In our post “economic crisis” economy, more pressure is being placed on all business silos to measure and report the return on investment that every activity, however small, is producing. And in no business arena has this measurement debate been as prevalent or heated as it has in social media marketing.
If social media measurement is what you’re after, you’ve got your work cut out for you as it’s one the most difficult metrics to effectively or accurately score, if at all. There are two camps that have emerged from this debate (the Team Taylor/Team Edward of Social Media if you will):
Can’t Be Measured:
- Social media measurement tools focus on quantity rather than quality so it would be like measuring the angle of a circle
- Numeric measurements and tools don’t adequately provide demographic makeup of people that social media campaigns reach
- Measuring clicks, follows, impressions, advertising value equivalents or other numeric values ignores more the important “soft” benefits of communication, thus not appropriate to the medium
Can Be Measured:
- Every business is unique and by establishing the goals your business’ social media engagement seeks to achieve, you create the KPIs for success and thus measurement
- New tools such as Alterian’s SM2 or Comscore’s Social Essentials are closing the gap between user demographic profiles and numbers to drive greater insights, albeit automated
- Measuring quantity (follows, impressions, etc.) sets benchmarks from which you can measure increases or decreases in brand awareness, referrals, etc. – all of which can be linked or cross-referenced to sales fluctuations or other sales metrics
- “Sales” is not the only measurement metric for social media. Decreased customer service costs, increased PR effectiveness, etc. are achievable measurements that demonstrate bottom-line value
But has anyone asked the question: should social media be measured?
- As measurement technologies improve greater analysis and data sorting will certainly follow but manual analysis will always be necessary with social media, as the media itself is about people, their attitudes and their conversations. Won’t attempting to measure something that can’t be measured by a calculation or a tool focus the marketer’s attention on the wrong engagement practices? Thus decreasing any real value that social media could potentially drive for the business?
- As we’ve seen with social influence monitoring applications, any attempt to plan and report measurement to qualitative engagements creates inaccurate scores and the eventual attempts to game the system. In the same manner that surveys can be “gamed” by asking questions in a specific tone or order, social media – via content development, platform selection and campaign tactics – can be created to encourage and solicit a desired response. And doesn’t that render any metrics invalid?
There are no answers in this post, only questions. And for good reason.
I’ll be moderating the #bizforum Twitter debate: “Should Social Media be Measured?” on Wed, Aug 10th, 2011 from 8 PM to 9 PM Eastern, where the pros and cons of these issues will be debated the business community. Our special guest on this debate is Candace Kemp McCaffery, Senior Vice President and Director of Social Media & Interactive Services for Cookerly Public Relations, an Atlanta-based public relations agency. Join us by following #bizforum on www.TweetChat.com this Wed at 8 PM ET and have your say!
In which camp are you? Let us know your thoughts in the comments section below, which will help us plan the debate.
by Sam Fiorella
Feed Your Community, Not Your Ego
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