With more than 70 million users on Pinterest, 1.11 billion on Facebook and over 554 million on Twitter, it’s less ‘the one to watch’ these days and more ‘which ones to watch’.
We’re all encouraged to use social media to engage with customers and many businesses are now using all of these platforms to get their messages out there and build public support.
But how do we decide where and how to focus our efforts?
Firstly, be clear what you’re aiming for and that depends on the aims of your brand and what you would class as a ‘win’ in terms of social media marketing and the end results you’re hoping for.
Secondly, consider the most basic metrics you should be gauging:
- How is my brand performing on the site? Monitor how quickly your followers increase, number of likes, repins, reposts and the overall influence of those sharing your content. Analytics tools like GoPixel can help you to track this data and show you the resulting ROI over time.
- Is the social media site contributing to your overall marketing strategy? The best way to judge the impact of your social media activity, beyond the site itself, is the amount and therefore the percentage of web traffic it generates.
- Planned and measured. Carry out controlled activity. Advertise a specific referral method, product or discount code so you can better track the number of referrals and purchases from that source. If you carry out a lot of general activity, it may be more difficult to find out what worked and what didn’t.
The important thing to remember is clear objectives with measurable outcomes. What do you want to achieve, what specific things will you use social media for to advance those goals and, most importantly, how are you going to measure the outcomes?
