Don't ignore ROI of social media

I had a great conversation this morning with a high school friend about social media. In a constant effort to learn as much as I can about social media marketing, I want to talk to people who are doing it or have done it before. That's why I made no hesitation in e-mailing Miguel A. Llano about my interest in social media marketing. He's been there before and he's been quite successful (and he was a hell of a wide receiver in high school).

I spent an hour talking with him on the phone and picked his brain about a variety of topics. One topic we got on was one that I had been thinking about quite a bit since delving into social media marketing, and I think it's a topic that, from what I've noticed, could use more emphasis: ROI, or return on investment. On the surface, it would seem that ROI would be at the forefront of most social media marketer's minds. After all, what good is promotion if there's no emphasis on monetizing it? I'd be willing to bet it's the only thing most CEOs and CFOs worry about, so why not at the marketing level, as well? Your job may well depend on it.

Brand promotion is great, and to me, it's one of the first steps that needs to be taken in order to get money to start rolling in. But if there's no strategy to that end, brand promotion efforts through social media are largely worthless. With my background in newspapers, I can see this being a huge problem for the industry. Newspapers are failing throughout the world, and no one has figured out a way to make money off the Web as content distribution becomes more and more digital. Most newspapers have implemented a social media strategy, and I think that's great. The New York Times this year created a social media department to help handle content distribution through social media avenues. But there's very little potential for return on such an investment. The Times has a strong following in the first place, and its implementation of social media strategies has earned the paper quite a few Web followers on Facebook and Twitter. But I'd be interested in seeing how much money is actually coming in through backlink clicks to the Times' Web site. That's not just a New York Times problem; it's a newspaper industry problem. And I use The Times as an example because it has completely devoted itself to using social media in a way that will redefine how its readers get their news. But newspapers have to solve the issue of how to make money on the Web before they can really see anything that resembles a ROI, especially those newspapers that have created new departments dedicated to social media.

Other industries aren't facing that type of problem. Most have some sort of product or service to promote that people can buy with real money that creates a real ROI. But the question I think most social media marketers needs to ask is whether or not the implementation of such a strategy is completely optimized. Are they making it as easy as possible for people to buy a product or service, or are they marketing for the sake of marketing? For example, if I'm using Facebook and Twitter to sell a book, where am I backlinking potential customers to? Do I backlink them to my homepage? Or do I backlink them to an order form that allows for easy buying while also providing a lot of great information about what's in the book I want them to buy? By taking clicks out of Point A to Point B (which is ultimately a consumer inputting their personal information and clicking the submit button), marketers can optimize the chances that a clickthrough will turn into real, live cash. The point is to make it as easy as possible for people to invest in your product or service. While simply pointing people back to a static homepage is a great way to promote and get people to learn more about the product or service you're offering, it's limited in terms of ROI since you're depending on users to navigate themselves to a page where they can actually buy your product or service. It seems like too big of a risk to take.

So, I'm interested in how you or your company implements a social media strategy with ROI in mind. How much emphasis is placed on ROI on a daily basis? Are you challenged to think in ways that will optimize ROI? Most importantly, what do you think can be done differently to improve ROI?

2009: The Year of JASON

An article in PC World caught my attention this week, and since my full name is Jason, I'd love to say that it printed an article about what a great year this was for me. Alas, that's not the case. The year 2009 became the year of the social network (or Just Another SOcial Network, as the disbelievers like to refer to social media). As PC World points out, social networks became more than just a way to keep your friends up to date on what store you shopped at or the crochet set you bought grandma for her birthday. Social networks, like Facebook and Twitter, became a popular and credible way to deliver news and market products. Think back over the year, if you will. How did you find out about Michael Jackson dying? Where did you hear about the plane crash in the Hudson River? How did you keep up with the election in Iran? Chances are, Facebook and Twitter are the answers to those questions and more when it came to the big events of 2009.

I know they are for me. I heard about the passing of Michael Jackson and the Miracle on the Hudson from Facebook. Twitter kept me updated on the broiling situation in Iran over the summer. Never before had I considered these sites to be sources of breaking news and ongoing situations. I'm sure a lot of us felt that way. But it seems fitting, doesn't it? It seems like people are finally figuring out the huge potential social networks hold for content distribution, serious discussion and keeping people informed. As the article in PC World points out:

Earlier this fall, for instance, Facebook logged its 350 millionth user. And this summer, Nielsen Co. reported that In April, Facebook users spent 13.9 billion minutes on the site, 700% more than the year-earlier total of 1.7 billion minutes.

And Twitter hasn't been a shrinking violet in the social networking scene in 2009. In March, for example, the number of U.S. visitors to the site increased by 131% just from February, according to online researcher comScore Inc. And Experian Hitwise, an Internet monitoring firm reported this fall that Twitter's September traffic increased by 1170% compared to year-earlier month.

Those number seem staggering? They should. Imagine, 350 million people. That's more than seven times the population of some countries. Eat that, Luxembourg. The increase in traffic is pretty shocking, as well. It should be no wonder, then, why companies are adopting social media as a new, effective way to reach people. Think about a mass message you're likely to see during a commercial break. How many people does it reach in this age of TiVo and DVR technology? I'll be so bold as to estimate that it does not have the potential to reach 350 million people. Social media sites, Facebook specifically, do have that potential. And while it's not likely that companies are going to reach all 350 million users by adopting a social media strategy, what's important here is that the potential for reaching as many of those people as possible exists, and it exists through more targeted means than mass commercial messages.

The adoption of social media sites by regular people as a way to share news has validated the very real opportunities that lie in social networking for businesses. After all, if people feel the need to share news, why not share products, too? While, as PC World points out, a small number of companies have implemented social media strategies, that number is starting to grow. We have the breakthrough year of 2009 to thank for that.

Welcome to my social world

I am very excited about launching this blog. It goes hand-in-hand with my portfolio site, which can be found by clicking here. A little about me: I'm a 28-year-old social media junkie. For years, I have participated in social media sites, but only recently did I fully discover the potential social media has in the business world. I hate to say something that seems so scripted, but social media possibilities excite me. I'm always going out of my way to learn the newest trends, work the latest gadgets and take in knowledge of people who are currently working in social media marketing. These people are a huge asset to anyone interested in learning more about how social media can work for businesses, and I highly recommend checking them out in my blogroll.

Currently, I am a graduate student at the S.I. Newhouse School of Public Communications at Syracuse University. I am focusing my efforts in new media and social media marketing, and I'm truly excited about job prospects when I graduate this spring. My background mainly lies in newspapers. I spent six years writing for several newspapers in Georgia before deciding to go back to school and get into the social media world. During my career as a sports reporter, I got to do a lot of things most people only dream of. I won a lot of awards along the way, too. But with the current state of newspapers and their obsession with their own inertia, I couldn't see making a lifetime career out of reporting. Social media, on the other hand, is all about new ways of doing things. It's cutting edge. It's what's right now, and I don't see it going anywhere any time soon.

Through this blog, I plan on keeping up to date with all the latest social media news and trends while offering a few opinions along the way. I welcome any and all suggestions and advice, especially from current social media experts in the field. I look forward to joining those ranks within the next six months.

In the meantime, if you'd like to see what I'm up to in the realm of social media, check out some of my pages: Facebook | LinkedIn | Twitter | Delicious