One of the biggest questions in social media is the Return on Investment (ROI). Business owners feel if they tweet, post and link, the financial return will be immediate. They expect marketing to get something they can measure at the end of the week, month or quarter. Can it be done? Definitely!
Revenue is the key indicator businesses would like to attribute to social media. Measuring revenue, however, is not direct in marketing – social media or otherwise. Measuring awareness, followers, customer service AND revenue should be part of your social media strategy.
There are a number of manageable tools businesses can use to find out if their efforts are getting results. Your job is to decide what you want to measure:
- Followers – Are people aware of your brand? Use tools like Hootsuite or Tweetdeck to find out what the conversation about you is like. If there are more mentions at the end of 60 days than before, you’re gaining popularity. Be sure to respond to ALL comments. It shows you care.
- Traffic – One of your goals with your social media campaign is to drive people to your website or store to buy your products. Use a tool like Google Analytics to measure traffic to your site. If they come to your store, ask how they heard about you. Facebook? Twitter? Blog? If you are providing valuable, interesting or humorous content, people will come to your site.
- Customer Service – I recently tweeted (late at night) that I was considering buying some shoes from Nordstrom. One of their employees saw the mention, sent me a link to the website and told me about an upcoming sale. Money saved! My tweets now include the hashtag: #nordy4life.
Companies like General Motors are pulling out of Super Bowl ads because the cost is going up, and they don’t know the ROI. Social media cost is going down and there is a more direct ROI. Just make sure to know what your “return” should be.
Scientifically Speaking, of course.
Next Week: 3 Steps to a Better Elevator Pitch
