CMOs integrate social media in their current strategies and are looking beyond sales, which indicates they understand the value of social media. Sounds nice but how do you measure the return on investment?

Whether or not to enter the social space is not even a question anymore. Even if you don’t want to be there your audience most likely will be in that space, talking about your brand. These days the question is towards the ROI of social media. Setting up a whole social media team is quite frightening for brands, because how do you measure the KPI’s and will this directly be shown in the sales numbers?

MDG Advertising made this nice video showing how the industry is measuring the ROI of social media.

Click here to view the embedded video.

MDG Advertising answers the question CMOs are having: how do you measure the ROI of social media? In short, every business has different objectives so there is no standard measurement.

So what is important to know then? Well, having clear business objectives may be an open door but is most certainly essential. Forrester recognizes this as well and recommends 4 factors to consider to measure the ROI of social media:

1. Financial
   Have costs decreased or sales increased?
2. Brand
   Have perceptions of the brand improved?
3. Risk Management
   Are you better prepared to respond to issues that affect brand reputation?
4. Digital
   Has the brand enhanced its digital assets?

The 4 factors indicated above are really relevant, however it only matters if the results are monitored. So yes, it’s really important to set up clear brand and business objectives but don’t forget to keep track of it all.

How do you measure the ROI of your social media efforts? Let us know in the comments below.

Source: Measuring The ROI Of Social Media photo from Shutterstock, MDG Advertising

Last week on ViralBlog among others “KLM’s Meet & Seat Social Seating Is Live”, “Why CMOs Will Focus On Social Media Metrics?” and “Top 10 Social Media Blogs: The 2012 Winners!”.

Mexican Football Team Managed By Its Fans

Recently we mentioned the very first article on ViralBlog written by our founder Igor Beuker, who announced, after his subscription to MyFootballclub.co.uk, that he proudly became, along with 50,000 other fans, the club owner of Ebbsfleet United. But guess what Igor! Mexico Second division club Murcielagos takes it even further! The club has no coach; instead…. the team is fully managed by its fans!

Top 10 Social Media Blogs: The 2012 Winners!

In December 2011 we found out that ViralBlog was nominated to Top 10 Social Media Blogs 2012 at Social Media Examiner. Earlier this month we were among the Top 20 Finalists and waited impatiently for the results. On the 30th of January the winners were announced, and guess what?! Thanks to you we made it!

Why CMOs Will Focus On Social Media Metrics?

In 2012 CMOs will focus more on social media metrics, says eMarketer. We do believe that content is king, distribution is queen but metrics is the emperor… The eMarketer study shows that CMOs were focusing on soft metrics in 2011, and feel they can’t gauge ROI.

Sign Of The Times: Zeitgeist By Slideshare

SlideShare is an active and engaging community where people post their thoughts on marketing, business, best practice or anything the community wants. In the above SlideShare presentation they give an overview of 2011 and analyse and share their summary. Below a short recap of this presentation and insights that struck me the most.

The Next Social Wave Of 2012: Pinterest

Pinterest, a social visual network that was launched back in March 2010. While the site is still invite-only it’s been very popular among their 4 million users logging 421 million page views, according to The Next Web. Of course Pinterest isn’t on par with smashing numbers like 800 million Facebook users or 465 million Twitter users. The invite-only system is keeping the Pinterest eco-system small for the time being, but is it ready to fully open their doors to the public in 2012?

Viral Friday: Matthew’s Day Off

A weekly viral video chart of ViralBlog, showing the 5 most popular viral videos, commercials, games or user-generated videos, carefully selected and ranked by popularity, viral impact & spread.

Mobile Gaming: State Of The European Market

The Mobile Gaming is still growing, not only in the USA but also on the “Old” continent, Europe. This comes hand in hand with the increasing penetration of smart-phones and Mobile Media. These are the findings from comScore‘s report Mobile Gaming: State of the European Market, having a deep look on the details how Europeans use their smart-phones.

KLM’s Meet & Seat Social Seating Is Live

Last year we told you that KLM would launch its social seating service in 2012. Well, Meet & Seat is live now. Facebook and LinkedIn users can now meet interesting passengers on their flight. Check the video below… What is Meet & Seat? Our industry tends to call it social seating. As seen at i.e. TicketMaster before.

In the above SlideShare presentation they give an overview of 2011 and analyse and share their summary. Below a short recap of this presentation and insights that struck me the most.

To start off with what struck me the most is that even though women are the most active in communities and on social channels; on slideshare the men seem to be posting the majority of content.  Probably due to the reason that men use it work related and this is endorsed by the most popular keywords: business, marketing, design, research, internet etcetera.

My thought on this is that this will change over time; I really believe that woman will dominate the marketing industry eventually. Men used to have the buying power, so advertising was aimed at men… but think about it: who has the most spending power and which group has the highest engagement levels…?

When we take a look at the globe, people do not really think the Dutch as a force necessarily to be reckoned with: however the Dutch rank the highest (I mean a global #1 position) on Twitter and within SlideShare they have the 3^rd place in the highest usage of slides (US is nowhere to be found). These Dutchies have always been known for their innovation, knowledge, mercantilism and their…horticulture

Thanks to SlideShare and their active community we can gain insights into marketing, development, learn how to do stuff and get a grasp of the vision people have on the world.

Here the most popular business presentation on slideshare:

 
SlideShare increases traffic to your site, offers you a possibility to include a clear call to action that provides you with HOT leads and just as important; gives you the opportunity to position yourself as an authority in your field.

Inspiring, informing and activating business professionals over the world.

Are you sharing your slides?

Last week on ViralBlog among others “Measuring The Business Impact Of Social Media”, “How Should CMOs Change The Communication?” and “Retail Trends 2012: Bricks Perish, Screens Profit”.

Top 25 Stories On ViralBlog In 2011

It was a busy year in the social media space and tech. Google+; new iPad, Facebook launched Timeline, Twitter with a new design for users and  brand pages and embeddable tweets and much much more. Impossible to name them all. And as there were more than 300 articles on ViralBlog in 2011, we bring you bring you the top 25 that you simply have to read…

Crash Corsage – ‘Til Death Do Us Party’

Remember The Wedding Crashers with Vince Vaughn and Owen Wilson back in 2005? Did you enjoy how they sneaked into weddings to take advantage of the romantic tinge in the air? Well in 2012, there will be an app for that!

How Should CMOs Change The Communication?

Your company has a Facebook fan page, maybe a Twitter account and thinking about joining Google+ as your competitors do the same and it’s on your “To Do List” for upcoming months in 2012. Hire a few community managers and maybe a consultant, all done and working! Or it may not be so as the social networks are maturing and also the users. How should CMOs change the way they communicate?

Retail Trends 2012: Bricks Perish, Screens Profit

The retail trend for brick and mortar stores in Holland are pitch black. 30% of the stores might have disappeared from the streets before end 2015. The empty square meters will go from 2 million to 8 million. Screen and Social Commerce will grow massively. Let’s take a deeper dive, into PSFK Future of Retail…

5 Mobile Trends For 2012

Always on, connected 365 days a year. Consuming information where, with who and when you want it. Making decisions to go where you want or to buy what you want; on the spot. Finding out what is happening around you and connecting with your friends 24/7.

Viral Friday: Volkswagen Game – The Bark Side

A weekly viral video chart of ViralBlog, showing the 5 most popular viral videos, commercials, games or user-generated videos, carefully selected and ranked by popularity, viral impact & spread.

Virality Lessons From Facebook Scammers

Have you ever looked at your Facebook news-feed and almost clicked on a link, realizing at the last second that it was just another Facebook scam? Or maybe you went all the way and clicked on the scam. Although they are annoying and their presence has been steadily decreasing, you can learn how to create a viral video, by taking a look at some of the more recent Facebook scams…

Measuring The Business Impact Of Social Media

ROI, CTR, engagement rate, fans increase,…Also the social media activities must be measured for analysis and details on the impact of your business. As more companies understand that social media is about long-term and strategic approach that goes hand-in-hand with other marketing channels, it’s no longer perceived as a single shot into the dark.

This is what consumers are doing at the moment and in the rate smartphones are being sold, it is almost inevitable that this will become the standard. Brands go where the people are; however they seem to be lagging when it comes to establishing their mobile strategies. So lets look at my top 5 mobile trends for the coming year…

The first three I will mention might be open doors, but not to be dismissed.

Location Based
Connect with your consumer when they are looking for a place to eat, where they can find a certain product or if they are looking for a good deal. Location Based marketing will enable brands to deliver your consumers a service in the context they require in that specific place and time. It is expected to grow to 1,4 billion users by 2012. You can target your audience in their context, their age, gender, where they are, what their personal preferences are and locking into their specific intention at that time. Send them on a scavenger hunt and reward them for their compliance and input.

Social Networking
This trend goes hand in hand with the previous; location based marketing. At this moment this is the fastest growing category on mobile phones. We have established that there is no use describing what kind of target groups use social media, more relevant is finding where we can pinpoint passion groups. People will be sharing what they are doing, how they are experiencing it and whether they endorse your product, service or event or not. It is likely to evolve to an infrastructure provider, turning into data warehouses and providing user data and access to consumers.

Mobile Search
Pulling your consumer through the marketing funnel is slightly different to pushing them; they will be influenced by their peers and in the consideration phase they will tap into the web to find the information they need. They will go online directly to look for better deals, they will actually do so even whilst talking to your sales rep. Search will empower your consumer to immediately buy tickets, make a reservation or to validate what they are told. Where do they land? I hope on your mobile site, your mobile site has another set-up than your regular site. They will dismiss your brand if you do not provide them with the information they need. If you do not have a mobile site… get one now!

My dad used to say; fix the roof when the sun shines. Now the sun is still shining, but due to the increasing market penetration of smartphones and the changing way consumers are taking in information, the first three trends are a must do.

For you that are already in tune with your consumers… have a look at the next two.

Object Recognition
We see a lot in a day and are encountered by things we find remarkable, interesting or compelling. A lot of these things are not tagged or we don’t know what they are, where to find it, how much it costs or where it can be bought. Thanks to great camera’s, 3G networks and Mobile search we can now create applications that recognize the things are surroundings in front of us. We can instantaneously tap into our needs, inspiring people to a whopping call to action.

Mobile Commerce and Mobile Payment
Though not evolved into a full extension of e-commerce, mobile commerce is a force to be reckoned with. Enabling consumers to immediately purchase the product or service they are interested in, is offering them full convenience and propelling them thought their decision making process.  Think of the conversion rates you can achieve… facilitate your consumer to do unpack offers, promotions and location based incentives. In order to get consumers on board, payment solution providers need to address ease-of-use for users and ease-of-implementation for customers without compromising security.

Convenience, customer experience and flawlessness are three keywords in making your mobile offering succeed. When is the last time you have used your mobile to check-in, share your status, search for information or to engage with your peers? Wouldn’t it be great if every brand or organization would offer you a good experience? …does your brand offer this experience?

Last week on ViralBlog among others “40 Smart Uses Of Social Video Metrics”, “IKEA: The Facebook Fan Sleepover” and “Apple & Google Bid For UK Football TV Rights?”.

Stop Pushing Pop-up Ads In My Face!

Remember those annoying pop-up ads when you visit a website? Most websites got rid of them in the last decade. Well in China it’s still being used on a widespread scale. In China online marketing is still mostly pushing banners in people’s faces. It’s so annoying that sometimes users cannot even click it away.

40 Smart Uses Of Social Video Metrics

Brands can still buy media, but attention can only be earned. That’s why CMOs will massively embrace social videos and video metrics in 2012, says eMarketer. So see below video and our list: 40 smart uses of social video metrics…

Anarchy – A Social Game By Axe Is Coming

A graphic novel from AXE? Yes and no. Axe will provide the sketches and users take active part in the story. At least that’s the plan.

IKEA: The Facebook Fan Sleepover

After a few years of just focussing on gaining as many likes, friends and followers, brands slowly start to realize that real fan engagement is far more important than just showing a big number. IKEA is such a brand that goes beyond ‘the Facebook Like’.

Viral Friday: Golden Loves Guitar !!

A weekly viral video chart of ViralBlog, showing the 5 most popular viral videos, commercials, games or user-generated videos, carefully selected and ranked by popularity, viral impact & spread.

Apple & Google Bid For UK Football TV Rights?

Insiders say that Apple and Google are likely to enter the auction for the Premier League football TV rights in the UK. Both tech companies could easily afford the amount. What are the odds? And what could be the impact…

Can You Copy Rebecca Black?

Seeing that virality is such a sought after prize among marketers, is it worth marketing your brand in a way that gets you a lot of criticism but attention at the same time, much like Rebecca Black?

If you’re already an established brand, making a video which people hate is not going to make upper management happy. However, if you’re an unknown, getting attention through a controversial video may very well be your only option. But can that attention translate into anything worthwhile, such as a fan base or sales? Yes.

Case in point. Rebecca Black. Mashable asserts that the amount of money made from YouTube and iTunes nets Rebecca and her producer $62,000.

That certainly isn’t a lot of money, but when you consider the fact that she’s been on Jay Leno, Good Morning America, and has a niche group of supporters who like her and her song, the viral video she made may very well launch a long and successful music career, assuming she perfects her music skills. She’s only 14 years old!

The people who don’t like her are the people who helped propel her to fame. At the same time, those haters exposed her to a group of people who genuinely like her and will support her despite all the criticism.

Can you copy Rebecca Black?

“Friday” was propelled by people who thought that the video was so bad that they shared it as a joke to their friends. That joke is now allowing Rebecca Black to make real money…

Can you create a joke that still gains you some followers? Take a look at this recent attempt by Shira MsMuffin.

I met Shira once, through a friend, a couple of months ago. I saw her in the recording studio and, to be honest, I didn’t think that her singing would amount to much in the way of Youtube views. She proved me wrong.

The aforementioned video now has amassed over 300,000 views in 10 days and has recently appeared on Tosh.O’s blog. I’ve listened to some of her other, less controversial, unreleased songs and they were more catchy and fun to listen to than Pound On My Muffin. I’ve heard marketing advice that you can’t reverse engineer viral YouTube videos.

They “just happen.” Pound On My Muffin does not have a million views, but it has the makings of one. This video was intended to go viral and it looks like it succeeded. Whether or not Shira MsMuffin stands to gain from it remains to be seen, but, fact is, if you want to copy Rebecca Black, you can.

Nickolay Lamm keeps track of the latest online scams at InventHelp Scam.

That’s why we wanted to share some examples, okay, well 40 examples, of actionable insights that CMOs could get from video tracking across the social web.

We are pretty sure this list will help CMOs to fuel their 2012 brand and business objectives…

The list with 40 smart uses of social video metrics, powerful videolytics and full social metrics:

1 Track your video views
2 Track your videos across 500+ video sharing portals
3 Measure your reach and engagement
4 Track Tweets of your video
5 Track Facebook shares of your video
6 Track comments of your video
7 Track ratings of your video
8 Learn about the creative power of your videos
9 Discover the long-tail effect of your videos
10 Discover your top viewing audiences by country
11 Measure the Costs Per View (CPV) of your videos
12 Measure your PR & Earned Media value
13 Discover what videos fly or die
14 Detect what videos your targets love and hate
15 Learn in what social hot spots your videos are embraced
16 Upload videos to multiple video sharing portals
17 Benchmark competitor videos against your own
18 Discover competitor video viewing peaks
19 Understand and measure competitor efforts
20 Discover social video shares of competitors
21 Enables you to track multiple videos for one campaign
22 Improve your creative power and future digital content strategies
23 Discover actionable insights and act upon them
24 Prove your natural seeding efforts with extreme low costs per contact
25 Measure free PR, Share of Voice (SoV) and earned media value
26 Save time with instant access to all external data
27 Manage information together in one (branded) dashboard
28 Measure videos at millions of blogs
29 Export video metrics data to Excel and PDF
30 Discover which video portals are important outside YouTube
31 Track videos of your brand ambassadors
32 Measure multiple campaigns at the same time
33 Review results from specific dates
34 Compare video results next to the overall campaign result
35 Discover when a video views start to drop
36 Learn about Strategic Social Seeding
37 Discover the power of the Owned – Earned- Paid value chain
38 Discover that content is king
39 Discover that distribution is queen
40 Discover why metrics is the emperor

We hope this list was useful to you. If so, please share this article with relevant peers.

And we would love to learn what other needs you have in the field of social video metrics. Please share them in the comments below.

Source: ViralTracker

Last week on ViralBlog among others “China’s Social Media Revolution”, “How to Buy Social Media Snake Oil” and “Facebook 2012: Placing Ads In User News Feeds”.

Non-Linear Media And Advertising Changes

The Internet has changed media and entertainment in ways that we are only now beginning to understand. The linear, or broadcast, model of content delivery is rapidly coming to a close as people switch from devices, media types and sources dozens of times per day.

Facebook 2012: Placing Ads In User News Feeds

Facebook will feature its Sponsored Story ads in users’ News Feeds per January 2012. This will greatly increase brand presence in Facebook. Mark and the rest of his gang did not meet their 2011 revenue targets and will have to show new revenues before Facebook’s expected IPO.

Putting The “Social” Back Into Network

Checking up on what closest friends are doing and getting into contact with family abroad that’s why some pick Facebook as primary social network. As a broadcasting platform and to keep up to speed with the thoughts of great minds, here goes Twitter. But both these platforms are loosing their playful charm, as they are turning into powerful marketing platforms. Now let’s meet Path…

China’s Social Media Revolution

Chinese citizens have clearly massively embraced the internet and the social web – with 500 million internet users! Even more stunning, a quarter of all global social network users are Chinese…

Viral Friday: Top 11 Virals Of 2011

A weekly viral video chart of ViralBlog, showing the 5 most popular viral videos, commercials, games or user-generated videos, carefully selected and ranked by popularity, viral impact & spread. This week we made a slight change and present you Top 11 Virals of 2011!

2011 In Social Media – What’s In And Out

With 2011 over, it’s time for a recap, what was In and Out this year, what really mattered in the field of Social Media. Have a look on two reflections of 2011 in two infographics - What Mattered In 2011 For Social Media and Out With The Old, In With The New.

How to Buy Social Media Snake Oil

3,000 Facebook Fans! 5,000 Twitter Followers! Engage in conversation! Sound good, right? Wrong. Too many businesses are being duped by social media “experts” who promise brand building and more relationships. Words like relationships and trust make many people feel warm and fuzzy inside.

Wrong.

Too many businesses are being duped by social media “experts” who promise brand building and more relationships. Words like relationships and trust make many people feel warm and fuzzy inside.

Couple that with everybody talking about Facebook and Twitter and you have marketing budgets opening their wallets wide for advice from social media consultants.

Social media is essentially another form of networking and consultants help their clients build platforms from which they can communicate. Things like trust and reputation are impossible to measure, yet they are the very things that social media experts peddle.

Although many like to place the blame on social media failures on the consultants who recommended them, whether or not you are buying social media snake oil depends as much on you as it does who you hire. Here are the top ways to buy social media snake oil…

Using Social Media When You Don’t Need It

What is your target market? Are any of them even using Facebook? And even if they are, are your marketing dollars better used elsewhere? For example, let’s say you’re a nursing home and your target market consists of senior citizens in your hometown.

Seeing that only 11% of Facebook users are 55 an over, your marketing resources are better spent away from the social media world. Rather than spending money acquiring Facebook followers, spend time acquiring leads through hospitals.

Believing that Only Social Media Will Lead You to Success

Social media is like a mascot to your business. Sure, people will appreciate the friendly gesture and like you little better, but if you aren’t getting customers via traditional marketing methods or if your core business isn’t that good, no amount of social media will save you.

Your social media strategies can be combined with traditional forms of marketing. For example, if you’re running a TV commercial, advertise the fact that you are on Facebook. If you have a website, make sure to link to your social media channels.

Hire Social Media Experts Who Only Talk About Number of Followers

No social media consultant can guarantee you sales. However, a social media consultant has to consult you in the right direction and not just talk about the amount of LinkedIn, Twitter, or Facebook followers. What separates the social media snake oil salesmen from the true professionals is their willingness to match your company’s target market to what’s possible with social media.

Not Taking ROI Into Account

Social media services get a lot of flak for completely avoiding the subject of sales and ROI. If a Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, or Youtube consultant completely avoids the subject of sales, ROI, and leads, you are dealing with someone who is concerned about their own bottom line and not yours.

A good consultant creates campaigns which aim to affect the aforementioned variables, albeit with no guarantee of success.

Look for a consultant to tailor a social marketing program based on your unique situation. For example, if you’re a local violinist trying to sell violin classes, a good strategy would be to get targeted traffic from Google Places and AdWords to your website, which would have a link to your Facebook page, showcasing your expertise and experience.

A bad strategy would be to get as many Facebook fans as possible, whether or not those fans have the slightest interest in violin lessons in your local area.

Google Places and AdWords may be out of the expertise of the social media expert, which is why the creation of a professional looking Facebook fan page is all the consultant can provide. Any more Facebook fans or Twitter followers would just be a waste of money.

Nickolay Lamm keeps track of the latest online scams at InventHelp Scam Watch.