The Basics of Social Media ROI

Posted on September 15, 2009

registerToday I sat on a panel at the IBM Websphere Commerce Leadership Summit, with panelists Brant Barton, co-founder of Bazaarvoice, Duke Marr, VP of Product Management at 1-800-Flowers.com, and Stan Payson, VP of Interactive Media at David’s Bridal, moderated by Forrester‘s Sean Corcoran.  The panel was called Answering the Burning Question of Social Commerce ROI. I enjoyed the discussion, especially with the varied perspectives of the participants.  There were lots of lessons learned shared – in particular Duke and Stan had terrific insight at different ends of the social media maturity perspective.  Stan’s company is just getting started, building a strategy, while Duke’s team has a foothold in just about every social and new technology (especially mobile) tactic out there working hard to be first.  1800Flowers.com was the first to do commerce on Facebook, for example.

Some key thoughts about ROI shared on the panel:

  • Measurement and ROI are not the same. Use measurements to calculate ROI (Return on Investment).
  • Practical experience shows that sometimes ROI doesn’t come right away.
  • When just getting started, it’s helpful to be able to attribute web traffic through links shared in social networks, promotion codes, specific landing pages, etc.  But that is just the tip of the iceberg for measuring ROI.
  • Longer term, lifetime value of a customer is a key metric to understand the net results of leveraging advocates.

What’s clear: businesses can measure ROI, they are focused on the long term, and there is much room for education of marketers in this space.  With my mind on ROI I spotted this presentation shared on Twitter today (feed readers may need to click through to the post to read).  Between the panel and the presentation my mind is overflowing with social media ROI goodness.  Yours will be too after going through this – Olivier Blanchard captures the essence of ROI from social media in a humorous, easy-to-understand way.  Worth browsing through.  While you’re figuring out who Olivier Blanchard (aka TheBrandBuilder) is, you may also want to check out his post today debunking social media myths.

Olivier Blanchard Basics Of Social Media Roi

Photo credit: thomashawk via flickr
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  • http://blogs.dix-eaton.com/measurementpr-spectives/ Chuck Hemann

    Hey Adam – great post, and thanks for also flagging Olivier’s deck. That was an amazing presentation, you’re right. This question of social media ROI is going to continue coming up, mostly because not many have a firm grasp on exactly what it really is (as Olivier points out in his deck, I think).

    If we’re thinking about a social media campaign (if you’re comfortable calling social media projects “campaigns) on an A-Z continuum with “A” being the defining of measurable goals and objectives and “Z” being the actual measurement process to show ROI, I think we mostly call down at “A,” which leads to so much trouble at “Z.” Defining those clear, measurable objectives is a critical piece that we all fumble from time-to-time.

    Anyway, thanks for sharing your thoughts. Always enjoy them.

  • http://blogs.dix-eaton.com/measurementpr-spectives/ Chuck Hemann

    Hey Adam – great post, and thanks for also flagging Olivier’s deck. That was an amazing presentation, you’re right. This question of social media ROI is going to continue coming up, mostly because not many have a firm grasp on exactly what it really is (as Olivier points out in his deck, I think).

    If we’re thinking about a social media campaign (if you’re comfortable calling social media projects “campaigns) on an A-Z continuum with “A” being the defining of measurable goals and objectives and “Z” being the actual measurement process to show ROI, I think we mostly call down at “A,” which leads to so much trouble at “Z.” Defining those clear, measurable objectives is a critical piece that we all fumble from time-to-time.

    Anyway, thanks for sharing your thoughts. Always enjoy them.

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  • http://outandaboutmarketing.com/ Milena Regos

    Hi,
    thanks for a great post. I do the social media marketing for a ski resort in Lake Tahoe. We did a contest on Facebook and with the help of little bit of pay per click advertising, Facebook generated the most traffic to our website for the past month. Call it measurements, but it’s at least something. You can read the entire post on the contest at: http://bit.ly/CJdwZ

  • http://outandaboutmarketing.com Milena Regos

    Hi,
    thanks for a great post. I do the social media marketing for a ski resort in Lake Tahoe. We did a contest on Facebook and with the help of little bit of pay per click advertising, Facebook generated the most traffic to our website for the past month. Call it measurements, but it’s at least something. You can read the entire post on the contest at: http://bit.ly/CJdwZ

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  • http://adamhcohen.com adamcohen

    Approved

  • http://www.buzzbishop.com Buzz Bishop

    I like to think of social media ROI on a very simple and basic plane: you measure social media roi one customer at a time.

    You offer super service and empower a customer to become a brand advocate and you will see that return on investment. Traditional advertising may count impressions, but does it *make* an impression.

    Social media makes an impression. That's how you measure your ROI
    http://www.cyberbuzz.com/2009/11/05/times-squar…

  • http://www.buzzbishop.com Buzz Bishop

    I like to think of social media ROI on a very simple and basic plane: you measure social media roi one customer at a time.

    You offer super service and empower a customer to become a brand advocate and you will see that return on investment. Traditional advertising may count impressions, but does it *make* an impression.

    Social media makes an impression. That's how you measure your ROI
    http://www.cyberbuzz.com/2009/11/05/times-squar…

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