Sure, social media has had plenty of hype, and everyone is "sure" of its value. But how do you prove that it offers a true return on investment, especially if you’re trying to persuade clients or management to invest marketing dollars in Facebook, Twitter and other social media campaigns? This session looks at emerging social media analytics methods, how to measure "conversions" when there may be no tangible transactions, as well as some of the tools available to measure ROI and performance of social media activities.

1. Scottsdale, Arizona
December 2011
Measuring Social ROI
Adam Ware - @wheresitworking
SwellPath - @swellpath

2. The Basic Approach
Understand
Business
Objectives &
Goals
Develop
Develop KPIs Strategy for Measure &
and Key Metrics Data Collection Analyze
& Organization
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3. Developing KPIs & Key Metrics
• KPIs – reach awareness,
sign ups, leads, sales in
dollars; things that “move
the needle”.
• Key metrics – the
numbers that funnel into to
those KPIs; click-throughs,
fans, retweets, visits, etc.
• Other metrics – don’t
waste much time on these
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4. Data Collection & Organization
• Connect dots where you can
> Analytics campaign parameters, social tracking (GA)
> Integrating Facebook Open Graph data into
analytics:http://ipullrank.com/code/keyword-demographics/
• Utilize multiple data sources
> Site analytics, social APIs, 3rd party tools like Twitalyzer
• Data unification
> If it’s all in the same place, it’ll be much easier to report and
analyze
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5. Unifying Data
• Google Docs
> http://www.seomoz.org/blog/how-to-track-your-social-media-strategy
• More advanced methods
> PHP/MySQL - http://emptymind.org/analytics-all-stars-create-
custom-dashboards-using-apis/
• 3rd Party Solutions
> DIY – NextAnalytics (http://excel.nextanalytics.com/), GoodData
> Solutions Providers – SwellPath, Webtrends
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6. Attribution
• Key to getting a realistic ROI
> Don’t use “last one in” credit for KPIs
> Use Google Analytics attribution tracking; look at visits
with and without historic social touches
> How much better do the groups with social touch points
convert?
> Is the AOV larger? Sales cycle shorter? Loyalty stronger?
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7. Thank You
@wheresitworking/@swellpath
http://www.swellpath.com
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