To protect the innocent, I've altered this question a little to disguise the firm:
"I need to convince management that social media is worth investing in, but they're concerned about tracking results of such activities when today's focus is very much on proving ROI through reporting."
My suggestion is to focus your Social Media efforts where they will do the most good. It's not true that you cannot accurately report ROI from Social Media efforts.
Start with blogging as the hub of all your SM activity. Blogs (multiple based on topics or keywords) will hit the biggest target out there first, and that is Search....for every Twitter follower, there will be hundreds of people searching to solve problems that will find your blogs.
For most companies, 65% to 90% of all traffic is coming from first time visitors. With Corporate Blogging as the hub of your strategy, use a sharing tool like Share This (built into Compendium Blogware) to share your content with your social media outlets like Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn Groups. Time Magazine very accurately defined Twitter as an excellent "pointing" device.
The idea is to use your social media to drive traffic back to your blogs, and then using CTA's on the blogs, convert that traffic into leads.
I've seen this strategy work wonderfully for hundreds of our clients. The measurements you need to focus on are: Bounce Rates, Time on site and most importantly....click through rates. Ultimatly the goal of any marketing effort is to build relationships that turn into business, so like all Online Marketing these efforts should be tracked all the way to revenue.
Anyone who says that social media can't hold up to ROI scrutiny is stuck in Social Media 1.0.
"I need to convince management that social media is worth investing in, but they're concerned about tracking results of such activities when today's focus is very much on proving ROI through reporting."
My suggestion is to focus your Social Media efforts where they will do the most good. It's not true that you cannot accurately report ROI from Social Media efforts.
Start with blogging as the hub of all your SM activity. Blogs (multiple based on topics or keywords) will hit the biggest target out there first, and that is Search....for every Twitter follower, there will be hundreds of people searching to solve problems that will find your blogs.
For most companies, 65% to 90% of all traffic is coming from first time visitors. With Corporate Blogging as the hub of your strategy, use a sharing tool like Share This (built into Compendium Blogware) to share your content with your social media outlets like Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn Groups. Time Magazine very accurately defined Twitter as an excellent "pointing" device.
The idea is to use your social media to drive traffic back to your blogs, and then using CTA's on the blogs, convert that traffic into leads.
I've seen this strategy work wonderfully for hundreds of our clients. The measurements you need to focus on are: Bounce Rates, Time on site and most importantly....click through rates. Ultimatly the goal of any marketing effort is to build relationships that turn into business, so like all Online Marketing these efforts should be tracked all the way to revenue.
Anyone who says that social media can't hold up to ROI scrutiny is stuck in Social Media 1.0.
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