You Tweeted - now what? Measuring social media ROI.

Have you used social media to promote your business or products, only to find it frustrating that you can’t precisely measure ROI?

Welcome to the wonderful world of social media marketing.

As I often explain to my clients, it’s hard to peg down ROI when you’re working with social media marketing and viral messages. There are ways to measure certain efforts, of course, but the overall concept of social media marketing is to spread the word about a product or service, and get others to do the same.

In his book “Unleashing the Ideavirus,” renowned Internet marketer and blogger Seth Godin refers to “sneezers;” the people who will talk about your product for you. If you’re trying social media marketing, it’s important to have brand advocates with influence to spread the word.

Consider Twitter for social media marketing. Twitter’s all about spreading the word. When I was at SES New York this past spring, I attended the opening keynote featuring Guy Kawasaki. He’s a former Macintosh/Apple marketer who’s now widely known for his content aggregation site, Alltop.

At the keynote, Guy introduced the audience to the power of Twitter. He picked a recipe page featured on Alltop and tweeted it. Within just a few minutes, 140 people had retweeted the link to their friends, measurable by a social media keyword monitor Guy was using. With over 125,000 followers, Guy’s a pretty powerful sneezer. There was visible evidence of this, but measuring overall page hits as a result of his tweet is a different story.

When you’re selling products, you probably want to directly measure your marketing efforts. So how do you accomplish that with social media, specifically Twitter? One thing I always advise my clients to do is to put a specific tracking code on each of their efforts, so marketing campaigns can be measured at checkout. For example, if you were selling kazoos and decided to market them by word of mouth on several social media sites, you could tweet something like this on Twitter:

Kazoo Blow-Out Sale on Now! http://bit.ly/kazoo4u. Enter code ITWEET for an extra 10% off!

As the sales pour in, you’ll be able to see who used that code. Direct marketers have been doing promo codes for years. They’re great for tracking sales, and people are especially inclined to use them if there’s extra incentive involved, like an additional discount. But what if you’re not trying to measure sales? What if you want to measure brand power?

If you’re getting into social media marketing, you have to be prepared to focus on the bigger picture rather than numbers. There are certain numbers you can look at, though, like number of followers, number of mentions, and number of page hits if your analytics show you the referring site. You can also measure inbound links and public approval, like the number of Diggs your page gets on Digg.com, for example. With Twitter, you can look at follow numbers and track retweets and brand mentions, which you can use in many different ways.

Consider @JetBlue. They’ve built a strong reputation on Twitter because they monitor Twitter for mentions of their brand and encourage people to send them feedback. From there, they can promptly deal with customer issues and take action, leading to a happier customer. If the customer feels that things have been set right, they’ll probably tell their friends about it. And when the friend goes to book their next flight, they’ll probably remember how Jet Blue provided their friend with excellent customer service, and they may look to book with them. It’s impossible to measure this kind of response, but Jet Blue still puts an emphasis on customer service through Twitter, with three employees monitoring the social network for mentions of their brand. As a result of this, Jet Blue is constantly referred to in articles about Twitter, mentioned on talk shows, and endlessly used as an example as one of the most powerful tweeters. Directly measurable ROI? No. Brand power? Yes. Over half a million people have indicated that they’re interested in what @JetBlue has to say. That’s the power of social media.

What do you think of social media and ROI? How has social media helped your business? Comment below or email me at j.tyios@gmail.com. You can also find me on Twitter at www.twitter.com/JulieTyios.

Comments

[Julie Tyios]

Comment via LinkedIn:

Measuring ROI for your time and energy spent using twitter is just as important as any other aspect of your business. Each business can measure it differently depending on their goals and desired outcomes of using twitter or any other social media.

Posted by Joshua Johnson

[Julie Tyios]

Comment via LinkedIn:

Twitter is different things to different people. Many want to promote their business and Marcos wants to be read. I am a new Twitter user and also want to promote my business but I don't sell anything.
I am in recycling and want people to turn things in for recycling. I've done a lot of reading on how to market with Twitter and my business model is so different I don't know how to really use the information I'm reading.
My company requires that people take action without an immediate payoff - always a difficult message!

Posted by Carolyn Kapp

[Julie Tyios]

Comment via LinkedIn:

Thank you for sharing - great information

Posted by Phil Williams (LION)

[Julie Tyios]

Comment via LinkedIn:

Like any marketing strategy you need to know your customers. Are they the type that will use the code? or not. I believe the % of coupon and code users is very low even in today's economy. When using these remember the % may be a lot higher than you think. Better to make an offering on a specific product and measure the sales of that based on the avenue you used to promote it. For example I'll use twitter to promote Flan, not just dessert, facebook to promote tres leches, another one of my desserts. I should have already been tracking dessert sales. Watch for the spike or lack there of. ROI should be done on all avenues of promotion to determine what the most effective tool is. Remember social media is just a tool like print ads, sales calls, etc therefore all the same ROI rules apply.

Posted by Fred Abaroa

[Julie Tyios]

Another comment from LinkedIn:

I really caught onto twitter just a few months ago, although I have had an account much longer than that! I thought it would be a great place to promote my business, and it is, but I have learned so much from my followers on twitter. I am new to blogging www.thetriadrealtor.com and learned that I may not be writing to the audience I had hoped, so my blogging is changing-thanks to Twitter. I have also had clients who said they specifically listed their home with me because I am active on social network sites such as LinkedIn, Facebook, and Twitter.

Posted by Heather DeDona

[Julie Tyios]

Comment via LinkedIn:

Uhm! Fantastic article. I have my own doubts about Twitter, but after read your post, the article itself seduce me to try it. Thanks for sharing. If you have a moment, I would like to share what I do ( http://www.mariocorona.com/ ). Any comment is welcome. Regards.

Posted by Mario Corona

[Julie Tyios]

Comments from LinkedIn:

I just wonder myself what results could twitter give if in my country are 3000-3500 users and these are persons more from IT industry or also providers of social media:)?

By cosenco mariana, PR Consultant

You are right - it is a matter of economies of scale. The clients we tweet for have multiple locations or are an association of businesses. Very hard for an individual business especially if you are in a country that does not have much Twitter users that compounds it. But thats not entirely the point. Building an audience of interested persons and delivering feed to them that is of value is the name of the game. If you cant find a way to do those things, as well as listen to others then it could be time spent better somewhere else.

By Chris Tucker, Owner, RightNow Communications

[Julie Tyios]

Comment via LinkedIn:

Very well written articles. I have often wondered the right approach & you just made it all "click" for me, with the special promo code for measuring purposes, and additional incentive for the buyer.
Thanks for helping me actually see your advice in practice with very pertinent examples. I have some ideas myself promoting bands, and you just showed me how !

Posted by david segal

[Julie Tyios]

Comment via LinkedIn:

Good article Julie.

Posted by Erfan Hettini

[Julie Tyios]

Comment via LinkedIn:

We have had excellent results for our clients seeking to create business relationships on Twitter

Posted by Chris Tucker

[Julie Tyios]

Comment via LinkedIn:

Great articles Julie.

By Mike Friskney, Creative Director & Senior Writer

[Lis]

I have resisted Twitter up until now. Perhaps I will give it a peep :) Great article, Julie.

[sameer]

Why are we soo interested in others lives to give up living our own. The social network is only good as long as it is used to maintain a connection with a friend relative etc.....and not use it as a substitute to face conversations. People are becoming more and more alienated with interpersonal skills and find more confidence being someone in reality they are not.

[Julie Tyios]

@Justin - Interesting story! That's why I always tell my clients it's important to show your value to your audience. If you can't, people won't want to listen. Social media marketing can be direct marketing - for example, tweeting promotions - or it can be part of an overall branding effort. Either way, there are many ways to captivate and engage your audience, and even turn them into brand ambassadors.

[Umar]

Great Post!

[Justin Trencio]

When I worked as a Account Exec in Direct Marketing, we had a mass mail campaign backfire when some irate consumers who wished to get back at junk mail by filling an prepaid envelope full of sand and mailing it back to the client with the intent of driving up postage weight costs and inherently 'sticking it back to the man.' In the absence of my client, this made me laugh.

The point I'm trying to make is that there is a similarity with Direct Marketing and SMM wherein your reach can be measured by negative feedback from people that do not wish to be reached. The viral nature of SMM, although sometimes a better way to reach your targets than traditional mail can also illicit the electronic version of sand in the return envelope. This can take a form of Twitter recipients ending up ignoring a frequent message, or ultimately deciding not to follow the sender. Marketers will continually have this problem of mitigating these circumstances, which will always affect ROI; ultimately not communicating this to an client who is happy due to the 'size of his reach'.

I don't work in DM anymore, however every time I receive junk mail with a prepaid envelope, I sometime get the urge...

[joe mccartney]

I didn't know Obama tweets. Where does he find the time?

[saadia]

Even if you don't agree with the hype you have to believe this thing is gaining momentum by the hour and it's just a matter of channeling it. Nice stats JT.

[JoanieTee]

I am not on Facebook (even though everyone's telling me to join) or My Space but I did sign up on Twitter a few weeks ago because there were a couple of dynamic people that I wanted to follow.
The power of the internet never ceases to amaze me, especially the lightning speed by which messages can be spread. You tell two friends, then they tell two friends, and they tell two friends and so on ......I have yet to actually post a Tweet myself but if I ever did have my own business you can bet I would be tweeting like crazy while tweeting is still free.

[David Macdonald]

Interesting read. Well done, JT.

[Julie Tyios]

@Jack - Interesting statistic, I've heard that one too. Either way, there are still 8 million tweeters (and counting), and the service's popularity outside of the Twitosphere is growing immensely. Whether it's because Twitter really is that amazing (I think it is), or it just got a little boost from star power, there are too many users and too many advocates to allow anyone to ignore Twitter's marketing power.

[Julie Tyios]

@Chel - Interesting. I was hoping to get a comment from someone who isn't on the marketing side of things. Social networks are chock full of good things, and chock full of what some people call garbage updates - that is, they're utterly useless. But then again, there's still a market for that (www.twitter.com/sockington). On Twitter, what you generally receive depends on who you choose to follow - I personally tak a look at every account I'm interested in following to see if it's worth reading, and I get great streams of information coming in and very little time wasted.

For marketing, companies will not generally tweet pointless things, as it's important to show value to their audience. Other users, however, are a different story. My dark secret is that once, a long time ago, on my first email account, I had a LiveJournal. People would watch my posts and I'd go look at their journals, and the endless updates like "Just took a shower" and "I have to (fill in the blank)" were tiresome to read. But then I realized that I could go and seek out more interesting blogs, and connected with some great thinkers. It was really my first foray into social media, and my, how things have changed.

There's still choice in social media. That's why on Twitter, your numbers can speak volumes - those are people who have chosen to follow you, thereby showing interest in what you have to say. While there are still plenty of scammers and fake accounts out there, I know from my own personal account that there are a lot of active tweeters who like to hear what I have to say, and I love interacting with them. If you are on Twitter, you can add me @JulieTyios.

[Chel]

Everything is going to the internet now. Even the Pope. Just look at him on his youtube channel! Groups on facebook, tweets. I think anything you do on these site is just a fast, cheap way to get the word out. But sometimes it goes to far, like do I really care what you are doing every second of the day? NOPE.

[Julie Tyios]

From LinkedIn:

I've posted 2 examples of how businesses have used Twitter from 11 case studies at http://michaelmyers.biz .

When I speak with clients, I take the conversation down the "should I have a web site" question from 98. This discussion usually works along with using several ways of measuring engagement. Overall though, we're just beginning and with the exception of the economy, most understand that they need to do what is best based on their brand. Social media rules still apply.

By Michael Myers Manager of Business Analysts

[Rose Water]

@butters because twitter is quicker to use than facebook

[Julie Tyios]

@Isa - Interesting to hear. Do you promote your blog to friends and family, or is it available to the general public? I suspect you might get more response on Facebook because that platform makes it simple to see these things and respond, and yes, it does promote a close sense of community. Twitter does this as well, as everything is fed to you, much like Facebook. The only difference is it's text-based (for now), so it's easy to scan and is a quick read. Even though Twitter's not as diverse, shall we say, as Facebook in terms of available applications or visuals, it's done really well for itself in terms of growth and publicity.

[Drei]

HAHAHHAHAHA!!!! I'll be damned, so Twitter does have some substance behind it afterall. A fine article Miss J. Tyios.

[Nikita]

This is so Tweet.

[Rosie]

THIS IS EXACTLY, WHAT I MEAN , check all these comments, there's always so much hype about this Twitter thing. People on YouTube talk about it, even Google has an account on there. I really thought it was stupid. But there is a quote that goes, "If it's stupid but it works- then maybe it's not so stupid afterall!" @Butters, I know what you mean, so many people around me talk about it too, hell, my boss was talking about it the other day!

[Earl]

What a clever little portal - it's like broken telephone- except the telephone isn't broken!

[Mercedes]

Speaking of celebs....Obama has a Tweet account - see even Twitter is part of the "change."

[Blue]

Damn, at least the papparazzi can leave Britney Spears alone because Twitter will always be one step ahead of them now that Miss Spears has a Twitter account. Plus now all gossip lovers (80% of the human population) have access to free information on their idols- goodbye vanity/gossip magazines!BTW this was a well written article.

[Jenny]

@Butters...Oh come on Twitter won the Webby Award this year for "Breakout of the Year." Just waiting for the rest of you Facebookers to convert to Twitters haha!

[Butters]

But why do we need it when we already have the same features on facebook & AIM? But seems like that's where everyone is headed these days...including the BIG NAMES... I hear so much about it.Maybe I will check it out sometime.

[Jack]

Hmmmm...indeed Ms Tyios, time will test the success of Twitter.
Although, I am skeptical of that growth rate because I heard that Twitter has a retention rate of 40% meaning that there are many users who use the service for about a month- only to drop it soon after.Although that may change considering how Twitter is being used for more productive use as a means of sharing information.

[Saira Muzaffar]

ROI numbers never tell the entire story. Like you mentioned, depending solely upon them also forces marketers to abandon the big picture to chase the details. Although these details are by no means insignificant, relying on strictly what you can 'measure' can add considerable strain, expense and a heck of a lot of time on your turnaround.

Businesses that continue shunning social media outreach effectively limit the shelf life of their sales strategies to the constraints of any variety of funnel models. Social media, and Twitter more specifically, can have people thinking, talking and sharing whatever you're looking to sell instantaneously. This is a boom effect that not only guarantees realtime results, it also gives you invaluable access to market reactions.

Lastly, because tools like Twitter function on and thus encourage interaction, any marketing campaign also automatically enjoys the malleability of being promoted personally by your target audience.

You’ve put it bang on; we might not have come up with the same Google-tracker ways to measure ROI via social media but marginalizing Twitter et al. until we can could prove a lot more disastrous than the discomfort of modifying traditional methods.

[Julie Tyios]

@Jeffrey - True, to look at click-through rates, you'd have to look at the data from the site you link to. That's what makes Twitter hard to measure, though - people will argue about what has more relevance, retweets and visibility, or click-throughs. With Twitter, you have to decide what your primary goals are and measure that way. Things on Twitter aren't measurable as they are on other advertising platforms.

[Jeffrey]

I think using analytics tools for Twitter is useful to helping to get a better idea of what ROI one is getting by Tweeting. How do you know that people are actually clicking on the links you're posting. Its all about metrics.

[Isa]

What an interesting article. Re: my experience with social media, I've posted images on an independent blog vs. within an album on Facebook and got a whole wack more feedback on the latter, even while my blog accumulated hits. Communicating within a closed community seems to up the comfort level, in addition to providing direct links!

[Julie Tyios]

As a fun little sidenote, Guy Kawasaki brought up this not-so-safe-for-work eTool that measures your Twitter influence using the size of a certain body part as an analogy:

http://tinyurl.com/cardua

For reference, JetBlue's size is 73.1cm, whereas Guy Kawasaki is only 15.6cm.