How to Measure Success in Social Media Part Two
September 25, 2009 by Spencer Spellman · 1 Comment 
Last week I discussed how as a company or a business you can measure success with social media marketing. I stressed the importance of choosing the right metrics (ie: click-through-rates not twitter followers) and suggested some software that could help.
Today I’m going to get into more specific ways you can measure social media success.
One of the biggest questions people have about social media is how to track sales. Hotels want to know how many “heads in beds” they can get from social media. There are a couple different ways you can do this.
The first is an oldie-but-goodie way of measuring your marketing efforts. Ask. Your. Customers. Put a referral source on any forms your customers fill out, or on the first page of your shopping cart. This is an easy way to sample which marketing is working, and I’ve noticed that for the first time, social media is now a option on many of these forms. Keep in mind though, that this is one of the least accurate ways to measure marketing success. Customers don’t always remember where they first heard your message, or it was the combination of several mediums that did the trick. Simple forms can’t take this into account.
You might also begin a new marketing campaign by opening it up to your Facebook Fans or Twitter followers first. Consider offering a 10% discount to followers that retweet your product. By offering a deal exclusively to social media contacts, you can get results that don’t include spillover from your print or radio campaigns. Anyone who used your special “retweet code” would be a direct result of your social media efforts.
One thing to remember, social media users are often more savy than the average consumer and they don’t like to be marketed to. So, if you’re new to social media marketing, then first grow your reach on different social media outlets. You must have an authentic group of targeted fans if you ever expect to run a successful social marketing campaign.
Also, make sure you know your starting point. Have the numbers from your traditional marketing campaigns. Know your results so that once you start tracking your social media numbers you have something to compare it to.
Lastly, if your business is new or even skeptical of social media, then don’t be afraid to start small. You may convince the higher ups if you start by keeping track of how social media is cutting costs. If you’re able to ditch a few online advertisements or cut the costs of your search engine marketing campaign by using targeted social media, then show these numbers to the boss.
How do you measure the success of social media marketing? Which social media strategies have provided the best ROI?
This is a great article. I think that has been one of the most challenging things about integrating the Social Media platforms into marketing campaigns and showing ROI. I appreciate that someone outlined a way to better measure results. TY.