7 Ways To Measure Your Social Media ROI

There’s no denying that social media can be a useful tool for any business. Of course, just how useful can depend on any number of factors.

When it comes to determining whether that success is greater than the cost of running your social media campaign though, it’s hard to know where to look or what to look for.

Knowing just how much return on investment (ROI) revenue accompanies your social media campaign is vital to knowing whether or not the campaign should be continued or canned. However, establishing your social media ROI is a potential maze of uncertainty.

Here are seven methods that will prove useful in measuring the impact of your social media campaign, as well as your social media ROI.

Note: It’s important to remember that no two social media campaigns are the same so not all of these measures will work for all campaigns. Finding those that suit your needs is just part of the fun.

1. Separate online and offline revenue

The first method in which to measure your social media ROI is fairly straightforward. Simply separate revenue that has been earned via online and offline measures. The sum made from offline sales can be dismissed as this does not relate to your social media campaign. The revenue earned online will give you a (very) broad idea of how impactful your campaign has been. This may not be the most accurate calculation but at least you’ll be somewhere in the ballpark.

2. Separate all social media platforms

If you’re using more than one social media platform (e.g. Facebook and Twitter) establish those customers that visit you via each. For each platform, establish how much each group contributes and how this relates to other sales areas. Do your Facebook fans spend more money than those that arrive at your site via a search engine? If so, how much more? Do Twitter followers create larger streams of revenue than your offline sales? Once you’ve separated each platform, you can establish the ROI for each and then you can focus on those that make you revenue.

3. Use incentives as a marker

One of the best ways to monitor any one social media platform (see above) is by creating exclusive incentives for those people using that platform. For example, offer a 25 per cent discount to Twitter followers and see how much impact that has on your revenue. The more people that take up the offer, the better your ROI. The fewer that click through, the more likely it is that your campaign is stalling. The beauty of using incentives as a marker is that you can use a different incentive for each platform and monitor social media ROI across a broader spectrum.

4. Pay attention to who says what

Social media isn’t just about scoring likes and followers. Remember that getting involved in the conversation is vital to succeeding. This doesn’t just relate to your own conversations with customers, communities and third parties but also the conversations they have away from you. So cast your net over the internet once in a while to see what people are saying about your company, and how that impacts sales. Are your sales falling when people are negative? Are they on the up when people have good things to say? This would be the expected trend, but it’s not always the case. If you can alter sales through other’s conversations, you’ll be able to monitor you social media ROI accordingly.

5. Experiment

If you really want to know if your social media campaign is drawing enough interest as well as revenue, be prepared to experiment with the elements of your campaign. Careful tinkering on a regular basis can disclose which areas are likely to generate improved returns. Don’t be afraid to pull the plug on a blog to see if its absence impacts sales. Don’t be afraid to throw more giveaways out there to see if it entices further custom. Whatever changes you made can be reversed if they prove detrimental to your campaign.

6. Compare visits and click-through

Remember, social media campaigns aren’t just about sales. For many they’re about establishing improved brand awareness or sowing the seeds for the future. In this case, it’s hard to put a financial figure against what you’re doing. However, you still need to know whether it’s worth continuing forward. Take a look at the number of visits to your social media platform. Determine how many of these influence ‘likes’, ‘tweets’, ‘+1s’, etc. Now look at how many of these create enough interest to visit your website proper or purchase a product. As long as these figures all remain stable or, even better, are in the ascendency you can consider your social media ROI to be profitable.

7. Survey your customers

This might seem obvious but you’d be surprised how many businesses neglect the obvious when they become wound up in social media ROI. By asking customers – be it by email, tweet, message, or anything else – why they chose to or chose not to use your brand, you can establish exactly how much impact social media had on any revenue earned from that customer.

Finally, establishing your social media ROI is an inexact science. Such is the frivolous nature of the internet it is impossible to predict the behaviour or exactly what did and didn’t lead to a sale. The best you can do is hazard a well-educated guess.

Remember to trust your hunches though; if you feel a campaign is underachieving but don’t have the figures to back it up, make changes anyway. Likewise, if your figures say your campaign is meeting its requirements but you feel it’s languishing, make changes. If you’re wrong, the figures will soon tell you otherwise.