your brand's health.

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