It’s hard to compete with other departments that can produce actual measurements on how well they achieved their objectives for the quarter… so before executives decide to cut your budget or your job, learn how to communicate your measurements and how you contributed to the company’s bottom line.
Katie Paine, founder and CEO of KD Paine & Partners gives great insight into how we can measure social media regardless of the lack of manuals available to guide us that have been used in the past to measure traditional media metrics. One of the easiest and first things she advises marketing teams to do immediately, is integrate your current social media campaigns with Google Analytics.
She also outlines how to measure in what she calls ‘super six steps’ and promotes these steps as ‘super’ because they work with no matter what you are measuring.
Step 1: Define your mission, objectives
Step 2: Define your audiences and what motivates them
Step 3: Define the actual metrics you are going to use
Step 4: Figure out what you’re going to benchmark yourself against
Step 5: Pick out your measurement tools and stick with them
Step 6: Analyze results
In a past interview with Online Marketing Blog, some of the biggest mistakes she has seen companies make in the past is confusing size with results. Bt getting wrapped up with large numbers companies can’t distinguish the hundreds of thousands of followers they have with those that are actually engaged with their brand. She also notes that an easy way to keep up with the ever-changing world of social media is to read what others are communicating to you. She is an avid user of social media and well-known on Twitter where she communicates with much of her fan base. One of the questions she addressed and answered was what is the newest social media measurement tool? Paine’s reply included mentions of Radian 6 and Techrigy and how they are becoming the 21st century’s version clipping services. To have your own questions answered, follow Katie Paine on Twitter @KDPaine
Katie Paine’s videos were interesting and informative. I wish she explained a little more what Google Analytics is, but that is something a company can research for themselves. Measurement is without a doubt no easy but definitely do-able. Her six steps give a good layout to begin your social media measurement process. I think that if any company starts off with identifying everything is these six steps than they can avoid a lot of chaos.
I think Katie Paine’s video is helpful when it comes to understanding how to measure the effectiveness of social media, when I read this I referred back to your other post on measuring social media and it helped to clarify some of the confusion I had about the process. I think one of the most important step for companies to be sure to do before using these social media sites is to figure out what they are going to benchmark themselves against. This way they have something consistent to refer to.