One of the big questions brands always face when it comes to social media is how to prove its business value to the C-suite. It’s not just a matter of followers, but whether those followers can be converted to customers or advocates, and loyal ones at that.
The first step in proving the value of social media is to define and measure engagement with your brand or organization. Lauren Friedman, head of social business enablement at Adobe and speaker at PR News’ Big 4 Social Media Conference in San Francisco on Aug. 6, shares some thoughts on what to look for when tracking your social media activity.
- Stick to the root of what you’re trying to accomplish. There are so many metrics available on social media. Before you get into what you can measure, think about what you’re really trying to accomplish and which metrics tie into that specifically.
- Understand the difference between marketing metrics and business metrics. Many metrics on social media are fluff. That’s not to say they’re not valuable in their own way, but make sure you understand that there’s a difference between the metrics that look good, and the ones that really impact your business.
- Objectives first, strategy second. So many times companies have their whole social strategy built out, but then have no clue as to what are their main objectives. Truth is, you might have more than one strategy that will impact one objective.
Attend PR News' Big 4 Conference at the Hyatt Regency San Francisco on Aug. 6 to get case studies from Aflac, the American Heart Association, Adobe, Charles Schwab, Edelman, Golden Gate National Parks Conservancy, Levi Strauss & Co., LEWIS Pulse, Lithium Technologies, Sharecare, Transamerica, Weber Shandwick and the World Surf League.
Follow Lauren Friedman: @lauren_hannah, @adobe
Follow Richard Brownell: @RickBrownell
You make a great point about having clear objectives. This is always our first step when developing a strategy. Like you said, an objective may have more than one strategy. And a strategy that isn’t based on a clear objective is not likely to succeed.
strategy -a plan of action designed to achieve a long-term or overall aim.
I believe this article is confusing strategies with tactics. Your communication objectives needs to be aligned to the business objectives, based on a communication strategy and achieved with different tactics.