BarnRaisers

As a sign social media is coming of age, two blogposts on social media measurement have made a strong impression.  They were written years ago.

One was in January 2009.  Chris Brogan encouraged us to Grow Bigger Ears.  The point: Use social media measurement tools to build business as well as measure it, by listening.  In November 2009, David Berkowitz wrote 100 Ways to Measure Social Media.  It proved to even skeptical viewpoints social media was indeed very measurable.

Now there are many social media measurements, software solutions, proprietary algorithms and companies whose reason for being is to provide measurement solutions.

Here are 7 that have stood the test of time to measure social media and build brands by listening.

1.  INDUSTRY OVERVIEW (GOOGLE TRENDS):  Google.com/trends examines topics from a few perspectives.  By typing a subject, industry, brand or keyword in the search box, a 7 year trend is graphed of: 1) Search queries, 2) references in the news and 3) top news stories.  You can see if interest is increasing or decreasing and the most relevant content for influencing the situation in your  favor.  Multiple topics can be displayed at once.  It’s a quick and valuable industry snapshot.

2. COMPETITIVE LANDSCAPE (COMPETE):  Compete.com tracks viewship of multiple websites over time.  You can examine your competitive set and see how events, promotions or PR might have effected web traffic with year-to-year change.  You see the search keywords and referring sites that drive traffic; all of which can put to use to increase web traffic for your business, perhaps at the expense of competitors.

3.  KEY INFLUENCERS (TECHNORATI AND ALLTOP):  Technorati and Alltop, blog search engines, let you know who’s writing about the topics that matter most and quantifies how authoritative their opinion is.  You can click on blogs and engage with the writers through comments.  I’ve been able to connect with celebrities, company heads and advocates with influencial followings using these tools.

4. BUZZ (BOOSHAKA): If you want to measure the buzz about a particular topic or location on Facebook, type it into the search box on Booshaka.com.  Posts and recency are shown.  You have the opportunity to discuss, share, like or tweet what was said.  It’s the most direct way to know, measure and engage in what people are saying about a topic that matters to you in social media.

5. TARGETING AND GEO-TARGETING (TWEEPZ): This is a precise measurement and geo-targeting tool.  If you want to find people on Twitter with relevant interests or that live in an area where you do business, you can find them on Tweepz.com.  You can also know the size of their following and how often they tweet before you start a conversation.

6.  VIDEO ENGAGEMENT (YOUTUBE):  Videos increase viewer involvement by 38%.  Most people don’t think of using YouTube for analytics but, since Google owns YouTube, the analytics are very similar.  You can measure where veiwership comes from, by day, by length.  Nothing explains a video better than a video.  Here is a brief tutorial.

7. LINKEDIN (LINKEDIN GROUPS): LinkedIn groups gives you the chance to see how often discussion occurs among people who share interests that are important to you.  It is also a very direct form of engagement that is truly 1-to-1.  I know a lot of people who have been able to connect with core targets, have important discussions and save a lot of money.

Measurement tools are only as good as the learning and the actions taken from them.  I hope these are of value to you.  Are they?  Just listening.

“How do I measure social media ROI?” is the #1 social media question people ask according to Social Media Examiner.

Recently, at lunch with David Berkowitz, Senior Director of Emerging Media and Innovation, at 360i and blogger behind 100 Ways to Measure Social Media, this question came up and we thought: Let’s compile 100 case studies that prove social media ROI.

Let’s do it in 3 installments to solicit input along the way and understand the business principles at work.

Here are 34 of those 100 social media case studies.  These 34 case studies cover B2C, B2B, profit and non-profit areas.  They include businesses big and small.  They prove social media ROI based on:

• Sales
• Shorter Sales Cycles
• New Leads
• Improved company operations
• Innovations that resulted in a better way to do business

Conclusion: Significant results are proven to occur in social media where low out-of-pocket investments lead to high ROI’s when businesses: 1) Have a clear business strategy, 2) Aren’t afraid to jump in 3) Use their imagination to make the most out of social channels, customer engagement and brand relationship.

Each case study has a summary headline with key results and links to reference sites for more complete details.  So, next time someone at your company questions whether social media demonstrates ROI, you can give them these 34 case studies; you can also let them know there are more on the way.

We’d appreciate your input on these 34 or any examples you may have.

34 CASE STUDIES THAT PROVE SOCIAL MEDIA ROI

1. AFTER STEAZ: Organic Tea doubled sales through coupons downloaded and shared on Facebook and Twitter with discussion of the how and why organic teas mattered.  250,000 coupons were downloaded and 2,830 tweets were recorded an hour.
2. AJ BOMBERS: Owner Joe Sorge used Twitter as social maître’d to build relationships with 75% of his customers at his Milwaukee burger joint and weekly sales were up +60% a year later without spending $1 in traditional media. AJ BOMBERS also declared a “Foursquare Day” to earn a Swarn Badge and increased sales +110%.
3. BEST BUY (Twelp Force): Best Buy employee communities grew to 2,200 employees within 3 months and responded to over 13,000 customers on social networks answering public questions, concerns, and opinions. The Twitter feed @twelpforce now counts over 29,000 followers and the number of questions averages 100-125 per day and is considered a key value-add by customers and the company.
4. BLENDTEC: CEO Tom Dickson ran viral commercials on YouTube to sell blenders direct-to-consumers and increased company sales +700%.
5. BURBERRY: Social microsites secured 1,000,000 fans and a 10% increase in same-store sales
6. CADBURY (Wispa Chocolate Bar): 22,000 fans of Cadbury Wispa petitioned the company on Facebook to bring back the discontinued chocolate bar. 40 million bars were released and sold out in 18 weeks, a rate of 4 per second.
7. CISCO: Launched a new router and achieved goals using only social media.  It saved the company $100,000′s
8. CLOROX: Launched online community, CloroxClassrooms.com, with blog and Twitter effort on Labor Day weekend at the beginning of the school year.  Twitter page was among the Top 10 trending topics over Labor Day weekend and blog was recognized by the Marketing to Mom Coalition and mommy bloggers for excellence in terms of delivering sharable information.
9. COFFEE GROUNDZ: Used Twitter as a direct ordering channel between the company and its customers.  Coffee Groundz reported 20%-30% increase in company sales and market share via Twitter
10. COMCAST: Started “Comcast Cares” Twitter customer service center and attracted 2,700 followers.  Many who were critics of the company changed to raving fan.  Quality of attention and dialogue serves as model for the the company.
11. CONAGRA FOODS (Hunt’s Ketchup): Advocates of Hunt’s pleaded with ConAgra through Facebook to stop putting high fructose corn syrup in what they believe is the “best ketchup ever.”  The company acts responsibly and stops.  Ok. This might not track to direct sales but it’s a great use of social media for a greater good.
12. DELL: Used Twitter to create “Dell Outlet” and booked $3 million in revenue in one year from Twitter postings
13. DOMINO’S: Credited Foursquare with a 29% pre-tax profit through promotions that encourage people to check in to their stores
14. DR. VAKSMAN (DENTIST): Dentist with five month old dental practice in San Francisco attracted 320 new clients through social media presence including Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn and YouTube.
15. DUNKINS DONUTS: Ran annual promotion, “Create Dunkin’ Next Donut,” through social networks to award grand winner with $12,000 plus year’s supply of donuts.  It generated more than 130,000 submission for 174,000 votes and “a healthy response in sales during the promotion period,” according to manager of interactive and relationship marketing, David Tyler.
16. HARLEY DAVIDSON: (HDTalking.com): Harley owners created website and social community totally funded by users and user-generated content.  Here, Harley owners trades photos, jokes, where to find hard to find parts, advice on Harley models and ownership plus there are at least 7 mechanics on-call at all times.  HDtalking.com now has 35,000+ and cost to Harley is negligible.
17. HISPANITO: Major hispanic online community, www.hispanito.com, created entirely through social network.  Within a year, it had 56,000 registered users plus 150,000 unique visitors with 6,000,000 pages viewed every month.
18. IKEA: Used one of the most popular and basic functions on Facebook, tagging pictures, and used it to IKEA’s advantage to promote its showroom products from sales people to regular people creating recommendation and advocates all over the world and a +15% lift in sales.
19. IBM: Decided to let company employees set up their own blog and Twitter accounts to service customers and reported the following stats:  There was no IBM corporate blog or Twitter account but there were 17,000 internal blogs, 100,000 employees using internal blogs and as many as 500,000 participants in company crowd-sourcing “jams.”  Results showed:  Crowd-sourcing identified 10 best incubator businesses, which IBM funded for $100 million and generated $100 billion in total revenue for a 10-to-1 ROI with a 44.1% gross profit margin
20. INDIUM: A company that manufactures special alloys isn’t sexy;  neither is convincing 14 of its engineers to start blogs.  But that exactly what the company does.  It increased leads, prospects, conversions and sales by double digits plus it gave customers the opportunity to know the company’s employees personally.
21. JETBLUE: Started a Twitter account to have more direct relationship with customers and potential customera and to listen and respond how they could serve them better and deal directly with any complaints.  They now have over 1.5 million followers.
22. KOGI: A Food Truck serving Korean BBQ in LA used Twitter to let them customers know where the truck was and when it would be in their neighborhood.  They had over 65,000 followers and 300 to 800 customers every time the truck parked.
23. LIVESTRONG: Raised $10.8 million with the Livestrong Challenge which occurred through social media channels with a blog serving as the hub.  This occurred in 2009, in the midst of a deep recession that was particularly hard on non-profits.
24. LOUIS E. PAGE INC: Fencing supplier really took off when now-owner Duncan Page added a blog to the business website. Duncan himself was surprised to find an article about how to use woven wire fencing to build a horse paddock attracted more than 1,500 views alone. The result: traffic, media coverage, and an 850% increase in sales leads.
25. MOONFRUIT: Website builder offered free Apple product via Twitter and got 44,113 followers that resulted in a 600% increase for sign-up.  As another result of the promotion, “Moonfruit” and “Moonfruit Twitter” rose to top-ranking search term on Google for website builders.
26. NECU JADRANU KOSOR ZA PREMIJERKU! 300 member Croatian Facebook group used Facebook and Twitter to break news of sudden, unexpected resignation of prime minister of Croatia a few minutes before mainstream media.  They became the largest Facebook group in Croatia within 24 hours and now have over 100,000+ fans.
27. ORACLE: Layered social networks on top of current communication channels and trained  25,000 partners, while reducing costs, boosting satisfaction and increasing PR
28. PIZZA HUT: iPhone app for ordering accounted for 50% of orders and generate $1,000,000 in revenues
29. PROCTER & GAMBLE: Launched social community for Tampax and Always with website, Beinggirl.com.  The site focused on the shared interest of early teen girls.  Social community outperformed traditional channels with ROI of 4-to-1.  Beinggirl.com was expanded to 21 countries.
30. SICKKIDS: The Hospital for Sick Children in Toronto, Ontario, set up a wiki, CasafinOntario Wiki, for Doctors to access resources and share “best practices.”  Over 400 physicians participated in the Wiki and comparisons were made between those who did and did not.   CafasinOntario Wiki users reported higher levels of practice change, greater CAFAS knowledge, and greater satisfaction with CAFAS implementation supports. Not only did they feel their learning curve had been accelerated thanks to the wiki, they felt more comfortable with transition.
31. SNAPPLE: Created Twitter account to share simple facts about its beverages and gained 10,000 followers.
32. STARBUCKS (MyStarbucksIdea.com):Went to customers for new product ideas.  “We used to launch a new product and it cost millions of dollars. Now, when we launch a new product, we already have millions of fans,” say Chris Bruzzo, Vice President Brand, Content and Online at Starbucks.
33. TURBOTAX: TeamTurboTax launched Twitter campaign to respond and answer questions during key tax season and found  customers were 71% more likely to recommend TurboTax because of their interactions with the company through Twitter.
34. VIRGIN AMERICA: Used “promoted tweets” to offer additional values to travellers and revenues to Virgin American and saw 6%-15% of travellers logged on through WiFi connections for 300 to 500 inflight tweets per day.

Social Media Examiner in their 2010 Social Media Marketing Industry Report says the #1 question people ask is “How do I measure social media return on investment?”

Business measurements abound in social media to determine return on investment and they’re worth considering since only 18% of traditional advertising campaigns ever generate a positive ROI (source: Nielsen).

I asked friend and colleague, David Berkowitz, Senior Director of Emerging Media and Innovation at 360i and blogger at Inside the Marketer’s Studio if I could re-post his blog, “100 ways to measure social media.” This post contains enough measurements to prove to even the most discerning examiners, measurements for social media ROI are there.

David published this post 9 months ago but it’s just as relevant today, maybe even more, because:

• It’s the topic most people are interested in
• Social media interest and usaage continues to accelerate – see Google  Trends graph below
• Great blogs stand the test of time
• When first published, this blog inspired me to start blogging

In fact, with 100 measurements, maybe the question really isn’t  ”How do I measure social media return on investment?”  But is: “What is your business strategy to prove ROI by its most relevant measurements.”

Many thanks to David.  At the end, there’s a presentation of “100 ways…” you can download but there won’t be a test – not interested in grades, just results.

________________________________________________________________________________________

100 Ways to Measure Social Media

By David Berkowitz

If there’s anyone out there left who says you can’t measure social media, here are a hundred answers.

At most of the events I’ve been to lately, measurement continues to be a hot topic. The first question that comes up is, “What can I measure?” That’s where this cheat sheet can come in handy: a list of 100 thought-starters.

Some entries here can be interpreted several ways. Depending on how you define them, some of these metrics may seem redundant, while others may seem so broad that they can be broken out further. Many of these can be combined with each other to create new metrics that can then be tracked over time. It’s a start, though, so dive in and consider which ones may apply to programs you’re working on.

1.     Volume of consumer-created buzz for a brand based on number of posts

2.     Amount of buzz based on number of impressions

3.     Shift in buzz over time

4.     Buzz by time of day / daypart

5.     Seasonality of buzz

6.     Competitive buzz

7.     Buzz by category / topic

8.     Buzz by social channel (forums, social networks, blogs, Twitter, etc)

9.     Buzz by stage in purchase funnel (e.g., researching vs. completing transaction vs. post-purchase)

10.  Asset popularity (e.g., if several videos are available to embed, which is used more)

11.  Mainstream media mentions

12.  Fans

13.  Followers

14.  Friends

15.  Growth rate of fans, followers, and friends

16.  Rate of virality / pass-along

17.  Change in virality rates over time

18.  Second-degree reach (connections to fans, followers, and friends exposed – by people or impressions)

19.  Embeds / Installs

20.  Downloads

21.  Uploads

22.  User-initiated views (e.g., for videos)

23.  Ratio of embeds or favoriting to views

24.  Likes / favorites

25.  Comments

26.  Ratings

27.  Social bookmarks

28.  Subscriptions (RSS, podcasts, video series)

29.  Pageviews (for blogs, microsites, etc)

30.  Effective CPM based on spend per impressions received

31.  Change in search engine rankings for the site linked to through social media

32.  Change in search engine share of voice for all social sites promoting the brand

33.  Increase in searches due to social activity

34.  Percentage of buzz containing links

35.  Links ranked by influence of publishers

36.  Percentage of buzz containing multimedia (images, video, audio)

37.  Share of voice on social sites when running earned and paid media in same environment

38.  Influence of consumers reached

39.  Influence of publishers reached (e.g., blogs)

40.  Influence of brands participating in social channels

41.  Demographics of target audience engaged with social channels

42.  Demographics of audience reached through social media

43.  Social media habits/interests of target audience

44.  Geography of participating consumers

45.  Sentiment by volume of posts

46.  Sentiment by volume of impressions

47.  Shift in sentiment before, during, and after social marketing programs

48.  Languages spoken by participating consumers

49.  Time spent with distributed content

50.  Time spent on site through social media referrals

51.  Method of content discovery (search, pass-along, discovery engines, etc)

52.  Clicks

53.  Percentage of traffic generated from earned media

54.  View-throughs

55.  Number of interactions

56.  Interaction/engagement rate

57.  Frequency of social interactions per consumer

58.  Percentage of videos viewed

59.  Polls taken / votes received

60.  Brand association

61.  Purchase consideration

62.  Number of user-generated submissions received

63.  Exposures of virtual gifts

64.  Number of virtual gifts given

65.  Relative popularity of content

66.  Tags added

67.  Attributes of tags (e.g., how well they match the brand’s perception of itself)

68.  Registrations from third-party social logins (e.g., Facebook Connect, Twitter OAuth)

69.  Registrations by channel (e.g., Web, desktop application, mobile application, SMS, etc)

70.  Contest entries

71.  Number of chat room participants

72.  Wiki contributors

73.  Impact of offline marketing/events on social marketing programs or buzz

74.  User-generated content created that can be used by the marketer in other channels

75.  Customers assisted

76.  Savings per customer assisted through direct social media interactions compared to other channels (e.g., call centers, in-store)

77.  Savings generated by enabling customers to connect with each other

78.  Impact on first contact resolution (FCR) (hat tip to Forrester Research for that one)

79.  Customer satisfaction

80.  Volume of customer feedback generated

81.  Research & development time saved based on feedback from social media

82.  Suggestions implemented from social feedback

83.  Costs saved from not spending on traditional research

84.  Impact on online sales

85.  Impact on offline sales

86.  Discount redemption rate

87.  Impact on other offline behavior (e.g., TV tune-in)

88.  Leads generated

89.  Products sampled

90.  Visits to store locator pages

91.  Conversion change due to user ratings, reviews

92.  Rate of customer/visitor retention

93.  Impact on customer lifetime value

94.  Customer acquisition / retention costs through social media

95.  Change in market share

96.  Earned media’s impact on results from paid media

97.  Responses to socially posted events

98.  Attendance generated at in-person events

99.  Employees reached (for internal programs)

100.  Job applications received

There you go. I welcome other entries in the comments. It’s also just the start of the answer to the broader question: “How do I measure it?” Ultimately, you need to start with figuring out your business objectives and then apply these metrics accordingly.

Before starting BarnRaisers, I worked at well-known advertising agencies.  I was fortunate to have worked on major brands, some at times of profound change, and with very talented people.  It was a lot fun for a lot of years.

A former client, Brian Perkins, Vice President of Corporate Affairs at J&J, said at Cannes this year, ”holding companies for ad agencies should consider taking themselves private.  Advertising is a labor-intensive, not capital-intensive, business and it’s inevitable digital agencies are going to gravitate toward brand stewardship.”

You may or may not agree, but Brian’s comments indicate a shift is taking place.  To help explain why, here are 7 reasons social media agencies are like ad agencies and 8 reasons they’re not.

7 REASONS THEY ARE

1. Both have to demonstrate a deep understanding of consumer attitudes and buying behaviors
2. Both have to find insights into unmet consumer needs
3. Both have to know how to create and build brands
4. Both have to be able to take the brand idea and translate it across all media platforms
5. Both have to be on top of media usage and trends
6. Both have to find unique tactics and executions that accelerate sales and have people talking
7. Both are accountable for results, return on investment and sustainable sales growth

8 REASONS THEY’RE NOT

1. Ad agencies communicate through a monologue.  Social media agencies through a conversation
2. Ad agencies work with product benefits.  Social media agencies with shared interests
3. Ad agencies target heavy users of brands who they encourage to buy more.  Social media agencies find advocates who they encourage to spread the word
4. Only 14% of people trust advertising.  80% of people trust the recommendations of other people
5. Ad agencies use multiple mediums and are ”media neutral.”  Social media agencies work mostly on the internet where 90% of all purchase decisions begin.
6. Ad agencies are labor intensive.  Social media agencies are even more labor intensive because, once the campaign is launched, the work has just begun (e.g. content refreshment, community management, measurements and analytics).
7. Only 18% of ad campaigns ever generate a positive ROI.  While people kick the tires on the ROI of social media, brands, like Blendtec blenders, have proven an ROI of 500-to-1 with much less investment.
8. Ad agencies tend to be secretive about their “proprietary” and “trademarked” process for creating ads.  Social media agencies tend to share their work and publish for all in places like SlideShare.

I’ve found social media promotes a culture of givers, not takers.  People like Joe Sorge, Toby Bloomberg, Tom Anderson, David Berkowitz, Kelley Connors and Mike Rogers (to name just a few) have routinely offered to help or participate in speaking engagements, workshops and presentations with no mention of “where’s my cut” or “what are you getting.”  It something that’s a little different and a whole lot more fun.

Do you have an opinion on the difference between the two?

A frequent comment from businesses and people new to blogging is:  I have a website, so why do I need a blog?

Here are 5 reasons blogs pay off.

1. IMPROVED BRAND IMAGE: Positive perceptions of  a business or company increase +36% if there is a blog either on or linked to the website. That’s because consumers view you as accessible, transparent and willing to help (source: Nielsen) .
2. BETTER SEARCH RESULTS: A blog is a major asset for better search results, especially since you can link your blog to others (and visa-versa), a primary characteristic search engines use for determining relevance. For example, my name, Rob Petersen, is pretty common. In searching the name, this site, BarnRaisers, comes up 4th, ahead of a famous magazine publisher and a former running back for the Philadelphia Eagles (sorry, I’m not them).
3. STRONGER RELATIONSHIPS: 95% of people never read more than 5 pages or spend more than 5 minutes on a website (source: comScore). If your company or brand website has more than 5 pages, consumers are likely to get to know you better through your blog than the chance your website can beat these odds.
4. RETURN ON INVESTMENT: “Open source” blogging platforms are very good now and keep getting better.  To reveal a little about myself, seven months ago, I built this site with a little sweat equity and $7.50.  Given the platform capabilities, I also made it the company website and put 5 tabs on top to tell the story of our business (with great respect to comScore). Although it also took knocking on dozens of doors (well, dozens of dozens) to secure initial assignments and there was  time, travel and other business expenses, blogs played a critical role delivering the necessary ROI to  start and build a business.
5. SHARED OBJECTIVES:  Blogs and brand websites share (at least they should) the same business objectives; that is, to drive leads, provide useful information, be helpful, convert consumers, complete desired transactions (e.g. create inquiries, sign up subscriptions, make a purchase) and keep your audience coming back to build your brand. Can any business have too much of that?

I go to blogs, before websites, for inspiration, ideas and help.  Bloggers I admire keep me in the know and have graciously helped me, either directly and indirectly, be a better communicator, business person and blogger.  I also feel like I have a relationship with someone which is always preferable.  Just a  dozen of the many I turn to are:

1. http://www.chrisbrogan.com
2. http://sethgodin.typepad.com
3. http://mashable.com
4. http://www.marketingprofs.com
5. http://www.bloombergmarketing.blogs.com
6. http://www.tomhcanderson.com
7. http://www.marketersstudio.com
8. http://mackcollier.com
9. http://www.socialmediaexplorer.com
10. http://www.n2growth.com/blog
11. http://conversationagent.com
12. http://altitudebranding.com

A blog I also admire for its business acumen is http://www.singleservecoffee.com

The blog’s creator has smartly identified a topic that is also be a niche business in a big, crowded, competitive category.  The brand name/URL establishes category authority and comes up #1 on search engines for “single serve coffee” and “single serve coffee makers.”  The blog reviews products, has relevant ads (that generate revenue) and sells single serve coffee makers and accessories direct to consumers.  On the site, there is also social community on the subject.  The ROI must be extraordinary.

Does this help you see the value of blogs?